How might a sitter get a sense of how many available sits there might be in a particular city for a particular time of year (e.g., fall, winter, etc.) ahead of time based upon previous years?
You can’t reasonably predict that.
This would be great but unfortunately THS don’t share this data and I dont know of anyone who has used APIs and set up a database (I’m guessing it would also contravene THS TOS) I looked into it a few years ago but unfortunately it’s beyond my skill set.
Even all the data, you couldn’t predict this, because most people aren’t consistent in how many trips they take in a year and when they travel. Say grandma dies and she doesn’t host Thanksgiving any more, or people take turns hosting, or kids grow and have activities or graduate, or money is tight, or travel costs rise or fall, or someone takes a trip and can take their dog, or they lose their job or get sick, etc. Or they decide to go to X country or city, and its best weather is at X time of year vs. X time of year in another place. Or someone doesn’t renew their membership or renews at a different time of year, etc. Or pets get sick or die. Membership numbers also aren’t static.
I agree you can’t predict individual behaviour. My point is that aggregated historical data could still reveal useful seasonal trends and probabilities, even if it’s far from perfect. It’s about identifying patterns, not making precise predictions.
There’s no quick way
If you love a spreadsheet you could search the city that you want to visit . Then look at all the listings - Including those that don’t currently need a sitter . Then by looking at all the past sitters make a note of the dates of previous sits.
It all depends on how much time you have on your hands and how much time you are willing to invest in gathering the historical data .
As others have said past patterns don’t necessarily reflect the future . We did a 3 week sit for a family regularly each summer year after year . Now the older children are in uni have their own friends and interests and don’t travel with the family for the full three weeks . So the family no longer requires sitters..