Hi!
I have the feeling that it is hard to find a sitter this year. Is inflation to blame?
I would say inflation would make it easier to find pet sitters. The cost of accommodation is negligible.
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Hello @Kristina
I would like to answer this from a sitter’s perspective as my husband and I have been discussing this also.
From our point of view and we are currently based in the USA, flights have got more expensive and we have found that there tend to be longer layovers on some flights making it logistically hard as well.
Plus when we attend sits by car we consider the gas cost, driving time to get there (we work remotely so have to make sure we can get online when travelling) and any hotel costs on route.
I think that it has always been this way as everyone always weighs up these costs when housesitting, travel etc. But we have noticed an increase in some areas. We do also factor in that we are saving on accommodation as well.
That said we have found some cheaper flights and luckily have some airmiles, we have done lots of sits in neighbouring states which we have never explored before. So there are still lots of opportunities out there and sitters still very much wanting to housesit - us included!
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This also might be an interesting topic to read as it touches on some similar points:
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Not sure it’s inflation, if anything as @ElsieDownie said, that’s probably encouraging people to sit more, budget better and save as they do. It seems that there are generally just more sits than sitters in the UK & USA which is a huge percentage of the whole THS membership. That’s an educated guess rather than fact.
Hi @Kristina - what is it that makes you think it is hard to find a sitter this year?
If it is your own personal experience, please link your listing to your group profile then members of the group can take a look and see if they have any ideas on how you can improve your listing.
If it is just because you are seeing more people posting that they are finding it hard to find a sitter that will simply be that the number of members in the group is constantly growing so there are far more members posting this year than there were last year
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I live in Germany, Europe. Here it often takes a long time to find a sitter. Sometimes you don’t find anyone. Ads are online for a very long time. Only big cities like Berlin or Amsterdam are in high demand. Of course it’s my personal impression.
We live in Northern Germany in the country. Last year I got applications for sits shortly after loading up the dates. Even though we had one sitter cancellation last summer, it hadn’t been a problem to find another sitter.
This year I only got three applications for our Easter holiday and one for our holiday in May, none so far for the time in July. I got the impression there are less applications than last year. But I also can imagine that spending your time in a city like Berlin or Hamburg is more attractive than being in the country without public transport nearby, especially for young folks.
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We personally do house sits in the country only if a car is also provided. There is no other way to explore the area or simply shop. Sometimes we rent a car if it fits into our plans. Maybe think about to offer your car to the sitters…
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In fact I do offer my car to sitters, unless I need it myself to go away, of course, which won’tbe the case this year. So far all sitters had their own car with them or simply didn’t need one.
So this can’t really be the problem and obviously wasn’t last year, as I had plenty of applications. Even for Easter we got applications but since then they stopped like someone cut off the line.
I would uncheck „sitters need a car“ and check „car included“.
Hi @Kristina. I agree with @Colin. There are lots more folks posting this year, and it feels like more people are posting / looking for sits later than used to be the case.
If you’d like, the members of the forum can take a look at your listing and provide you with ideas of ways you might make your listing more enticing to sitters. Here’s how to do that.
If you have a sit in a less dense or rural area, those probably were in greater demand when the pandemic was seen as a greater danger. People have since ventured strongly into cities.
Also, there were more sitters who could work remotely. Sightseeing isn’t necessarily a factor for such folks. But since the pandemic has eased, various companies are forcing employees back to offices. That means declining supply of sitters vs. increased demand as more HOs travel.
Inflation is certainly a concern to various folks, but that’s something that can be helped by posting sits early, to some degree. And not everyone pays out of pocket to travel — some people use hotel and airline points.
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