I’m a little confused. When I go to look for sitters, I enter the location of the sit (my house) on the search bar and it pulls all the people locally. I feel like it should almost be the opposite. Enter where I am and look for everyone NOT local. Like, why would someone who lives here, want to come sit here. Am i…confused?
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Better to let sitters find you. Create a great listing, far enough in advance and hopefully people will apply. Inviting sitters can work, but often is a lot of wasted time for both parties. Good luck.
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To elaborate on what @Cathie said.
When I first joined THS last June, I searched on sitters and created a spreadsheet with dozens of potential sitter-applicants based on their review history and profiles.
I reached out to all of them to invite them to a sit. On subsequent sits I again reached out to some sitters that I had previously put on my “top favorites” or A- list, including a few of my favorite forum members here. I also reached out to several sitters who had applied for prior dates but I declined because I found a sitter that I felt was a better match.
As a result of all this work I obtain no sitters from an invite. Many said they’d like to do it but were unavailable for those dates.
When I post dates I get a slew of applicants, always filling the que within an hour or two.
So from my experience, inviting sitters is a pointless exercise in futility
what is a que?
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A que is a “slot” or a “position in line”.
In this context, an example usage would be “The sitter was in the que after submitting an application and was waiting for a response from a host to either confirm or decline the sit”.
Generally in English spelt queue 
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I think you probably meant queue.
que is Spanish for What.
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I see that, having now looked it up, however both are recognizable despite my usage being technically incorrect.
Think of all the bandwith I saved by omitting those last two letters.
There is no que in the English language. Fact.
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Well Americans do invent their own English 
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I use this feature and find it helpful because I am a US citizen, but my housesit is in Mexico only 4 hours from the US border. I prefer to use English (as their first language) speaking folks for a variety of reasons. My town is a small Mexican tourist town on the ocean and attractive for the nearest US sitters (4-8 hours drive). So i have A BUNCH of Arizona sitters and some in other parts of Mexico already favorited currently. The local sitters are GREAT for doing short sits and short notice sits. New to THS sitters also like to use local to them sits to build their ratings up and get access to “better” further away sits as they get more ratings (as long as they are all 5 star). IF i am having trouble getting applicants (which I had once due to a short sit) I can reach out to the closest people I prefer to ask if theyd like a quick trip to the beach for a weekend. Especially if I am flexible with my dates.
You are not confused at all, there several reasons THS may do this, just not obvious at a glance.
@Mindy1, welcome back to the THS Forum.
We continue to be amazed at the diversity within housesitter community - in terms of personal situations, listing preferences and housesit usage. While many housesitters use THS to support their travel plans, perhaps within home country or internationally, then some housesitters do indeed seek local sits. They may seek a mini vacation from everyday home; to accumulate reviews; or otherwise.
That said, Pet Parent sending blind invites to prospective housesitters is almost always a complete waste of time. Invest effort into creating a complete, attractive listing, with clear, reasonable expectations and housesitters will find you. Have faith.
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Why do you bother?
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Your question has been discussed ad infinitum on the forum. People are very rarely lucky with finding sitters by searching for them, whether near or far. As others say, ensure you create an attractive listing with great pics (there is a lot of help on the forum and on the website or look at other great listings) and hopefully sitters will apply to you. Also, if sitters favourite your listing they can probably not do your current dates but would like to be automatically advised by THS should you add future dates that they may be available for.
Some people are big on pointing out grammar, spelling, and word usage errors by others.
Why they do this is subject to speculation but I’ll wager that it has to do with a feeling of superiority.