Did you always plan to live a nomadic life?

Meet-ups & Travel
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Hello everyone!

Today, I’ve been wondering… for those of you who are on the road full-time, were you born a nomad, or did you grow into one? For those of you who aren’t on the road full-time… is this something you’d like to try in the future?

I’d love to hear what sparked your journey. Was there a moment that set you on your path? Share your story in the replies!

Looking forward to learning more about what inspired you to live the nomadic life! (and maybe gather some inspo for getting my driver’s license and a camper van!) :slight_smile:

Jenny

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International Sitting Advice Wanted
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No, when we signed up, we planned on sitting just now and again… then we did our first sit, loved it so much that we were sitting full-time within 3 months of starting, and have rarely been home since.

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I was born in a small village where the next village is considered ‘abroad’. My parents were born and met in that same village and still live there. I think my nomad-tendencies come from a simple “surely there must be more to life than this!” :smiley:

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I’ve told our story before, here is the updated version!……

I started work the day I left school in 1978, aged 15, and I retired in 2018, aged 56.

Karyo, (My husband), is 16 years younger than me. Thinking he was too young to retire, he continued to work full time, 50% of the time from home, 50% of the time in the office. This meant the amount of time we had to travel together was dictated by his work schedule, and I was getting itchy feet!

Then Covid hit, and Karyo’s, like many others, contract was changed to working from home 100% of the time. This allowed us to test out an idea we had for a few years.

After being Airbnb hosts for many years, we had always wondered whether it would be possible to live full-time as Airbnb guests.

August 10TH 2020 - We treated ourselves to a new suitcase each and set ourselves a challenge. Anything we owned that we could not fit inside these two suitcases, we had to sell or give away. Nothing was to be stored or saved - if we couldn’t carry it with us, it had to go.

August 31st 2020 - Mission accomplished! Oxfam did very well out of us :sweat_smile:

September 1st 2020 - We let our apartment

September 4TH, 2020 - We took a one-way flight from Manchester to our first month-long Airbnb stay in Greece. From there, we went to Italy, then to Spain, only staying in Airbnbs

March 2021 - We returned to the UK.

We headed north and booked six weeks in an Airbnb in Edinburgh. Whilst we were there, we were telling an Airbnb host our story, and she asked us if we had done any house sitting. We hadn’t even heard of it, but a quick Google search brought up Trustedhousesitters.

It looked interesting so we joined.

June 2021 - We did our first THS sit, and loved it so we booked more. Before we knew where we were, we’d completely stopped booking Airbnbs and were now using house-sitting exclusively for our accommodation.

July 2025 - This nomadic, minimilistic, lifestyle really suits us so I can see us carrying on for the foreseeable future. Also, it is addictive! - We are currently in Brighton on our 97th sit!

Over the last four years we have been house sitting in England, Scotland, Belgium, The Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Australia and New Zealand!

We have also met many other amazing fellow sitters/friends from all around the world - what a great community this is :heart:

Financially we’re ok. We have some rental income, I have a small pension, and we do the occasional paid sit to keep the wolves from the door!

We’re not big spenders, on average spending £1000(ish) per month,

We do what we want, when we want. Sometimes we spend a lot of time exploring areas where we are sitting, and other times we hardly leave the house. We eat out once a week and never waste money on anything we dont need, as everything we buy, we have to lug around with us!

Mainly because of the minimalistic nomadic life we now lead, last year we had a big discussion and decided we no longer needed Karyo’s wage, so he gave his notice in at work.

On July 4th 2024, he officially retired, aged 46!

Life is good - Thank you THS :heart:

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We are currently nomadic but this a just a period in time for us. Both retired, still with a home in Australia. I have a big list to see in Europe and the UK so we figured 12-15 months doing the Schengen shuffle. We have been travelling now for 11 months and I am tired and ready to go home. But there are still a few places calling to me and once we complete our booked sits in the UK, the Schengen reopens to us so……

It’s a damn long flight from Australia so I am trying to get as much out of it as I can, but I think 3 months might just be the nomadic sweet spot for me. Unless we travelled much slower than we have been. Paying for accommodation keeps you moving though, unless you are made of money which we are not. All you can do is try it and see what works for you.

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We have been full-time housesitting since Spring 2023. Wholly unplanned. We had life stuff afoot and were planning a trip to visit family. Airbnb was super expensive and poor quality. By chance, some friends were about to go on an extended trip to Japan and mentioned housesitting. We had never heard of it. We initially joined a Canada specific housesit site and completed a 3-week sit to visit family and as an experiment. Huh, it worked out nicely. As a numbers person, the economics was not lost on me. As potential adventurers, it opened our imagination. We joined THS shortly after and completed several sits visiting family in UK. Incrementally we have reflected on appetite to continue housesitting. And, with an experience objective, we have proactively sought to see how far we can push the housesitting concept. We have completed 50 sits in many countries and met some fabulous Pet Parents. Not always sunshine and roses but vast majority has been a treat, and a subset of housesits have been truly spectacular. As we accumulated reviews, experience and self-awareness then we have evolved our application criteria, due diligence questions, and broader objectives. Most family and friends probably think we’re nuts. Some drool with envy. Some just seem mystified. All good. Onwards to future adventures.

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I am really curious to know how full time sitters such as yourself and others plan and search your sits. Do you have an area criteria or just look for things that take you fancy? We are starting out and will never go full time but I see some sitters are fully booked for 2026 and I am very curious about getting the logistics of this down. I feel like my current approach could be improved.

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What a great story @Colin - so that chance meeting and conversation in Edinburgh changed the course of your lives. So inspiring.

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I have told my story elsewhere on the site, but I will refresh. I had my child very late in life, 46, so I retired. I was living in NYC, worked on Wall St for over 25 years, then my husband died from cancer right before my daughter’s 8th birthday. We moved to Toronto after the school year, as I am originally CDN and have 2 passports, as does my daughter. I could downsize my budget in Toronto, but live well, travel well. Then my daughter went to USC in Los Angeles. Our dog was declining and I took an airbnb in Long Beach, CA in Jan and Feb 2023 to be near my daughter, so she could visit frequently or I could drive up to campus and she could spend time with her dog. I took the dog by wagon to the beach everyday, she would swim, wagon back. Then in March, the dog passed. That Christmas I went on a cruise with my daughter and a woman next to me at trivia, told me about THS. So I joined, did a sit in MI in January – local to get a review, then another in FL in an RV with 2 puppies. But I then used it to spend long periods in CA near my daughter, when she had to move out of her dorm in May, put stuff in storage, then back into another apartment in Aug etc. And I would go during Christmas, we went to Indonesia last year from LA. Came back on the Jan 7th and could see the Palisades fires from the plane. I missed how I went nomadic. After spending a few months like this, I decided to leave my apartment in MI. It was temporary, planning to move back to Toronto at some point. So in Oct 2024, left apartment and began nomadic. Only planning to do it for 5 months. But as Colin said, it can be addictive. I see housing prices coming down in Toronto, I see the economy weakening and I do not want a temporary home, if I stop, then I want what I want. So I kept going. Now I am approaching 40 sits. And because I am alone, clean, have car, great with walking dogs – I tend to walk them 4/5 times a day= habit from living in apartments, I get really good sits now. I am booked through mid March. Beautiful homes in southern California, pools, hot tubs, holiday sit on the ocean. The sits tends to be longer. I have a month long sit through mid Feb and after that – heading towards Toronto, have a 3 week sit in Scottsdale through early March. I have a friend I stay with in Toronto, in between sits, and since alcohol is more expensive in Canada, she takes payment in duty free pick ups or wine and I take her out for dinner every so often. I don’t go out for dinner much as I spent all my working life going out for dinner, so I am more a homebody. I just walk the dogs, exercise and try and figure out next steps. I am trying to figure out something next for me. I have some ideas and watching the changing world. Financially I am solid. But I do not want to pay more than I have to. And I guess I want to plan a life for myself, not just where am I going to live. Not there yet and so far this works. I have thought about non north american travel. I would like to try it. But I traveled a lot in my work. And I took my daughter everywhere. By the time she was 15 she had been to 7 continents and over 45 countries. I have been to over 65 countries and many I didn’t think I would go back to again. I love Igauzu Falls, but didn’t think I would see it twice. Though seeing Moscow and St. Petersburg twenty years apart was interesting. So I read about people’s experience of sitting in Europe and at some point would like to do a sit in southern Spain. But I think I would do that once I get settled in Toronto.

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No, it was planned for me, I believe. Or, to quote Lady Gaga: “I was born this way.” Born nomad, always a nomad?

Seriously though, I even did some research on the matter, which suggests that my ancestors, who left Africa during the (possibly third) Out-of-Africa migration wave, eventually ended up in Mongolia, some 45,000 years ago. My very unusual blood type in the Western world (but quite common among Mongolian nomads), as well as my dietary likes and dislikes, also seem to point in that direction.

Due to my parents’ work, I began my nomadic life (i.e., expat life) at the ripe age of 10 weeks old, but then continued on my own once I reached 18. Exactly ten years ago, I left my expat life for full-time travel, and almost four years ago, I joined THS. And the nomadic life goes on.

Do I plan to settle down one day? Not really… but I’ll consider it when I find a beach community with like-minded people – my tribe

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@Cathie, for the last three years we have have followed a three step process.

  1. we get a flipchart sized piece of white card. Months long axis. Scenarios short axis. Post-it notes to represent one month of time (to keep big-picture, we prohibit any item less than one-month duration). We map out several scenarios of what/where we’d like to spend time, and any family/other commitments. Sounds ridiculously flippant but it sure does start conversations, get us thinking about what would bring us joy, and often spot opportunities or challenges that impact actual plan.
  2. we opportunistically secure ‘feature sits’ - housesits that we consider notably attractive (location, property, pets, something joyful) with duration likely exceeding one month.
  3. we work out how the heck to make pieces fit together :joy:. This often involves creativity in flight choices and ‘filler sits’ (acceptably attractive but helpful to plan execution, e.g. helpful location).

We travel without suitcases. Just carry-on bag and a backpack each. For months at a time. Appreciate this may be scary as heck for some people but we find it liberating. And frankly pragmatic for travel. We mostly use two airlines (one transatlantic, one Europe) on which our carry-on and backpack work.

On an ongoing basis, we have experimented and evolved our equipment, clothes, bank/credit cards, all sorts to be optimal for our current lifestyle. For example, our credit cards (good ones) incur zero fx fees on international payments, and we have more free airport lounge passes that we could conceivably use in a year. My spouse, bless, rolls eyes at iterative stuff-culling gestures … recent experiment was shampoo soap bars instead of bottles (less weight, no liquid) :joy:

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May I ask, since a few of us have mentioned we are retired and have financial security, you are in your twenties. Are you able to work for cash as you go? Or get paid sits?

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Hi @Cathie , you did not tag anyone, so I am not sure who your question was for?

We tend to book two or three in the same ish area, then move to a new area and book another two or three,

When we are sitting abroad, we book an ‘anchor’ sit of at least two weeks ( preferably more) , then try to tag others on either side.

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I wish :slightly_smiling_face: (Maybe not the twenties, but why not the thirties or forties?) I am officially retired, but occasionally do some freelance work mostly for intellectual stimulation to keep my grey cells in prime form.

I could, I guess, but I don’t think I’d like to.

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Perhaps I read it wrong, I thought you were a decade from 18, joining the next sentence.

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Thanks Colin, I’m a bit crap at the tagging, I reply quickly and keenly and then realise I have just done a general reply :person_facepalming:. Of course you are one of the people I was referring to. I have gone back and read a lot of the old stuff too so always learning. I find the forum really helpful and thought provoking.

Cheers

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