House sitter experiences?

[bearkeley]

We are currently staying at a nice Villa in a winery in Australia’s Hunter Valley. We will be staying in Air BnBs for the next two weeks before we hop on a campervan for a month in New Zealand then 6 weeks of diving in the Philippines. A week ago, we completed our 5 week house sitting assignment in Brisbane. It’s our fourth trip to Australia. We travel 5-7 months a year....Housesitting really allows us a way to get to know a new area well, get our dog/cat ‘fix’ and save a lot in hotel and car fees. We love it!

 

[grasshopper]

Our pet sitter gets a full time job at the ponderosa. Had 2 wildfires within a two week period one less than a mile from the casa while in the Galapagos. Mr smarty pants dog was bitten by a bear, he bit the bear first, while we were kayaking the Sea of Cortez. One of our big tortoises went missing, and our sitter was really upset, it just had dug a new burrow, while we were in Italy.

Any takers?

 

[garyt]

Hahahah, i promise to not walk around in my boxers if i house sit for you

Me neither...I'm a nudist

 

[Teacher Terry]

We have never had a bad Experience but only hire good friends or my son does it. Nothing has ever been damaged or moved. If we take the dogs we just leave the house empty. I wouldn’t hire someone that I didn’t know very well.

 

[Rico]

We've had both great and awful experiences with people sitting one of our places while we're at the other.

The best, retired couple, friends of a neighbor. Fixed a whole bunch of stuff, and left a list of all that and other suggestions. Very nice.

The worst, won't go into it.

Now that our daughter is graduating high school, we plan to travel more. Thinking of selling the Maui house cuz of all the upkeep, either renting or buying a condo, unless we could find a reliable sitter. I'd love to get a "job" living 8-10 months sitting some of the mega-mansions out here that are inhabited by the owner about 2 months of the year.

Btw, should sitters be paid or should they be paying you for rent/utilities?

It's a valid question, gcgang.

The concept with housecarers is that rent=pet care services provided. There's no exchange of money whatsoever, only free accommodations for the sitter in exchange for pet care services provided.

As for utilities, it's never been an issue for me so far, since the pets would need to remain cool or warm in their home environment anyway. Incremental costs for using cooking facilities, water, electricity is somewhat minimal and normally all parties agree that the pet sitter is not expected to contribute extra toward those expenses.

It doesn't work for everybody, but overall it's often a win/win for most, with very little downside. Vetting applicants is a process that takes some time, trust and gut instinct on the part of the pet/home owner. But my experience has been that the number of applicants is usually robust for most requests for help. So there are lots of potential sitters to review and choose from or respectfully decline as warranted. Historical reviews of sitters are also made public on the site. Further verification of credentials and/or background checks can be requested as part of the process.

 

[simple girl]

We've used housecarers.com and trustedhousesitters.com on both sides of the equation - both as a homeowner and as a sitter. We LOVE it!!! The trustedhousitters site is my favorite because I am able to receive reviews directly on the site, thereby building our sitting "resume". I also can go read reviews left by homeowners for other sitters, which gives me insight into their personality. There are certain homeowners you do NOT want to sit for - had a bad experience once with a VERY particular and demanding homeowner. Otherwise, it has been a fabulous experience. You just have to do your due diligence on both sides.

We hope to do more and more sits after DH retires.

 

[eastnortheast]

We have a cousin and her husband who have used trusted house sitters to housesit for other people. (They are kind of nomadic and do not have a place of their own). They have had really great experiences in a variety of locations - from the Caribbean to Europe. Downside is you have to pay for your travel to get to where the house is.

However, they have accrued a number of very positive reviews, so generally do not have a problem in securing a place if it fits in with their timing and placement.

 

[Surewhitey]

We house & pet sit for many different people when living in Mexico. You really need to prove yourself to be considered for either. Once you have one good in the area, you can get a lot of opportunities if you want it.
We house sat for 3 months and it was great...

We'd do it again if we were to travel a lot again.

 

[Sunset]

This is a very interesting idea, being frugal it of course appeals to my nature to want to stay some place for no money in return for some easy work.

But, after reading some of the opportunities, I am more tempered in my view. Some folks simply want an employee to run their business for months on end while they are gone !
Actually this might not even be the case that they are gone, but simply brilliant. Imagine buy/lease a small B&B, and then get free employees to run it.

 

[simple girl]

This is a very interesting idea, being frugal it of course appeals to my nature to want to stay some place for no money in return for some easy work.

But, after reading some of the opportunities, I am more tempered in my view. Some folks simply want an employee to run their business for months on end while they are gone !
Actually this might not even be the case that they are gone, but simply brilliant. Imagine buy/lease a small B&B, and then get free employees to run it.

You do have to be smart about which housesits you apply for. Some of them are awful! But, if you screen the opportunities appropriately, it can be an amazing, wonderful experience for both parties.

 

[48Fire]

DH & I are recently ER'd and love to travel. Has anyone ever done house sitting as a way to spend time in desired travel destinations less expensively? How did it work out for you? And if you've used house sitters, what was your experience? Would welcome any thoughts on this.

We've had several house sitters over the past 20 years. We've had two, horrible experiences.

One was with a long-time, close friend that we trusted implicitly. The house sitter had a huge party. It was so large that our neighbor asked us if it was a graduation party for our daughter someone burned our master bathroom countertop. We found several beer caps scattered throughout the house. The table in our finished basement was covered with sticky, dried up orange juice, probably where they were preparing orange juice and vodky mixers. The worst part of the experience was when my wife confronted her, she denied everything and became belligerent.

The next worse was a person we hired from Rover. She was extremely odd, but she seemed to love our dog, and that's what matters most to my wife We used her for day-walks, then overnight a couple times, the finally for a week. She decided this was a good time to move her own puppy in The puppy peed all over the house, including the master bed. Several spots on the tile floor were just dried up and crusty.

We've discussed house sitting other places, so this is a timely and interesting thread to me. We recently spent 2 months essentially doing that at our daughter's house, including caring for our granddaughter. We may give this a try

 

[220volt]

We thought about doing this when we retire, but lately, we came to the conclusion that it might not be worth it. Basically what you’re gaining is only a free place to stay, but have to deal with someone else’s property and lives of their pets. No matter how careful and responsible you are, things can happen. And even if you don’t get blamed for it by the owners, deep down I would feel responsible and would have to live that. That is the responsibility I’m not sure I’m ready to trade for temporary free housing.

Besides, you can rent an apartment pretty much anywhere in Europe for 600-800 Euros and be completely worry-free and live like a local not have to worry about things breaking or pets getting sick or dying. That amount should not make much of a difference in your overall budget. Especially if you’re doing it for a month or two.

 

[Rianne]

Over a 10 yr. period, when we lived in Portage, MI, we were so fortunate to have university students I knew from my job. They were awesome with our black lab and later a yellow lab. We filled our frig with food they liked, encouraged them to have a few friends over (no big parties), we paid them well and trusted them completely. There were no issues and our house was always clean when we came home. Maybe they were worried because we worked together. I was more or less their supervisor and they liked their job.

I'm not sure I would have an in home sitter with someone I didn't know. Today, we take our love bug to a farm in a rural town. He likes it there and is excited to go.

 

[Fireup2020]

simple_girl and others who have used house sitting services (housecarers.com or trustedhouesitters.com) - do you have security cameras in common areas in your home? DH is VERY concerned about a stranger staying in our place, but we have hopes and plans to travel overseas or without the fur-kids for extended periods of time (2-8 weeks). Did you require the house sitter to get renters insurance?

 

[Teacher Terry]

I would never hire a stranger for my dogs as people lie about the time/care the dogs will receive.

 

[simple girl]

simple_girl and others who have used house sitting services (housecarers.com or trustedhouesitters.com) - do you have security cameras in common areas in your home? DH is VERY concerned about a stranger staying in our place, but we have hopes and plans to travel overseas or without the fur-kids for extended periods of time (2-8 weeks). Did you require the house sitter to get renters insurance?

We do not have security cameras inside or outside of our home, BUT, I think it is a great idea, especially for entering/leaving. This way you could tell if the sitters are staying with your pets a reasonable time and also if you have a dog they are walking that they are doing it regularly. In addition you could make sure that they are not bringing others into the home (except for those you have approved of, of course). If we still had pets and needed a sitter, I would get security cameras put on all doors and make sure the sitter was aware that we would be monitoring them from afar.

We lived in a townhome when we used sitters. We were close friends with our next door neighbors and made sure to introduce the sitter to them and make it be known that they would be keeping an eye on things (and also if they had any issues to contact our neighbor for help). We would periodically check with our neighbor who would let us know if the sitter was there as expected, doing anything unexpected, etc.

We also told our sitter we expected regular texts with pictures of our pet - this gave us a great feeling of security.

You can also lock off a room of your home with things you don't want disturbed if that is of concern to you. I made very sure all of our financial files were locked in a safe as well as any prescription drugs, etc. We don't have valuable items in our house, but if we did, I would store them in a locked area just to be extra safe.

I also did a very good job of screening via talking to the sitter's references and interviewing the potential sitter. We used Skype or something similar. Also, trusted housesitters has online references/reviews from past homeowners - I would use someone who has at least several good reviews. I would also ask to talk to at least a few of their references to make sure I wasn't missing something left unsaid in a review. In addition, you might want them to have the criminal background check service done via the Trusted Housesitter's service. We did this for potential homeowners to give them an extra feeling of security.

You can set up a contract with the sitter if that makes you feel better - we didn't - but I did consider it. You could ask for a bond as well; I've not done that but if a homeowner asked me I would consider it to give them peace of mind (depending on how much it was/how it works - haven't done that before). I don't know how renters insurance would work in this situation - you are afraid of being liable for something of theirs that gets destroyed?

There's always some unknown risk (so it's not for everyone), but I really like the trustedhousesitters site because homeowners can leave reviews of sitters, and likewise. Sitters are more likely to be on their best behavior if they want a good recommendation. One bad recommendation can tarnish your ability to sit from there on out. So that feature on their website helps me feel more secure.

 

[Sarah in SC]

What simple girl said...to a "t".
We've used house sitters and frankly, the strangers have been WAAAAY easier to deal with than "friends or friends-of-friends" that we've tried to have stay. With the exception of our long-term roommate, who was awesome, I'd say we've had better luck with the strangers!

If you look for older retired folks, you are unlikely to find ax murderers among the house-sitting sites. Or maybe we have been lucky, right, SG?

 

[simple girl]

What simple girl said...to a "t".
We've used house sitters and frankly, the strangers have been WAAAAY easier to deal with than "friends or friends-of-friends" that we've tried to have stay. With the exception of our long-term roommate, who was awesome, I'd say we've had better luck with the strangers!

If you look for older retired folks, you are unlikely to find ax murderers among the house-sitting sites. Or maybe we have been lucky, right, SG?

Agree on all counts!!!

So far, so good! Just do your due diligence. It isn't risk-free. But you can certainly do your best to manage and reduce the risk. It's been worth it to us. We get to travel AND our pets had someone there many more hours than a traditional pet sitter who came for 30 minutes a day.