Is it just me?
We can only sit during school holidays and despite having had an alert on for may half term for months, i havent found anything suitable. Yes, we are a bit fussy, but this will be the 2nd holiday now we have failed to find anything that fits our parameters.
I am curious if other sitters are finding the same?
The more provisos you have on your flexibility/availability will always impact the number of sits available to you.
Not sure if you sit with children or you perhaps work in an educational facility but family sits are quite limited.
Hope you have more success in the Summer break 
I am not quite sure what you mean by great, but if that refers to more in demand vacation- like spots like Thailand, popular European capitals etc, then there are definitely less of those type of sits for sure.
But the holidays are probably one of the times when youâre most likely to see them, since people of all locations are more likely to be traveling during this time.
Generally speaking though, the more criteria a sit must meet, the fewer options there will be in most cases. Being limited to certain dates and traveling as a family will definitely narrow choices for sure, as most sits do not accept children.
But with the number of sits on this site, even a small fraction of the total can still be a decent number, and still add up to way more sits than are available total on many other house sitting sites.
I have seen a number of people post here who only sit during school holidays and they seem to do well with it, but I donât really know the types of locations they go to. They may be interested in very different areas than you are. But I do think itâs totally possible if you just keep looking and perhaps open up more to the types of places you would be willing to go if possible.
Good luck!
@catscatscats24, we find that what constitutes a âgreat sitâ varies greatly within the housesitter community. Housesitters have different personal situations, listing preferences, housesit objectives, flexibility, travel-willingness & more.
Whenever we struggle to identify attractive listings then we pause and breathe. We usually expand our openness, searches and criteria. We create multiple Saved Searches. We adapt.
When we struggle to confirm sits then we self-assess our profile and application content. Perhaps weâre being unrealistic. Or perhaps we need to think about situation from perspective of pet parent.
Itâs impossible to comment on someone failing to find anything that fits our parameters. Could be all manner or possible reasons. But suggest review your profile, assess parameters, open imagination, and assess your applications from perspective of pet parent.
Good luck!
I sit with kids and have done so for 2 years now. It has occasionally been challenging to find a sit but we have always found something we genuinely wanted to do and not felt like we would be sitting for the sake of it.
I have just noticed a real lack of opportunities this year and wondered if it was something people had noticed across the board.
I think I get what the OP means, most of the sits have multiple animals or canât be left alone for long, undesirable locations, short sits⌠very few good ones here. I guess if it was easy, people might just ask their friends or family to look after their pets, with multiple animals maybe itâs too much of favour to ask
Where abouts are you?
I have been traveling through Europe and have been landing plenty of great sits, and I wouldnât say that Europe is necessarily a hot spot for house sits compared to US and UK.
I donât really use alerts, I donât think its the most reliable. I just look regularly online, alongside some alerts (just in case) and I tend to find exactly what I need.
I also found that there is more than enough house sits. Sometimes to many, so we are actually very picky with what we choose and so far we have landed absolute dream homes and pets.
What are you specifically looking for.
I donât think thatâs true? I think OP sits with children which is why itâs challenging. I donât thing âmost sitsâ have multiple animals, etc. I think there are plenty of sits available with normal pets, but not that many that want children.
THS introduced a filter specifically for family friendly, and as just we finally have a box to check. So the sits ârecommendedâ for OP are probably dwindling as now itâs a criteria that filters what fits the OP.
There really are tons of sits with general availability, but again finding the ones that ok with families/children is different.
@catscatscats24, separate to our earlier comment then we reflect that there seem to have been an increased stream - on THS Forum - of Pet Parents that struggle to find housesitters.
Sometimes this appears due to poor listing content; unattractive listings; unrealistic expectations; reduced US-travel; or perhaps lack of housesitter applicants.
Given that the number of active THS listings seems to have increased over the last few years then it seems odd that both pet parents and housesitters struggle to find a great match. So perhaps each party is becoming more selective; or current THS members are becoming less experienced; or the world is becoming more fractional.
Encourage that you donât take matters personally. Create/revise a good profile. Explore realistic listings on a timely basis. Hopefully you find joy.
Whatever the reason, there is a shift. For the past 3-4 months or so, I, an experienced sitter (85+), have been struggling to find suitable sits, which is rather surprising and unexpected (for me) given the alleged shortage of sitters. On top of that, for the first time ever, I was not only not offered a sit during a chat but also declined after the chat in favor of another sitter. Not once, but twice.
Note that for the past few months I have been looking exclusively for continental European sits. Perhaps due to the current political climate, there is significantly more interest in European sits these days.
@august Iâm definitely with you on this! Never struggled as much as I have this trip. There might be a lot of listings but without going into it all again, even as an experienced full-time sitter the dynamics have definitely changed.
I think maybe because Iâv been looking at the most recent or last minute sits, I found most of those sits no good, some of them are âleftoverâ sits that very few people are interested in. Sits where the hosts were let down by someone last minute might be okay sits but might not be in a desirable location, otherwise it would be filled quickly.
@august, very interesting.
Weâve not been impacted by this. But thatâs simply chance as we received multiple requests for extended duration housesits this year so are only looking at THS for very targeted âfillerâ listings.
Just guessing (as THS does not publish relevant data) but maybe itâs an impact of US situation. US housesitters appear to apply to global listing. Many non-US housesitters appear to limit their applications to non-US listings. If so, this would appear to increase competition for non-US listings. I tried to explore related topic a couple months ago, and frame idea for pricing model tweak, but got shot down in flames 
Curious on whether any US based housesitters have found challenges in securing sits?
Weâre probably slightly left field sitters in that we love the quirky sits in unusual locations a lot of the time. One of the things that seems to be happening for us is that more cancellations are happening so we are picking up âGucciâ sits when the sitters cancel on the first round and we werenât quick enough to be in that first five. Weâve just picked up Oman for awesome hosts and one cute dog for 5 weeks as theyâve been messed around and cancelled on but it was already reviewing at least twice when we saw it before. #differentdynamics
It may be more complex than that. Having searched actively for sits many times a day, I have had the opportunity to observe all the comings and goings
Currently I see just under 10,000 sits currently listed in the UK and US. How did you determine that a lot of these sits are for new hosts and that the majority of these are young people? Did you somehow use the beta smart search? I searched for sits in the US for 3 days or less with no other filters and found 1327, thatâs roughly 20% of the total # of sits in the US. Thanks
The US and UK sits are totally irrelevant. As mentioned earlier, my observations are based exclusively on a three to four-month-long daily search for continental European sits.
I did a search for Europe>7 days and another for the UK, also >7 days. The difference was 235, is that down a lot from previous years?
Iâve not had any problems getting sits in Europe this year. The limiting factor for me is the 90/180 rule. Perhaps Iâve just been fortunate.
Iâve seen another sit in Oman, 1 dog for 7 weeks with a 4x4 provided.
We couldnât do the whole of that one as weâre still on a Turkish island 
When we read both listings, we much preferred the tone and welcome of our chosen host even though thereâs no car with the sit. Plus one cute dog (2 on that other one) who doesnât walk so super easy. If you havenât been, Oman is a very hospitable and fascinating country, 4th visit 
#beautifulpeople