Hi There, I’ve posted a listing for Christmas this year for our two lovely Labradors. We’d love some feedback from any potential sitters please. Please check out the link to home in the beautiful Scottish Borders in my profile. We look forward to hearing from you all. Kind regards
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Hi @gmac
Welcome to the Trusted Housesitters Forum!
I’ve added your listing to your Forum profile, so that our members can give you some feedback on your listing.
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Hi there,
I took a look a for you. Overall your sit looks lovely and you have very nice descriptions of your home - I see that you already have an applicant, so I hope it works out for you. Here’s some ideas to consider if it doesn’t:
1: Try an exciting title related to Christmas (e.g: Celebrate the holidays in the Scottish borders!) and use a cover photo that reflect the Christmas/winter season, not Autumn.
2: In your intro, consider that people from any place, culture, age & English language level may be reading your listing - ‘bumpkin’ is an unfamiliar word for many. Your intro should also tell sitters who you’re looking for (singles, couples, people with or without pets etc) why they should sit for you (especially over Christmas!), when you’d like a sitter to arrive & depart, and create a strong reason why somebody should keep reading & engaging with your listing.
3: Your home and location section has some lovely descriptions, but make it relevant to Christmas & winter. Why should a sitter spend Christmas at your place? Will your home be nicely decorated? How’s the heating in your home? Do sitters need their own car? Can you collect sitters from the nearest airport or station?
4: Your responsibilities section is quite minimal. Tell sitters:
- How long can the dogs be left? (If you ticked a box for this, tick-boxes cannot be publically viewed).
- Where do they sleep? (Note: in the room with a sitter is a deal breaker for most)
- How do they behave on walks?
- What are their personalities?
- Can they get along with other dogs?
- Can they be taken in the car with sitters?
- ‘Regularly let into the garden’ is ambiguous; how often, exactly?
- Are there home maintenance tasks to be done such as snow blowing & winter maintenance?
Hope that helps 
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Your pics show Colonel and Purdey in the back of a car, is a car necessary on this sit? If so, it’s worth mentioning in your listing. On that note, are there good walks from your doorstep (it certainly looks like it) or will a sitter be required to transport the dogs? If so, are you hoping they will do so in their own vehicle, or will you be making yours available? All points to mention (and I understand from other threads on here that making your vehicle available to sitters does increase the number of applicants). For info, we travel in our own vehicle and are mindful that sandy or muddy dogs means a bigger car clean-up at the end of a sit, despite us using liners/protectors, and especially so for 2 sizeable dogs.
And that reminds me of another point: do you hose or towel-dry the dogs after a mucky walk? Is there anywhere they can dry off? Where do the dogs sleep? Issues worth mentioning in the listing, please.
Since this is a Christmas sit, it’s always more tempting when the first pic is of a wintery scene. However, I note your mention in your listing that you’ve only recently moved in, so that may not be possible this time.
I’d recommend adding a pic of a roaring fire in the log burner. Also, is there a sofa in your living room or just the two chairs? Maybe include a photo if there is, and one of the television might help attract sitters for this winter period. Move the cardboard box and re-take the bedroom pic, possibly with the vase of flowers from the kitchen placed on the chest of drawers. Basically, sitters need to be able to see themselves living comfortably in your living space and want to be there over the Christmas period, when there are more sits than available sitters. State whether or not your home will be decorated for Christmas, as this might sway some sitters, one way or the other.
You state ‘no parties or events’ at the end of your listing. Make it equally clear if you will not allow visitors, since some sitters will arrange to be near family over the Christmas period or potentially ask if it is possible to have a guest (this is not a foregone conclusion, but is something we have asked the hosts at our present sit which will extend over the festive period, and they’ve happily agreed). Transparency is important in all sit situations, so maybe make that clear at the beginning of your listing, rather than adding it as your closing sentence.
Jedburgh is a wonderful area and the setting of your home looks idyllic. Your two dogs are gorgeous (we particularly love Labs!) so I’m sure you’ll have no shortage of applicants.
Best of luck to you!
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Great advice given. As Christmas is high season and demand for sitters is high (especially in UK with many listings) and sitters applying for multiple sits at a time - do assess applications as you get them, so you don’t lose a good match because you were slow and they got another offer.
If it seems a good match, get a video call and see Where it brings you. If everything is fine and your gut feeling is good, confirm the sit.
Never make an agreement if something feels «off». Trust your instinct.
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Agreeing with all of the above suggestions. One further point - you mention the use of a “shared bathroom”. Shared with whom? I presume it is for sole use by the sitter(s) during the sit - perhaps you mean it is also your bathroom whilst you’re at home and not a dedicated guest bathroom. This might be worth clarifying.
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Agree with all suggestions above before. First and foremost, your pictures are beautiful and your dogs look adorable. I would definitely think you will get a sitter in no time…just give it some patience.
Our biggies to update:
- Shared bathroom, with who?
- Would put less about the towns activities (these are things you can share with a sitter on welcome guide or in person handoff)
- Bumpkin (change the wording)
- Charming (can be off-putting to a lot of Americans. To us, this means small or old)
- Put Christmas in your title somehow
- Talk about public transport in the home and location part. Will you be willing to pick up sitters? What is nearest airport to fly in to?
- In dog section, are there walking paths nearby? Do you have to drive dogs to a park?
- Are dogs used to sleeping with you? If so and sitter is not okay with this, where is the alternative for them to sleep?
- Lastly, how is the heating in the home? Is it central or wood fire? If so, will you be leaving wood stocked from their time there?
- Since you will probably be getting international sitters, I would list in the opening introduction if the dates include a night prior with you there and/or when you actually leave or depart. Will give sitters more of a gauge to look into flights, etc.
- Lastly, I would update the listing with current pictures as to what the house looks like now. Anytime we see “updated photos to follow” (or something similar) it is very off-putting to us because we think people are trying to conceal something.
Best of luck to you! 
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The thing that stood out to me was the need for a car which should be stated. That doesn’t make things hopeless. This sounds like an ideal sit for a person or more likely couple who want a quiet country setting Christmas with two great dogs. Given the expense of air travel this time of year, I can imagine sitters a few hours away considering this a lovely getaway.
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Welcome @gmac your sit looks lovely. We love this Scottish borders area having spent time in Melrose last year. We have favourited your listing as we travel to the UK to sit, unfortunately not this Christmas. In your listing it would be helpful to know more about the dogs as @Nagy26 says and if a car is essential or is public transport available. Not sure what you mean about the house being more put together as it looks very nice.
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Hi Georgie, I had already favourited your advert, as it appealed to me, and I live within easy travelling distance. The only reason I didn’t apply was that I already have a sit for those dates.
As others have mentioned, what does shared bathroom mean, as in the THS rules only the sitters would be in the house?
Do you look to see if anyone else had perhaps favourited it?
In my opinion, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the words charming or bumpkin.
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Problem with bumpkin is that the word isn’t understandable for others than native speakers. As language is a tool to be understood that is a challenge.
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Yep, and not just ELS speakers - for best results, using language more accessible to a global audience is a good idea; sitters from all over the globe from different cultures, countries & generations could be viewing the listing, and won’t necessarily know words such as ‘bumpkin’ - this is a rather old fashioned term mainly familiar to the 50 - 60+ community of English speaking countries.
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It’s not realistic for everyone to have entirely shared vocabulary, even in the same country. And it’s easy to google. Or you can ask.
Like someone above mentioned that they don’t use the word “charming” and offered some connotations that don’t resonate with me, even though I think we’re both Americans. I use the word and often see it used, whether by Americans or other folks. That’s just one example of many.
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I have a hunch that ‘shared bathroom’ in this case means not an ensuite. I am highly doubtful that it means that it is for more than one abode.
But, yes, probably best to use different terminology.
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I agree that one can ask or search online. I did find out what bumpkin was (in my opinion the meaning could more effectively be put across with another term).
But looking for a sit, I don’t do much research in what the host really means with their listing. There are so many sits! All over the place! It is like online shopping (or online dating) - even small and un-important things can make one scroll on to the next listing, looking for something better (unless it is a really desirable place - in which case too many sitters will maybe take too many risks in some cases, going into it blind). I don’t think I would research «bumpkin» for a sit. To me, «charming» is also realtor-language for old/small. It wouldn’t matter for me personally for a sit, but it seems it matters for some.
If something seems unclear, at least I am much more likely to scroll on instead of asking. If something is unclear or questionable it can often be interpreted as «negative» of sort, or at least not interesting enough to read on, click or ask. So it is great when forum members can ask the community and get insights on how the listing is perceived. And then many of us learnt something. In different ways.
Hi @Nagy26 I have seen a couple of posts now where you have advised hosts
This is useful to know if the host already has a strong preference for a single sitter, or only has one bedroom.
However not all sitters fit neatly into the category of single or couples, so this could reduce the available pool of interested sitters for hosts that might otherwise have had no strong preference of preconception of the type of sitter they would be comfortable with. Anyone who doesn’t sit as a single or couple will scroll on by, as might those who sit as a couple, but prefer to have access to separate bedrooms, as they would likely assume that only one room was available.
There are many different types of sitter, including friends, siblings, parent and child duos, and families. It doesn’t make sense to advise hosts who may be struggling to find sitters to narrow their pool unnecessarily, or to create the impression that all sitters are singles or couples. They could miss out on some really great sitters (including this “BRILLIANT” trio with 30+ five star reviews).
It’s certainly useful to know upfront if you are not the type of sitter hosts are looking for, but we don’t want to accidentally encourage hosts to exclude types of sitters they may not even know exist!
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Hi @Debbie, good point and of course nobody fits neatly into any category - never meant to make it seem as such, I was just giving some general examples of who an owner would be open to sitting for them (as in, how many people are they willing to host/how big the bed is & how much space they have available). Sometimes, I read listings which state the owner is only seeking a single person to sit for them, which immediately tells me it’s not a sit for me and it’s very helpful. That’s all I meant That’s lovely that you’re sitting as a trio, sounds like it would be fun
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Hi Georgie,
Much like @RedLassie, I also considered your ad as it’s within reach of where I’m based and looks wonderful. However, the dates overlap with another sit, unfortunately.
I suspect the difficulty in finding sitters is less to do with the wording or content of your ad and more to do with an awkward time of year when sitters are either booked up or want to be in a specific area, close to family (or both). Rest assured, this is not always the case! I hope you are able to find someone suitable and perhaps there will be an opportunity for me to sit for you another time. Best of luck!
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We are new to the THS platform (as sitters) so still learning.
Joe and I would have happily spent Christmas abroad this year if flights were not so expensive around the holidays.
There have been a lot of listings that were very appealing to us! (We are instead hosting a neighbor’s dog at our house.)
There are clearly a lot of home owners in need of pet sitting over the holidays and it’s likely a time when many sitters are not available because of family gatherings.
I think that offering assistance with the high flight costs is prohibited by THS. (True?)
However, is providing useful gifts to the sitters permitted?
Gifts that offset other travel expenses might make Christmas housesits more feasible for those on a budget–a “win” for everyone.
There are endless possibilities: museum passes, a cooking or language class, transit cards, a gift certificate for a favorite restaurant that allows pets, etc.
I would never ask for extras like these but it doesn’t help home owners that we simply stay home.
Thoughts? Thanks!
Beth