We have been housesitting/Pet-sitting since 2018 but would like to pick other members’ brains. Now that NZ is (hopefully) opening up and we may get the chance to travel there this year, we are wondering if it is worth becoming HO as well as sitters. Our query is whether there is an extra cost if we do become HO as well and also, would there be people who would want to come to the depths of winter in Sweden for maybe 3 months? We live in a small village (2 supermarkets, 1 Pharmacy, Medical Centre plus a couple of gas stands) approx. 1 hour from Stockholm. There are lots of trails around our village where you can Xcountry ski and the nearest city, Vasteras is a half hour bus ride away. We would just want a responsible person/couple who would stay in our house as we then wouldn’t need to rely on our neighbours and feel “obliged”. I look forward to members’ comments.
KiwiSwede
KiwiSwede
I’d come to Sweden for 3 months, even in winter time. Would probably want to be able use your car given your description of the setting. Not sure how Swedish auto insurance works, but I had a March sit scheduled near Goteborg that would have allowed use of a car until Covid shut the world down. Of course, I lived in Minnesota for 15 years so have some cold, snowy experience.
Tom
I would love to spend 3 months in Sweden.
@toml @BunnyCat @trustSitCommunity Thank you all for your interest and lovely to know that it wouldn’t be as difficult as we anticipated. We haven’t as yet made any decisions but we first have to see if NZ will relax its restrictions on non-citizen visitors. Just to let you 3 know, we would only require somebody to keep our home safe - no pets as we travel often and it wouldn’t be fair of us to leave them so often. We do get quite a lot of snow and have had our fair share this winter with quite a lot still lying around. Still minus temps at night but our house is set at 21 degs so cozy. Will let you all know once we make a decision. Many thanks once again.
It would interest me one day but you don’t mention what animals you have…or don’t you have any? Presumably you have a tv and good broadband?
Hi @KiwiSwede I have a combined membership there is a small additional cost. https://support.trustedhousesitters.com/hc/en-gb/articles/360001752018-How-do-I-upgrade-to-a-combined-membership-
I had many sitters for my home in BC Canada while I pursued my pet and house sitting lifestyle. I was gone for a minimum of 3 months, once for 12 months and welcomed sitters from all over the world my biggest challenge was having to say no to many great applicants.
I had no pets and by having sitters avoided Insurance issues, in Canada and other places there are penalties for leaving a home vacant for more that 30 days but more importantly I would always have sitters when leaving my home vacant.
Recently we did a week’s sit in Edinburgh, Scotland, we have a home in Scotland, we were gone for just a week, we had a breaker trip shutting of the electricity to part of the house, the part which housed the fridge/freezers etc., we lost all of the contents and had a huge mess to clean up, moral to that story is TrustedHousesitters.com 
And to address your concerns about getting applicants, I was always inundated, as mentioned the hardest part was having to disappoint so many amazing sitters.
There can only be one.