This hasn’t affected me, my theory is that the best sit for me will be available to me at the right time.
We love the housesits we’ve had and have often had past Housesit hosts contact us before they post to see if we are available. We also have new ones contact us to check our availability.
We are now fully booked both in Europe and Canada until the end of June 2024.
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@JanAlayne - it differs a lot to what extend the rule affects a sitter or not. I look for sits in the same time zone as where I live (Europe), but I certainly am too late for quite a few of them. Obviously not all, but more sits than I like go automatically to reviewing status before I can get to them. And it’s frustrating to not even be able to make contact with an HO when I feel the sit could be a great match.
I sit as a single woman, in cities and towns, in ‘continental’ Europe, in places where there’s good public transport, only cats or small pets like rabbits, guinea pigs, and 1-2 weeks in length etc. There’s never been a flood of those in the 8+ years that I’ve been on this platform; and they tend to be popular.
If instead, I was for example part of a couple, with a car, interested to do sits in the French, Italian, Spanish, Swiss etc country side, and also available for 1 month sits, it would be a lot easier to get those sits in because the sitters pool for them is a lot smaller. And yes, there’s some wonderful sits that sometimes come up in these places, that make me itch to apply, but not very suitable for a single car-less sitter.
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I am single and car-free too, now travelling with a bicycle and by train.
Also the small towns that I was at in France, Spain, or Switzerland can be reached by public transport. The HO are normally willing to pick you up with your luggage at a railway station or bus stop. And then they often have a bicycle. Or one can for example use those rental scooters to get around.
This was in Estepona, on the Costa del Sol. No, one cannot get there by train. So I took a bus from Málaga.
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Small towns sometimes still works indeed. A few years ago I cat-sat in a small town an hour outside Madrid and they had a train station. Fairly popular places along the coast often have at least some ways to get around without a car as well. I once sat in a village in Germany, that was a 5km cycle ride from a larger village with supermarket and train station. As long as it didn’t rain, it was Ok to rely on the bicycle to get me places.
There’s also many HOs on THS who live in (very desirable but very car dependent) small villages or hamlets -or not even that - in rural France, Spain, Portugal etc. Where the nearest supermarket means driving a car for 15 min. Any exploration means having a car, etc.
Many years ago I tried cycling to get around a few villages in the Dordogne (where I was staying for 6 wks) due to the complete absence of public transport… It wasn’t the best idea… besides the hills, rural France is very car focused and cycling wasn’t exactly safe with the French drivers on narrow roads. Also getting groceries was very challenging.
@Bluehorse
I agree on this. I get a notification and open it immediately and it’s already being reviewed or no longer a sit needed. I am ON it to say the least and did not understand how it could be seconds that they are in the reviewing process. I’d like to understand how that happens.
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I was in Saint Cyprien in the Dordogne and had a great time. It is a small town, several grocery stores within walking distance. Several bakeries and cafés. Cycling along the river was stressful in some stretches, idyllic in other parts. I have borrowed electrical bicycles to get up the hills, to the castles. And I made friends with locals.
I was in a village about 5 km from Beaune. That was no problem on the owner’s bicycle.
Wonderful places, that are not immediately getting five applicants.
@pietkuip it is great that you can ride a bike or scooter to sit in many of the wonderful places it seems you get to stay in. Unfortunately, for myself and probably a good deal of other sitters, I wouldn’t even be able to get ON to a bike nowadays 
The body takes its toll as you get older and the dreaded arthritis etc sets in making such “normal” things like riding a bike/scooter etc impossible. So please, do enjoy it all whilst you can because one day, you just may end up like me and many others. Remember that we are not all as agile as yourself and sometimes reading how easy it is for you going here, there and everywhere on your pushbike/scooter does upset me because I CAN’T. I am an older woman stuck in a younger woman’s brain and wishing every day I could still do everything I could do years ago. Just a thought for you not to be too harsh on people who can’t access certain sits, maybe this has a lot to do with why. I am saying all this from the heart so please don’t take it as anything else, I’m jealous of your ability 
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The notifications are not contemporaneous with the listing going live, unfortunately. Notifications happen hourly, I think, so the listing could have been live for 59 minutes before you got the notification.
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Well, there are always taxis.
But at least dog sitters need to be fit enough to walk a few kilometers.
@Lassie Thank you! I still don’t understand a lot about the site, but this forum helps me learn more with each topic.
That’s why I mainly sit cats now I can still walk a few klms though thank goodness, still haven’t bought the wheelchair lol
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I dont think that is true. On two occasions I wrote up an application that would have been numver five, but after I hit send i recieved a message that the application limit had been reached. Very frustrating.
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Yes, very strange indeed. Normally the moderators would be on a post like this within minutes and close it down. Are they all on holiday😆
No we’re here 
Thanks for updating me.
Wishing you some great housesits in the future.
Thanks for your reply. What’s happened then? Is there a change on moderator policy? As I said before, I’m extremely surprised this thread hasn’t been moved and closed to further comments like the hundreds that have gone before on the topic of the 5 applicant rule.
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Had you ticked the date box first then written your application @AnnaM as that is what you need to do?
When I signed up as a HO I thought I was going to be getting access to every sitter on the site (including all the experienced ones) and the 5 quickest rule was something I later discovered.
As a HO is not my responsibly to give new sitters experience. If I am handing over the keys to my house and pet then if I want to pick experienced people rather than newbies then that is my choice and I’m not here to spread the love just so the company can make some extra money off people.
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Of course, Piet, there will always be villages which do have a supermarket. Or where you may be able to borrow an electric bike.
The opposite is also true: plenty of HOs on this website who live in the European countryside not anywhere within walking/short cycling distance from supermarkets, who also don’t have electric bicycles available etc. And where the primary mode to get around is a car. Plus they may prefer a couple if it’s a large property with a variety of things to look after - which I understand.
Just to go back to my original points: these sits are less popular than e.g. city sits, and it often takes longer for them hit the 5 limit. So if for instance you’re a couple with a car looking to do multi-week to - month sits in scenic places in the European countryside (not UK), you generally face less competition for sits than if you’re in my category of city/town sits with good public transport, cats or small critters, 1-2 weeks. The latter is more of the ‘speed is what we need’ category, which clashes with the ‘careful consideration’ approach.
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Hi @ElsieDownie. There is a facebook group set up to do precisely that. Let me know if you’d like the details.
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