Choosing a sitter - single or couple?

This is always a question for me. So far we have used all single sitters. It’s a very small house, and the bed is a double - we know most people these days are used to queen or larger! However, I worry about a single person feeling lonely, especially many of our sits are over the Christmas holidays. Any insights?

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Lots of single sitters on here love being exactly that. Single. And free and flexible. I wouldn’t worry too much TBH @AKSing - maybe just say you would welcome a single person or a couple into your home and mention the bed size and that you’re in a small house. If the pets are used to a couple then that sometimes makes a difference too. They can read the listing and make their own minds up. Good on you for thinking about it :star_struck:

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I’ve had sitters here alone for one to three months and worried the same, but each one reassured me that they enjoyed their time alone. Many people dont celebrate the holidays and would be glad for quiet time alone with animals. Some of my single sitters had friends nearby to visit with, or just enjoyed spending an hour at a local coffee shop. All you can really do is trust that the sitter knows themselves and their social requirements.

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I love being alone and wouldn’t travel any other way. Christmas doesn’t mean much anymore since my child became an adult and the magic changed. Have done numerous long sits from one month to six months and rarely felt lonely. Sometimes you can be with lots of people but still feel lonely. Have been alone and on the road for four years now and sometimes I do get “lonely” but after spending time with people, it quickly returns to “being alone” :wink: Good quote I read recently…

“Being alone is actually just a state; it means that you are not with other people. Loneliness is an emotion, which describes a feeling of sadness attributed to not having connection”.

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@AKSing I’m a solo sitter, currently on a 3-week sit in a different country to my home. I’m not alone - I have a four-legged housemate who is near me or has me within his view almost all of the time. :paw_prints: We spend most of our day together and I talk more to him than I do when I’m with other humans.

My next sit is again for three weeks, over the Christmas and New Year holidays. I’m not one to enjoy the holiday season anyway, in part because I don’t have family but also I don’t like big gatherings.

Thank you for being considerate and caring, but if someone applies, hopefully they’ve already decided that it sounds like a fit for them. Sitters come in 1001 varieties. :slightly_smiling_face:

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For me, there is not that much difference between being by myself at home here and being on a sit.

Last Christmas I was in Brussels, with two dogs for company. That was nice, newly retired. After that I spent New Year staying with friends in Rotterdam, which was very nice.

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We solo sitters like doing our own thing. We’re rarely lonely. Don’t worry!

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As a HO, after I post a sit, I wait for applicants. My apartment isn’t big, but it’s big enough for my spouse, the pets, and me, so it is big enough for a couple, but honestly, I don’t filter applicants as single or couples. I look at experience, specific pet (cat) experience, and other stuff that may influence my decision like whether or not they’ll already be in town when the sit starts or would be .in specifically for the sit.

As a sitter, I’ve sat solo and with my spouse. It’s easier with a spouse. Mine is great at taking heavy packages up the stairs, and he’s my personal chauffeur. In multi-cat homes it’s great to have another person in case one cat needs to be distracted while the other gets some needed attention.

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We‘ve invited both, single sitters and couples.
If our cats were young and completely healthy we wouldn’t have a preference. But for our two seniors, who need medication regularly it’s not very easy to find a replacement in case the sitters had to leave (family emergency or similar), there would still be one more person to stay longer and make sure someone, who takes over knows everything there’s to do and watch out for.

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I would have thought there would be plenty of single sitters on here that would love to escape for Christmas to be alone.

We sit as a couple, and like small houses, in fact, we often choose smaller places in between larger houses, simply due to the reduced cleaning time in comparison to a larger house and reduced gardening tasks too. It means we can clean everywhere in the fraction of the time, so perfect!

You don’t need a queen or larger, as long as your profile says it is a double bed then it is totally fine. We don’t ‘expect’ anything larger. Remember, you aren’t offering holiday accommodation, you are simple exchanging your home for someone who loves pets & wants to be in your location for a while.

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It sounds that you are choosing single sitters only because you think the double bed might be too small. I think you should let them decide that! So long as it’s clear in the listing, then the information is there for them to decide.

My only suggestion is to add the actual width of the bed - single/double/queen/king/superking etc mean different things in different parts of the world. In the UK, a double bed is 4’6" wide.

(The bed in my spare room is a UK ‘small double’, ie, 4ft/120cm wide. It’s clearly noted in my listing that it is too small for two people. I still get couples apply so I check they realise the size of the spare bed - it’s usually quite clear they havent read that bit :smiley: but generally they say they arent bothered.)

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See who applies. Not everyone is that into Christmas. Some solo sitters might be visiting family or friends where you are, but prefer sitting to staying on someone’s couch.

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Many of the home owners are also not into Christmas, that’s why many of them travel over the holidays. Not all of them visit family for Christmas celebrations. One simply has to find a sitter, who either isn’t into it as well or a couple who don’t need to celebrate at home :wink:

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