As a home owner, you still want the freedom to travel around the world, without any worries about the state of your house. As pet owners, our furry friends cannot always accompany us on our travels. Of course, you can find someone to look after your pet or bring them to an animal hotel. However, in my personal experience, I think it is best when your pets stay at home in their own environment. But who will do the house sitting and pet sitting for you? Where do you find trusted house sitters to look after your most valuable possessions?
This guide is to help you navigate everything to do with finding responsible house sitters and pet sitters. I now have 2 years of experience with finding trusted house sitters to look after my house and my fluffy friends!
This post contains affiliate links. When you use the link, you’ll receive 20% discount on your subscription to the house sitting site I use myself and so will I. Win win for everyone but I wouldn’t promote the services if I didn’t believe in them myself.
Why you need house sitters to look after your house?
Some people leave their house for their vacation and not worry about finding trusted house sitters. I did this for numerous trips when I didn’t have any animals to look after and didn’t have my own house. Since 2 years I’m a home owner and I love my house. But the house is old and has many quirky things. In winter times, I’d like someone to check on the state of the house because I worry about the cold.
When I travelled for a longer period of time, I worried that people would notice I wasn’t home and might try to break into my house. Having someone to open the curtains every day shows the house is occupied and this gave me much peace of mind! Ever since I first put up my house for house sitting, I knew this was the solution for me!
Why reliable house sitters are so important?
House sitting and pet sitting is a relatively new concept. When I told people around me, I put my home up for house sitting, the first reaction were: “I’d never let a stranger into my house!” Questions concerned the safety of house sitting, your privacy and the people who would do the house sitting.
I never worried too much about this. I’m not concerned the house sitter will steal my stuff. Or go through my things. I don’t even care the house sitter will sleep in my bed. Why? Because I know I have found the most trusted house sitters!
Who can be your trusted house sitters?
Anyone can basically do the house sitting and pet sitting for you. You can ask a friend, a neighbour or a colleague. Heck! You can even ask a stranger! Anybody you trust your home to when you are traveling the world. Anyone who you find suitable to look after your animals when you are on a business trip.
How do I know if I can trust my house sitters with my home?
To put it bluntly: you don’t. Trust is a flexible word and trust can have a different meaning for you than it has to me. But here are some pointers to look for when choosing trusted house sitters to house sit your home:
- Does the house sitter provide information freely, without you asking for it? Someone who can easily share information has not much to hide.
- Can the house sitters provide you with any references from previous house sitting jobs?
- Do the pet sitters have any experience with pet sitting? A cat person can have experience cat sitting but is a different person than a dog person.
- Do the house sitters share information about what they plan to do while sitting your house? Will they work from home or will they want to meet up with friends in the area?
- Does the house sitter ask questions about the house and the animals? This shows they are engaged in the job of becoming your house sitter!
Read more: Tips on getting your first house sitting job.
Obviously, too many detailed questions or an insecure attitude might be signals that put you off. As with all trust issues, to find trusted house sitters you need to rely on your own feelings.
So where do I find trusted house sitters to look after my house?
Do you need to travel soon and you don’t want to leave your home unattended? You don’t want to leave your pets alone but you have to go out of town? Than putting your house up for house sitting might be just the right move for you! For me, it allows me to travel more without worries about my home and animals.
But where do you find reliable house sitters, you ask?
If you cannot find any people you know to be your house sitters, you can always go online and search your trusted house sitters on the internet. That is what I did and I’m very pleased with the services my house sitting website offer and how easy it is to find house sitters and pet sitters.
Trusted House Sitters
I went online and made a profile with trustedhousesitters.com. It is all in a name isn’t it? The advantages are it is global, you can ask for references and verification and there are many potential house sitters to choose from. Each house sitter has to provide ID verification and the site does back ground checks for you.
When I first put my house and animals up for house sitting on the website, I got 87 responses in 3 days! I went through all the applications and picked a house sitter that looked trustworthy, sounded engaged and was responsible! Now that is someone I’d trust my house and pet to!
Do you want to find house sitters you can trust to look after your home and pets? Do you want to join the house sitters community? Unfortunately, the service is not free, but I have a 20% discount code for you to use. Check out the rates to sign up to the website and choose from hundreds of trusted house sitters!
I want the 20% discount !!
Have you ever used house sitters to look after your home? Are you a house sitter? Please share your experiences in the comment section below!
I have had good and bad experiences with trustedhousesitters. One thing that rubbed me the wrong way was how they changed the number of stars (increased them) I assigned to one sitter.
that is not cool Caroline. I’m sorry you didn’t have such a good experience with the rating system. I did not have the same experience as you so I can only speak from my own experiences.
I absolutely love Trusted House Sitters. I have two dachshunds that don’t do well when boarded (plus boarding is expensive). I met wonderful people through Trusted House Sitters and they always took wonderful care of my dogs and my home.
Thanks for the great post. I’m in the process of purchasing a property. I plan to continue traveling and your article gives me lots of good ideas. Thanks!
Your bunnies are so cute! We live in an apartment right now, but I’ve been a house sitter for someone else before. It’s a great gig once you build a trust relationship!
I had read posts about housesitting from the point of view of the house sitter, so it’s interesting to see it from the point of view of the house owner. It is definitely a great concept and a win win for both parts.
I agree that there are no rules to know if you can trust someone, you have to chose based on your intuition. I haven’t done housesitting but I’ve used couchsurfing and by reading the profiles you can tell most of the time if the person is to be trusted.
I don’t own a house but I can imagine that a good house sitter is important. Thanks for sharing all the tipps!
I love your tips on questions to ask potential housesitters when vetting them. I’ve never done houseswapping before because of many of the same concerns you mentioned, i.e. how do I know they can be trusted, will my privacy be invaded, etc. but might give it a try one day! Thanks for sharing.
I have been thinking about house sitting for a while, would you recommend it as a traveller?! I hear it is hard to get your first house sitting job but may have a look into it!
I’m kind of paranoid so I’d be scared to leave my house with a housesitter I don’t know. A friend or family member would be great though but mine don’t live near enough. When travelling I normally just switch my house alarm on. It’s linked to a security service. I also have lights that switch on automatically at night.
Never thought about using a housesitter before! We usually just lock up and hope for the best!! Thank goodness nothing has happened :/
This is such a great idea! I don’t have a pet or a house but would love to look into being a house sitter. I’ll have to check out the website!
I have always used people that I know for house sitters, I am still a bit nervous about a stranger in my home taking care of my pets. Going with a service is appealing, especially with such a response rate so you can review applications.
We have looked into house sitting as we travel around Europe, and Trusted HouseSitters specifically. It’s a great way for travelers to reduce costs. And it’s such a nice way to be able to leave your house and pets for a bit to travel. I like that there is a background check so you can feel a little safer.
I always use a housesitter when I go away. Luckily I have a friend who is willing to stay and look after my house and my two cats! I however have bookmarked this for the times he is not available. Nice post!
Those are some great tips. I know about many of my friends who are looking for such candidates. In fact I am baby sitting for a friend’s dog in the next week. He is going on a vacation to Goa, India.
House sitting is always something I’ve been interested in but never really read into. I’m sure I’d get pretty close to the pets in the time I sitted the house, although I’d be nervous at first if they didn’t eat or behave or something. Thanks for the info, house sitting is becoming more of a possibility now!
I haven’t used a housesitter before, but I can definitely see the value in using a service like this!
We have not tried this yet, but we definitely do think about it. We moved abroad with our two dogs. They are our first kids, a big part of our family. Something just wasn’t right for us, to leave them behind. But, now that we are here…it gets really tough to do all the stuff we want to do without leaving them home alone. We have used a trusted friend on occasion, but we have never felt comfortable with an online. It’s good to know that you’ve had a great experience with this, and it might be something we seriously consider in the future.
I’m signed up with Trusted Housesitters and have had some fabulous gigs through them. I also manage to pick up quite a few local sits when I’m in a new neighborhood. I always make sure to slip into conversations with new people and let them know that I’m available for house sits. It’s amazing how fast word spreads and opportunistic sits pop up. ~~ Jay @BirdsOAFpress
We really want to find somewhere to house sit for when we’re in South America later this year. Do you have any tips on how to secure a house sit as a sitter?
I first started using house sitting when I went to South America, what a coincidence Sam! I suggest to sign up with a few housesitting websites (like the one mentioned in the article) and follow my tips on how to get your first house sitting job http://probearoundtheglobe.com/how-to-land-your-first-housesitting-job/
Those bunnies are so cute!! No wonder you want someone you can really trust to look after them.
Thanks for the tips! Your fluffies are so cute. We always struggle to find good housesitters when we travel.