Humbling house quirks

Owner Questions, Advice & Chat
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I’m working on our home welcome book for our first sitter in March!

Dang. We remodeled in 2017 but the list of quirks I have for a new sitter to get on is humbling:

Left corner cook top fan gets stuck.

Under counter lights randomly flicker-no repair has corrected.

Draw TV room window drapes in afternmon, so the blazing sun that comes thru the picture window doesn’t melt the TV.
(I mean it’s like the old magnifying glass & sun experiment waiting to happen.)

The list goes on :smile:

Ps: don’t recommended to move the TV please…:upside_down_face:

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@HelloOutThere, I totally relate! My Welcome Guide is full of those kinds of things. I wouldn’t worry about it. All homes have those little quirks and I think the sitter will appreciate the knowledge you are giving them. I’m a sitter as well as a homeowner, and I certainly I prefer to know all those little quirks – keeps me from inadvertently breaking something or using something incorrectly.

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Exactly. I’m also adding a list of noises the house makes when it talks. We don’t really hear them anymore but when the pump in the basement flushes out the utility sink… it’s quite a “bang.”
It happens infrequently but if you’re not expecting it …it sounds like something big hit the house!

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Here’s a couple of mine:

My smoke alarm frequently kicks off when I cook something in the oven. If it does, I open the sliding door and the front door and wave something under the detector. If it continues, I take the detector down and take the battery out.

Freezer - sometimes ice falls behind the freezer drawers and the freezer doesn’t shut completely. It’s easy to overlook, so, if you open the freezer, please make sure it gets shut completely. If ice falls down there its a pain to get it out, basically you have to get a long handled spoon or something similar, get down on your hands and needs to try and reach behind/underneath to get it.

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My HO warned me to use the fan whenever I use the hob. The alarm goes off EVERY TIME. I’m here for 9 weeks - perhaps I’ll have learned by then :joy:

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As a house sitter an idiots guide step by step for oven microwave tv .only one house sit had that for everything .they did house swaps as well as house sits.it helped me so much.

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Loving this. With this sort of detail we are not trying to second guess strange goings on.

Fore warned is fore armed.

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If I listed every quirk in our home our binder would be 100 pages! We do our best to cover obvious things and I’m constantly updating due to changes. One funny experience: recent sitters got frustrated with our sticky sliding screen door so they put new wheels on it. We’re always grateful for proactive sitters… unfortunately now the cat can easily open it and if we lock it he just climbs it and tears it up. So now we have to keep the glass door closed, another thing to our book! :joy:

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So true! It’s in our book that when you are on the patio or deck…the glass sliders in the sunroom should be closed -counter intuitive- but Ollie will nearly crawl up the screen, if not!

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For us it’s the dog that has the quirk. She makes a very loud, deep groan that sounds similar to a growl almost every time she lies down. It only seems to mean, “I’m so comfortable,” but if you aren’t warned about it, I can see how it could be terrifying!

But back on topic… yes, I think every house has something funny about it. Or lots of somethings! I only hope we can notice/remember ours well enough to let sitters know about them!

I remember being scared out of my mind, to the point of calling my parents (two doors down) when I was babysitting as a teenager, because there was a series of loud bangs in the kitchen later in the evening after the kids had gone to bed. Turned out it was an ice maker in the fridge, long before it was totally normal and common for people to have those.

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Honestly, I’d suggest messaging them directly immmediately through messages to tell them before the Welcome Guide. Esprcially since the sit is coming up soon and many form their plans around where theyll be sitting and may need to change things on their end if they no longer wish to sit.

They may not.mind at all, but these were things to tell a sitter before anyone considered qhether to accept or not.

Then, if you havent already, add notes on your listing about household renovations and that youre happy to discuss them (if this sitter cancels or for future needing of sitters).

Someone only finding these things out after accepting and then in a Welcome Guide so close to the sit puts them in a very awkward position socially, too.

Personally, the things you describe wouldnt put me off from sitting so long as all else was promising about the listing and speaking to the HO. I dont mind renovation ossies or household quirks, so long as within reason, as ive certainly dealt with my own in the past. Recently did a sit where the HOs were in the act of remodeling.

But let them know these details immediately rather than in setting up your Welcome Guide. Then be sure to have some mention of them in your listing so that the specifics get talked out during messaging.

Apologies if im misunderstanding and you already did these things and now are just feeling awkward in filling out your Guide.

If that, instead, is the case then dont be self-conscious. They already know youve these sort of quirks/issues with your home right now and have agreed that theyre fine with home renovation and similar odds and ends a home may have like that.

Getting into reminders on details is a huge help and not something to feel self-conscious over writing down.

Being able to look back at the Guide and being reassured something is normal for there when a sitter cant recall for sure is a huge help to us. I cant tell you how much i refer back to a Guide or hand-written instructions given to me by people even when I know i was told of something or how they want something done. It’s reassuring to be able to click back and go, “oh, okay, yeah, that was mentioned and is fine/I’m doing this right”.

.

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