Hi! My husband and I are venturing into house sitting. I am a former international school drama teacher and he is an IT professional and we are making huge life changes. This looks like such a wonderful community, and we are excited to get started. I have grown up with pets and am completely comfortable with all sorts and sizes of dogs. My husband has even more experience having worked with all sorts of animals. Eventually we would love to have a small holding with our own dogs, and maybe some bigger animals. We have been living all over the world, and are hoping to travel a bit more before, finally settling down. We would love to hear any advice or just to chat!
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Welcome to your new life. Have fun exploring the many topics and commentaries by the active community members here. Feel free to ask anything, interject your own observations and experiences. We all have very diversified backgrounds, experiences and life styles. Our commonalities are a thirst for adventure, the excitement of the new and a love of animals and I am going to venture to say, people.
Since I began doing this in 2018, (something I really had not “planned”, just sort of came to me), It has been a flurry of adventure and goodness.
Chat away. It’s fun and most definitely a boost to the feel good battery.
all the best and happy @WorldTrav ling!
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@WorldTrav
Welcome! I’m relatively new myself after joining mid May. Since then I’ve been lucky enough to do sits in Greater London, Henley, Copenhagen and have upcoming sits near Venice, Oxford, Athens and Stowmarket. I will have spent time by the year end with 17 wonderful cats!
I’ve loved every minute of my sits! 
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That sounds wonderful! Any advice on getting your first sit?
Hi @WorldTrav - welcome to the wonderful world of pet & house sitting. The first sit will always be the most difficult to get but at the moment there are more sits advertised than sitters available which will really improve your chances.
The number one important thing is that you need to start you collection of reviews. As time goes on these come naturally, and gradually as each sit ends but to start you need to give them a bit of a boost! To do this think about doing a couple of very short sits, 1 or 2 days is a great way to instantly get yourself some reviews. Staying local so that you are not incurring travel costs is a good idea initially.
Once you have a couple of reviews under your belt then you will find it much easier getting accepted for the sits that you really want to do - good luck.
You may find having a look through this thread helpful
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Welcome @WorldTrav to this amazing community of like-minded happy pet lovers! You’ve had some super advice from all that have posted already. I’ll add that personal references are equally as important, especially if they include any animals you’ve cared for in the past. We were quite surprised when our very first sit was a local one that we were invited to, so no application process at all!!! After that it was off to the races, and now we are overseas on our 9th sit. We joined in October, and began traveling in February when full retirement commenced. Best of luck in your new journey…the planning is half the fun 
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Hello @WorldTrav. Welcome to the community forum and congratulations on the major life changes you’re making. As @Colin mentioned, this is a great time to start as a pet sitter. You’ve come to the right place to find answers to your questions. We’re a community of supportive pet- and travel-lovers, and we’re glad you’re here. By the way, how did you find us?
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