Hello! I just signed up because I’m planning a 4 month trip to Austalia starting mid October - 7 months away. I thought it was early to start finding places, but a bunch are already reviewing applications! Did I miss my window or is it likley there will be more popping up as it gets closer? Is there a standard for how early people post? Is there a point of no return where I should give up?
Thanks!
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Hello and welcome to forum @Eberm !
If you are new, I would guess that you don’t have any reviews. It is not very likely for someone with no reviews to be chosen for attractive sits. So if you are looking for very central, city-based sits it would be important to get a few 5*-reviews. A few short and local sits could be the way to go. Short because the shorter sits aren’t so attractive, and local because you can then offer to meet in person. Great benefit with no reviews. It will also give you experience in what to look for in a sit - and what to avoid. To have good sits is also connected to choose carefully what you will accept. Or not.
Haven’t seen many sits for autumn, I would think there will be more of them going forward.
Do read up on forum - lots to learn and learn from.
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Hi @Eberm I’m an Australian sitter & owner & live in Brisbane, Queensland. You will see some sits advertised 7 months out but not that many. It’s more common for sits here to be advertised closer to the dates, maybe a few months out, so you haven’t missed your mark.
Be aware that October is spring here not autumn as @Garfield mentioned. October is a beautiful time of year for weather but it’s not school holiday time so you won’t see as many sits advertised. It sounds like you will be here over our summer school holidays December to January during the Christmas New Year period, so there will be loads of sits advertised. Our summers can be very hot and plagued with extreme weather events, so do lots of research about expected weather in the area you are interested in sitting. We generally have heat waves, snow, bush fires, droughts, floods and cyclones all at the same time in different parts of the country
You need to do a lot of research and planning to visit Australia as we are a huge country with very long travel distances. Not sure where you are from but it’s not like travelling in the UK or Europe where towns are close together. By way of example, the whole of Europe fits inside Australia with room to spare. Check out the map below.
There are a number of experienced Aussie sitters on the forum and some from overseas who have done long stays sitting in Australia. Do some research on here about Australia by using the looking glass above & ask heaps of questions. Australia is an amazing place to live and to visit. Good luck with your planning!
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As @Garfield says, if you are new, you will need reviews first to stand a chance to score sits in popular destinations, especially if you are looking for sits on other continents. The competition is fierce!
See it from the home owner point of view: why would they pick someone with no or few reviews who needs to travel from the other side of the world, if they have a chance of getting Australian sitters with reviews?
Don’t mean to discourage you at all, cause it is definitely possible. My partner and I are European and petsat in various places around Australia last year. But we already had 60+ reviews.
For Sept/Oct, some owners will have their dates posted already, but it’s still a long way off, so there will be plenty more. When you see sits that are ‘reviewing applications’, it means the owner had 5 applications already and the sit is paused.
The key: be super quick to apply! For us to score sits in Australia, it meant setting the alarm at 3am in the morning to check what was out there. If we waited until the European morning it was too late, the owners would already have received 5 applications.
Bearing all that in mind, get some reviews and you’ll stand a far better chance. Good luck!
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Ofc! 
Hi @Eberm, welcome to the forum.
Don’t be discouraged. I got a wonderful sit in Melbourne when I had only 3 reviews. It was 3 am when I applied, as @Els mentioned. It was the end of May and the sit was for the end of September, the ones for October and November came a couple of months later.
Do get some short sits and it will be doable.
Good luck!
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Thanks so much! This was super helpful! I just booked two local sits for the up coming long weekends per everyones advice!
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