You’ve probably been happy with around 85% of your longer sits then, that’s a decent rate I would have thought?
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@pietkuip
Sorry to hear you’ve had a less than great experience too. Micromanaging is very annoying. Great that you could stand up to them though.
@Hallt64 It was the number of all my sits, not just the long ones. The ones that didn’t go great were all 2 weeks or more.
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@andrealovesanimals Standing up to them resulted in three stars, of course.
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So 100% happy with shorter sits and 0% happy with your longer ones. If so, you know which ones to choose 
Hi there
My husband and I have been sitting full time since 2014 and can’t imagine living any other way. And if we ever reach a point where it’s not working for us, we’ll stop but I don’t see that on the horizon any time soon. In the almost 10 years we have been doing this, our experience has been OVERWHELMINGLY positive and that isn’t sheer luck.
You mentioned you have done a decent amount of sits already so some of my advice may be things you are already doing, but the ‘best practices’ are even more important to adhere to when sitting full time, especially if you will be doing more longer term sits–at least a few weeks.
You have already been on the road for the last year so you definitely have a taste of the ‘nomad’ life but that is still a relatively short amount of time and the experience may start to feel differently after awhile. It really depends on the person and why they are doing what they do, including long-term traveling and house sitting.
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First thing I would say is doing this full time is not for everybody and if you decide it’s not for you, no shame in doing something else. There are lots of awesome things about this lifestyle but like any lifestyle, it is not suited to everyone’s personality, preferences and temperament. So give it a good go and just be honest with how you are feeling about it. This life is only great if you really like it. If you don’t, not so much.
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The most important thing to me when considering a sit, especially a longer-term one, is what my day to day life will be like, and how well that sit gels with my preferences and what I know works for me. It is all too easy to get swayed by a exotic location, a really nice, house,etc…and not carefully consider the actual day to day responsibilities, certain aspects of the house or location, etc. OR think all of those good things will outweigh aspects you know you will find challenging or unpleasant. I may make some mild compromises on occasion, such as a short sit that fills a gap in our schedule.
I love a nice tropical environment, but I don’t want to sit for someone who is really precious about their garden that needs to be watered 2 hours a day. I had a sit once where we needed to drive the dog somewhere to be walked every day and that got tiring after two months and I wouldn’t do that again, unless it was a really short sit of a few days max. Just a couple of examples of what I mean.
- Let intuition guide you. It is all too easy to take a sit where something feels off, but again, there is some sort of attachment to the location, or there is fear of not finding something else, a sit working really good for the schedule or wanting to save as much money as possible, and then it ends up being a bad experience.
I rely heavily on my gut instincts and they have served me well. No matter how great a sit may seem in various respects, if I feel something is off I take a pass. This may be based on something specific I read in the listing, or nothing external at all, just a pure feeling.
I have accepted many a sit without any official ‘interview’ and it has always worked out fine, though the majority of HOs do want to connect before confirming and I am fine with that. For many international sits in particular I would prefer to connect first actually, and HOs always seem to want to so I never had to request it.
Of course, here and there we encountered some unexpected issues or things were different than we anticipated, but never anything major that seriously put us out or made the experience really negative.
Another aspect of the intuitive guidance is taking sits that didn’t fit in with my planned itinerary. My husband and I often say we want to go here or there, but end up doing something completely different. We recently spent 8.5 months abroad and that trip ended up looking completely different than I thought it would. But we saw certain sits come up that seemed really great, that we felt pulled to do, so we were open, and they were some of our best sits on the trip.
- Don’t get attached to particular sits. Most of the sits I have applied for get confirmed pretty quickly. It is rare I put in an application that sits there for days and days or longer. A few times I have let an application sit there longer, such as applying to a short sit that would fill a gap in my schedule, and possibly save me on hotel costs.
But when that happens, I typically withdraw them after a few days if I haven’t heard back. This is especially true if I see the message has been read. I find it strange when people read the application quickly but then don’t respond for days. I don’t think most HOs are being deliberately inconsiderate; I just don’t think many of them realize how important it is to get in touch as quickly as possible, and how things work on the sitter’s end of the process.
As a full time sitter who is flexible on location, duration and the like, there are so many opportunities available and I have no interest in waiting around for one in particular.
Sitters can do whatever they want ultimately, but I see how many people here express their frustration at waiting around for HOs to respond to them when they can avoid that by simply withdrawing the application and creating an ‘opening’ for new opportunities. While I enjoy a decisive, fast acting HO as much as the next person, my need to figure out my schedule as quickly as possible, book something by X date or a strong desire to be in a certain place, is my problem, not the HO’s, so the frustration is misplaced.
I believe this more relaxed attitude and openness is a major factor in our good experiences here and aligning with some really amazing sits over the years.
I am sure there is a lot more I could say but these are the main points that come to mind. Hope it helps a bit!
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@pietkuip
The person sounds very unpleasant. Future pet owners who read your profile will surely see that.
Re topic:
Yes, gut feeling. It’s very important.
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As a new HO on this site, this was very helpful. I want to be very considerate of the pet sitters who apply and take care of my darling animals and house. For me it’s so hard to decide who to pick… All of the applications looks so great. I am going to decide today though after reading this post Good luck to you on your travels.
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Hi @debmarst . Glad it was helpful. I don’t think HOs should feel rushed into making a decision by any means, but the more quickly they move on getting in touch with people who seem like good candidates, the more likely it is they will find someone they really like.
The thing about a site like THS in particular is there are so many new listings every day, and even within a few hours of applying for one listing, a sitter could potentially find numerous other sits that may work for their schedule.
This is especially true of full time sitters who may have a lot of flexibility with location, start dates and time frames, such as myself. But we have seemed to connect with HOs who move pretty quickly for the most part. And that, combined with being selective about the sits to which we apply, I don’t often find myself in the position of having multiple applications out for similar dates.
Because HOs can vary so much in how long they take to respond, putting in multiple applications for similar dates when the opportunity presents itself just makes good sense. And response times aside, another reason is because the sitter may not be the person the HO picks so passing up other potential sits–unless it is one someone really wants for some reason–wouldn’t seem like a good strategy.
I think the most important thing for a HO is to make that first contact relatively quickly, even if you may not be able to arrange a time to speak for at least a couple of days. There have been many sits where the HO responded to the application very quickly but couldn’t arrange a time to talk for at least a few days. In those sorts of instances, I am fine with that if it is a sit we would really like to do, and I’m not particularly pressed for time in planning those dates.
I recently took a sit where we didn’t connect with the HO for over a week–that is very rare, at least in my experience. She was really busy with work and then had a conference for several days. It was a longer term sit in an area we really wanted to be in at that time, so I was happy waiting. But if she hadn’t gotten in touch with me at all until she was ready to actually do the call a week later, I probably would have withdrawn it at some point.
Also, we get picked for pretty much every sit we apply for, so I always feel good about our chances, and waiting a bit doesn’t make me feel like I may be missing out on other opportunities.
Again, HOs should not feel rushed into a decision, but know that in some cases, even waiting a day or two to make that initial contact could result in losing out on a good sitter. This is just the nature of the game!
I recommend once a HO posts a listing, start checking for responses that day. It’s probably best not to post a listing until you are really ready to choose a sitter. If it isn’t something you are going to give full attention to for another week, then post it in a week, not now.
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Thank you so much for your sage advice. Yes, I was so surprised at how quickly I got my five applications. I posted thinking it would take a while! I’m getting back to people right now as i was out of town when i posted originally. Yes rookie mistake that I won’t be making again.
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@debmarst If you got 5 applicants quickly, you must be in a desirable location so if you ‘lost’ anyone good in that first batch, I’m sure you’ll easily get new people. And if it is a really good location, people may wait longer to hear back. Good luck finding someone!
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Such useful tips thank you!
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Something that might be worth considering, depending on your income, if you’re still working: Some jurisdictions will require you to pay taxes if you spend X number of days a year there, even if you don’t move there permanently. And it gets even messier if say you get equity in a company, because you might need to track prorated dates for when you earned shares / stock options, which some jurisdictions will expect you to declare when you eventually sell the equity, so they can charge you taxes. If you’re in such a situation, it might be worth talking with a tax accountant about things ahead of time, so you can avoid unnecessarily messy circumstances. In the U.S., for instance, you might need to track for state taxes, as well as pay federal taxes.
And if you plan to sit in various countries, you might want to familiarize yourself with visa requirements and limits on lengths of stay.
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Expect the unexpected and have a Plan B .
It’s happened to us twice this year that the sit was curtailed ( owner coming back several days early ) and it’s much easier to handle if you already have a back up plan.
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@Silversitters ouch! That has haopened to us once but we were on the road anyway so didnt mind too much.
What kind of back up plan do you mean? Enough money for a hotel? Or making sure you have friends in the area?
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Plan for cancellations and having to take mini vacations or hotel rooms. Also if your going to be in England, get a trainline card for discounts on the trains. It has been a lifesaver for me and they save 33% off the cost of the ticket. However there are a lot of train strikes in the UK so always check ahead of time say 3 days if the trains are running. Usually the busses will be running when the trains aren’t.
I might also suggest in investing in a ball launcher for dogs, they love it and it saves your arms from sigificant repetitive motion movements especially with large dogs. I also invested in some feathered cat toys and a battery powered ball with a tail that they love to play with. I also have a few simple doggie and cat hats that make light of the pets and it gives the pet parents a good laugh and they see that you go the extra mile to care for their pets.
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Such a good idea on the ball launcher!
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This sounds like a dream life! Exactly what I envision. I’m new here, and it helps to see that people are making it happen. I realize that this is not a guaranteed lifestyle, but I love to see what is possible. Thank you.
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Hello @Tekla and a very warm welcome to the Community Forum and I hope that you too will enjoy your housesitting journey 
For reference, if you are a member, once your listing is completed you can also add your TrustedHousesitters profile on to your Forum profile by following the attached link, should you wish. This will then enable others to offer you helpful advice and feedback.
If you are unsure how to do this, or if you have any questions at all, do not hesitate to ask, we are all more than happy to help.
Also, remember you can use the spyglass symbol at the top of the page next to the TrustedHousesitters logo and search for any questions that you may have as they have most likely already been answered on here and of course if not then please just ask! 
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What a really helpful message. Thanks.
Would you be willing to share how you found your sits, particularly in Europe? Have you used any platform other than TH? Thanks.
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