The man exchanged homes with the stranger but was stunned after learning his true identity.
Home exchanges have long been an unconventional way to take a break. But when Simon Sanders and Mark Sallin swapped homes—without knowing each other—they stumbled upon something unexpected and beautiful, reports METRO. The two connected through the Home Exchange program, where Sallin had sent out multiple requests before Sanders responded. When the families finally met in London, none of them could have predicted how much their lives would change.
This life-changing event occurred in 2014. After the swap, Sallin noticed that Sanders had many of his late father’s mannerisms. At first, he brushed it off as a coincidence. Sallin admitted he never expected more from the swap than an affordable getaway. “When we arrived, there were many idiosyncrasies that reminded me of my dad... We said our thank yous at the end, and that was that,” he told Ireland Live.
Fate had different plans and Sallin found in his email the picture of his family tree from Sanders. He mentioned that he was showing his son the family tree when he came across something familiar. “We followed across from my grandfather Emmanuel to his brother Bertie through male descendants and ended up with Mark Sallin who married Helen Bishop. I thought, I recognized those names, and looking into it and back at my emails realized that these two are surely you two! Seems a jolly good reason to get in touch again – thought you would be as amazed as I was!” Sanders wrote in his email.
Turns out, both men shared the same great-grandfather, Louis Salinsky. After the World War, their great-grandfather’s surname “Salinsky” was anglicized to “Sanders” and “Sallin” respectively. The picture of their family tree revealed that the duo were indeed second cousins and go way back. From simply swapping homes in formal and professional contracts to discovering a familial bond, the duo has come a long way. Revealing how the men felt about finding their common root, Sallin exclaimed that it was a “one in a million or a one in a 50 million chance” that something this astounding should unfold.
“Sometimes it might be your fourth or fifth cousin, but we were next to each other on the family tree. We might have never found it – it’s just the fact that I’ve got an unusual second name that he spotted. It’s just mad,” Sallin mentioned. Sanders added, “I was surprised, but in a way, not shocked because it all seemed to make sense having met them – I felt immediately at home and comfortable doing the home swap with them.” What followed was catching up on all the years they missed being with each other.
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