Hi,
We’re Helen and Dave and are new to this house sitters site so please excuse any gremlins!
We’re both in our early 60’s and are energetic and love the great outdoors. We are keen to carry out our first swap- we live in rural Warwickshire so quite centrally based in the UK. I’m a retired secondary school teacher ( Geography) and my husband is a retail manager due to retire in October this year.
We recently married and can’t wait to start new adventures with the greater amount of time and flexibility we will have once Dave has stopped work.
We hope to combine our love of travel with our love of animals and start filling in more visited countries on my Scratch map! We have recently returned from our honeymoon in Addu Attol in the Southern Maldives where we were spoilt by the abundance of exotic plants snd creatures- snorkelling opened up a whole new world for us. Nature is far better than any 5 * luxury resort!
Although new to this site I have carried out numerous long stay house-swaps in Europe and North America when my 3 children were growing up so I am familiar with the organisation and protocol of such exchanges.
We are trustworthy as our reviews indicate and my DBS is regularly renewed as I carry out seasonal work in a school exam invigilating.
Dave and I hope to build up shorter weekend sits in the summer months this year with a view to venturing to the southern hemisphere earlyJanuary next year to tie in sits in New Zealand where my daughter and family now live.
We miss our “beloved old lady “ JD very much and the prospect of caring for other pets,especially cats ,is most appealing.
@Morris first of all congratulations on your recent nuptials! Looks like you two already know how to have a great time together!
Welcome to the forum where you are going to find so much helpful and informative information from our members who are here to assist you along the way with your questions and/or concerns.
A great way for our other members to get to know you and be able to give you valuable feedback is to link your member profile to your forum profile. By doing so, they can easily click on your info and help you with valuable advice if you have concerns about your listing or questions on what might make it more appealing. It’s amazing how much valuable knowledge exists in this group. To link the two just click here How to add a listing or profile link to your FORUM profile - Owner & Sitter Exchange - TrustedHousesitters Community Forum.
Hello @Morris and a warm welcome to the Community Forum and of course Congratulations on your recent marriage. The Maldives are certainly a beautiful part of the world and we always enjoy our travels there, especially for the marine life.
As @Debbie-L mentioned, if you are already a member you can also add your TrustedHousesitters profile on to your profile on here by following her attached link, should you wish. This will then enable others to offer you helpful advice and feedback.
Hi Thank you- I’m aware this is for house/ pet sitting. I simply wished to explain that although we are new to this site we have some prior similar experience hence are not total novices.
I think @Smiley just wanted to clarify, as you mention “swaps” twice in your intro. It’s true that TH is a form of swapping, as no money changes hands. Swapping pet and home care for pet time and a place to stay. But the jargon used here is a little different.
Rather than “swaps” we just call them “sits.” Don’t want to get confused with house swapping!
There are PPs (Pet Parents) and sitters. Some are both.
PPs have also been called HOs (HomeOwners), but PPs is the new term. Emphasis on the pets! =)
TH profiles
PPs have a listing.
Sitters don’t have listings but do have a sitter profile.
Before you do a sit, you can have external references.
After you do a sit, a PP can give you a review.
And you can give a PP feedback.
Those are different than the forum profile. We encourage all forum members to link to their TH profile; it’s easier to help each other with more context.
For example, you mention reviews that indicate you are trustworthy, and I’m sure they’re great and would love to read them! But only mods can see your TH profile unless you link to it in your forum profile.
Your plan to start with shorter sits sounds great! And you can search these forums for lots of info on New Zealand sits.
New Zealand and the Maldives?! I’m kinda jealous. But I did go to the Galapagos once! Highly recommended! For some reason I’ve traded my wanderlust for tiny homes.
One more link:
Again, welcome! Here’s to the start of a wonderful adventure!
–Geoff
Welcome to the group.
I’m sure you will love it, we recently joined and received two offers of sits in the first couple of days-which we accepted.
Have fun
JD very much and the prospect of caring for other pets,especially cats ,is most appealing.
