I understand your frustration, but I do it, but I remove my application within a day or two. It is the only way to reach out to a pet owner who is in my perfect location/s. There is no other way to contact an owner unless I’ve already applied for a sit before. I am pretty certain that if someone read our profile they would consider us for future sits, given there will be a real reason for us visiting that specific location (ie family). But I’ve had a great response from those I’ve reached out to, and ended up discussing future sit dates that aren’t advertised. We only do it with places that we return to over and over again, where a pet owner may have liked us to return time after time.
I would say it would depend if they are reaching out purely to get ‘anything’ (in which case just reject their application) or whether their particular advert in their particular location had a real significance for the sitter.
But I totally understand your frustration.