EURO 2008 INFO

You're welcome at the Hulligers for the Euro 2008 soccer championships.

``You don't have to bring anything in return, although a bottle of wine would be nice,'' says Katrin Hulliger, a graphic designer from Dotzigen, Switzerland, who is opening her family's home to foreign soccer fans for the June 7-29 tournament the country is co-hosting with Austria.

As hotels raise prices to profit from the 240,000 visitors who will visit Switzerland during the event, some residents are offering rooms at no charge. About 20 percent of the 9,500 beds listed on the Sleep-in.ch Web site are free, said Patrick Tschan, who runs the site that helps fans find places to stay.

``A lot of people don't want money,'' said Tschan, a public relations consultant from Basel who started the service with a friend to counter negative publicity about possible security risks and hooliganism. ``They want to have good friendships, good parties.''

The good Samaritans will help blunt the financial hit for soccer fans visiting Switzerland, where an eight-day tournament rail-pass costs the equivalent of $331 and the average one-star hotel costs $94 a night.

Zurich and Geneva, which are hosting games along with Bern and Basel, are among the world's 10 most expensive cities, Mercer Human Resource Consulting LLC said in a June report.

Hulliger, who lives with her husband and two sons, ages 5 and 6, says she wants to share her home with foreigners to get more out of Euro 2008, a quadrennial competition between 16 European national teams.

No Worries

She isn't worried about guests becoming troublesome, citing her own experiences abroad. When Hulliger and her husband couldn't find a hotel room on a trip to the Greek island of Finikounda, a local family put them up.

``It feels natural to share our home,'' says Hulliger, 37. The family has invited ``friends and friends of friends'' to their home to watch tournament games on television ever since the 1996 event in England, she added.

Not all the Swiss are so accommodating. The tournament will generate $113 million in spending for hotels and guest houses, according to Ruschlikon, Switzerland-based researcher Rutter & Partner. Prices on sleep-in.ch go as high as $272 a night for a bed in a home near Stade de Geneva stadium, which hosts a match between Portugal and Turkey on the opening day of the tournament.

``We can't make people charge nothing,'' Tschan said. ``Most prices are reasonable.''

$542 a Night

Tschan set up sleep-in.ch with Roberto Greuter, an Internet technology developer, in March last year after hearing there was a shortage of hotel beds for Euro 2008.

``Everyone was talking about negative things like hooliganism and security, and we were more interested in friendship,'' said Tschan, whose Web site uses the slogan ``fair play'' and sports a picture of a referee holding a disciplinary red card shaped like a heart.

A similar house-sharing site, gastfamilien.net, is run by the city of Basel, which expects 30,000 visitors on match days -- more than triple the number of available hotel beds, said tourism board spokesman Rafael Wyniger. Switzerland opens the tournament against the Czech Republic on June 7 in Basel's St. Jakob-Park.

Some Swiss hotels plan to increase prices in June as demand outstrips supply. The Basel Hilton is charging $542 a night for its cheapest available room in the second week of Euro 2008, 50 percent more than in July, according to prices listed on the hotel's Web site.

Hilton Hotels Corp. rates fluctuate depending on expected demand, and there are price increases during big events like Euro 2008, said spokesman Iain Wearmouth.

Father and Son

Michael Frey, a Microsoft Corp. technical consultant, is helping out in Basel by offering a spare room in his wood-paneled home for free.

``It would be nice to help poorer folks who wouldn't otherwise be able to come,'' said Frey, 34. ``I'm not in desperate need of the money.''

Niggi Weissen, an insurance company worker in Basel, said he'd ideally like a father and young son to stay in the two- bedroom apartment he and his girlfriend are offering free of charge, even though they pay $2,000 a month rent.

``Coming to Euro 2008 would be a dream for them,'' Weissen, 28, said.