Oh my gosh! I had a sit where the whole fridge was rotting, and every sauce and fruit had mold. Things were at the back of the fridge that were forgotten and bought again… only to see it go moldy again. I do not understand… do they not check anything before a sitter comes? I try to understand different circumstances, who knows if the people suffer from mental health issues, etc.
I understand the rush and that you are extremely busy but this is just a health threat at this point.
Honestly if you love to cook and fresh spices are important to you, then just bring small amounts of your own.
It is not inconsiderate of a HO to not provide you with a drawful of fresh spices. We need to provide you with a clean and hygienic space, with enough clear space for your own items to meet your preferences.
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FELINELOVER
I’m bewildered by how completely you have misread and misunderstood my post.
This post is not a demand, rather written to provide perspective after reading many posts by HOs asking for recommendations on how to prepare for a Sitter.
As a Home Owner i made what I found to be small adjustments to make a Sitter’s stay comfortable.
As a Sitter I find most HO’s do the same.
As Sitters we bring supplies & shop locally, never expect things to be provided.
However, we have found that almost all Home Owners are thoughtful and do provide at the very least the basics. Because they, as we did when we were using Sitters, value the exchange.
Of course you should do as you see fit .
Clearly this post is annoying you although I’m at a loss to understand why.
Perhaps you could try rereading it with an open mind instead of leaping to erroneous conclusions.
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If you go back to the original post…
Points A and B are completely valid for all sitters (and I believe are part of the terms of THS).
Point C is debatable - you shouldn’t have to move things around too much as owners should give you a little space. But so what if a can of tuna is expired? Just ignore it. Everyone has their own reasons for prioritizing certain tasks over others. Maybe this person is busy and just didn’t get to it. Who cares, just don’t eat the the old tuna.
Point D is over the top. No homeowner owes you fresh spices and if it’s important than just bring your own.
If your intent is to educate HO on how to make sitters feel welcome - then maybe also try to not be so judgemental over expired items. Is the home otherwise comfortable? Are the pets fine and as expected? That should be enough to make any sitter feel comfortable.
A welcoming attitude actually goes both ways so maybe focus on the important things - is the home comfortable? Are the pets enjoyable? Is all as advertised? If so, then who cares about spices or cans of expired tuna?
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Again, I think you are making a lot of erroneous assumptions.
None of what I wrote was in the form of a demand: it was all written in response to Home Owners in this forum asking the Members for insight into what makes a good experience.
Again, I do not expect anything be left for our use as Sitters.
And we don’t use things without the express invitation of the HO.
The points I was making had to do with a HO seeing their home, their kitchen from the Sitters’ perspective. Especially since so many Sitters are visiting from a long distance, the likelihood that they will travel with a pantry of things is unlikely.
Of course Sitters buy their own food - that’s standard. But to leave a completely empty kitchen is inconsiderate. Happily that has happened only once to us. And that wasn’t the only odd thing about that sit. Neither bathroom had a functioning shower. The pets’ environment was bad. Happily for us it was a very short sit.
On the flip side, when we started in this system it was as Home Owners using Sitters and we wanted our Sitters to be happy with the arrangement.
We saw having Sitters as a great solution to our needs.
Instead of stressing our animals with kenneling, the cost of kenneling, worrying about an empty house, the cost of an empty home insurance rider, plants being kept alive, our things safe, etc? It seemed to us a small thing to create a welcoming environment and that included making our kitchen (and the rest of our home) comfortable for their stay.
Home Owners usually leave rather detailed instructions for the care of their pets & home.
Sitters also have requirements for a sit. A decent environment that’s clean, the use of normal home facilities, etc.
House Sitting has to be a win-win arrangement or it doesn’t really work.
MOST members understand that.
It’s baffling to me that you find it so difficult to understand.
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We’re totally with you @ASASG on the welcome & consideration from an HO in whatever form. One sit after an international flight, a ferry, a taxi & a rainstorm, our arrival resulted in absolutely zero contents in the fridge & the HO owned a local restaurant. Baffling! The sit was great otherwise. We travel all over the world sitting @Felinelover & don’t carry spices with us in our cabin bags. (Border agents don’t like them either so likely they’d be confiscated if we did). We appreciate it if an HO leaves spices, herbs, oil, milk, eggs & some bread. A lot of ours have left way more but that’s choice. We’d like to be treated as a friend or a guest so in our mixed cultures (UK & Anatolian) that includes things like offering someone a welcome drink on arrival or us preparing a shared meal on their return. None of this is about expectation it’s about treat someone as you’d like to be treated. As for expired goods, we’d just avoid them or if perishable then throw them in the bin but it’s good solid advice from @ASASG who’s both a sitter and an HO we believe. #balancedviewpoint
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Some people are simply oblivious to how the state of their home reflects on them. Or it’s a case of out of sight, out of mind. The contents of the fridge aren’t exposed to them except when they open it and when it’s closed they just don’t think about another person opening the crisper and seeing rotten celery or examining the jars of spoiled condiments. To many of us, the THS reminders to HO about cleaning out the fridge is eye-rollingly obvious but there are people who do need to be nudged. (And then they take the instructions literally and remove every last item from it!)
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It seems to me that there are some people who simply don’t notice what’s in their fridge - I’m seeing this as more the case with those with the huge American Fridge Freezers, where there is possibly space for far more food than a family could consume between shopping trips (or deliveries). I have often been left with food that really should have been discarded weeks ago, being told to feel free to use up what’s in the fridge.
I am beginning to adopt the same blindness - if its not on the shelf that I have (hopefully) been left for my stuff, then it doesn’t exist - until it begins to pong a bit too much when I will bin it.
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Thank you, Cuttlefish, for writing a comment which really makes vivid what I’ve tried to express. As you & we have found, most HO and Sitters understand the formula for a good experience!
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Good points, DianeS - I agree 100%.
Good advice: if it’s been ignored by the HO then the best thing to do is ignore it ourselves.
KChev - I think you’ve nailed it: there are simply people who don’t think about the way their home (esp fridge) looks to someone else. The majority of people in the system are thoughtful & considerate. But, like everything in life, there are outliers who don’t get the win/win concept!
Like other sitters, we’ve experienced both ends of the fridge-cleanliness and food-freshness spectrums.
It’s downright disrespectful for hosts to leave rotting food in a grotty, unhygienic fridge and we’ve often had to turf stuff out - a job which should have been done before our arrival!
We did one sit where the hosts said “Weve left you a meal for this evening”, it turned out to be a fresh Charlie Bigham’s cook/chill meal, 2 months past its use-by date, plus some greying cooked vegetables. Okay, so it has previously been frozen (but wasn’t when we arrived, so who knows how long it had been out of the freezer?) and freezing instructions were ‘use within one month’. This was at a very affluent address. We left it in the fridge (it was a short sit).
We’ve only twice encountered really dreadfully filthy fridges, which were a real disgrace and totally unhygienic.
It would be helpful if THS would really would stress the necessity of clean fridges for sitters (and include ovens, microwaves in that imperative!)
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I’m also a combined member, and want to second this.
Just as sitters have to pay a price – travel expenses to get to sit, packing stuff they might need to be more comfortable in a stranger’s home, etc – hosts also have to pay a price. That price might be hiring a cleaner if they can’t get the house “guest-ready” without one. throwing some stuff in a closet in order to clear drawer space, or yes – cleaning out the fridge or making room in the pantry before a sit.
Yes, I get it, you’re leaving in a hurry, but if your sitters left a ton of stuff that needed to be tossed in your fridge, you wouldn’t be happy about it.
Speaking of which: there is often SOMETHING left in my fridge by sitters which I wind up tossing! So it does work both ways!
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While THS does send out an email reminder to petparents about this stuff, I think few read it. IMO, THS has to stop sending the constant barrage of "a sitter has saved your listing’ emails, and focus on IMPORTANT messages, and these should be texted as well as emailed and in the THS inbox. My THS mail winds up in a gmail “update” folder never to be seen, and to trashed when my box starts getting too full.
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Disrespectful is a very good word for what you’ve experienced (and unfortunately too many other sitters.)
Tired from a long trip to arrive at a sit, the last thing most of us expect is to spend time tossing rotting food, cleaning fridge shelves & drawers.
I’m baffled by those who expect a sitter to respect their home, care for their animals, HOs who want a responsible, considerate Sitter but don’t think to extend that same respect & consideration.
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Marion: BINGO!
You describe exactly what we did as HOs.
The THS win/win comes with what should be obvious expectations on both sides.
Perhaps since we started in the system as HOs we are more confident about the “win” from the HO’s perspective and thus none to pleased by an inconsiderate host.
Happily MOST home owners are like you: prepare the home for the Sitter to have a comfortable stay.
But I ask myself: who leaves their home & pets with a stranger but doesn’t at least selfishly think it in their own best interests to treat that person with consideration?
We did one sit in a grand home where only a container of half-eaten take-out & some way past-tossing veg was in the fridge. The closest market (and the one they recommended!) was a 20+ minute walk (the post was for a stay “in the city” so we hadn’t rented a car - turned out “in the city” was actually a suburb.
We took an Uber from the station and hired an Uber to leave. Not a big deal but not the “in the city” location described. Luckily we had stopped for a good dinner near the station before arriving…
My only niggle about food being left in the fridge by the HO, is when they say - please use / eat any perishable items from the fridge that might otherwise go past the sale / used by date.
I often would not choose to eat the foods left.
So, in the event that I am left to either throw out, or eat the food, I feel compelled to replace them for when the HO returns.
Please leave me a fridge that does not contain perishable items.
Why?
I may do it with some items (like milk), but I don’t feel compelled.
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Agreed, @pietkuip! We don’t replace perishable foodstuffs and have never been requested to do so. But then, we very rarely eat anything left by hosts (and never touch their leftovers!). We expect to provide our own food, on sits.
To be fair, we’ve also encountered some really generous hosts, who have said they’d like to leave us some groceries and asked us what we like to eat. We always say that isn’t necessary, but many still do like to do so (and it would be rude to refuse such generosity).
I make note of what the HO preferences are and try to replace like for like if we’ve consumed it. Especially things like milk, yogurt, bread, fruit that they probably want their first morning home. Of course a LOT depends on the length of a sit. Two nights is very different from 10 nights.
When a host has been considerate, welcoming us with a meal or leaving some basics - again, it’s like-for-like, if we can shop for them we send a note, “What can we stock your kitchen with for your return? Eggs? Milk? Bread?”
One host who was lovely returning on a very delayed flight asked if it would be possible for us to pick up one of the two kinds of fresh soups available at a neighborhood market. We got both kinds. A small “thank you” for a lovely experience.
And when a HO has left money for “emergencies” I’ll add, “You’ve left $100, would you like us to use that to buy some groceries?”
That makes it very easy for a HO to say, “Yes please! Could we have juice, eggs, milk, bread, yogurt, fresh berries” or whatever.
Examples of kindness brings kindness!
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