North London dog owners - nervous newbie

Not sure where and how to start … we’re an North London older couple with a lovely Maltese cross dog. What comes first? Becoming a member, posting pictures, naming dates, listing advantages of where we’re located, singing the praises of how easy our dog is to look after … ???
Would love to hear … just hope I’ll find your many (:-)) responses!

3 Likes

Hi @Monica1 welcome to the community forum and I am so pleased to hear you are looking to join TrustedHousesitters and connect with sitters to care for your precious Maltese-cross.

I completely understand how daunting it can be when you first think about finding a sitter for your home and your favourite furry family members. You are absolutely in the right place here to gather insight from our helpful members who have introduced the world of house-sitting into their lives and the possibilities it brings. This forum is place to share, ask questions, and discuss all things TrustedHousesitters.

You can use the search icon in the top right or you can simply browse previous threads and all the interesting discussions within.

In regards to the actual joining and setting up of your membership, I am going to connect with you directly from Membership Services to offer support in this regard and help get you started.

All the best
Lucy

1 Like

HI @Monica1 and welcome to the community forum. You are going to receive so many great answers to your questions here but I will try to help with a few right now.

The first thing you want to do in join Trustedhousesitters

Once you join, you can follow all the steps for uploading pics, setting up your profile, etc. If you need help, please reach out and one of our Member Service team members will be happy to help.

Also, once you have joined, make sure you link your forum profile to your member profile so other members can view it immediately if you are reaching out for answers, insights, etc.

We look forward to having your join the TrustedHousesitters family and want to see pics of your travels!

Have a great day!

Debbie - Forum Team Moderator

Hi @Monica1 as experienced sitters but brand new owners requiring a sitter, we understand your feelings. We will be in the UK for 5 months in 2022-2023 sitting full time and we took a few months to decide if we would find sitters to look after our apartment while we are away. We don’t have any pets, only some plants to water but our driving reason for a sitter was peace of mind having someone onsite during our summer storm season.

Even knowing how well the THS system works and the many great sitters out there like us, we were still hesitant. Why? I guess it’s human nature that your home is your castle, your sacred place, your private place. Or we were looking at it from a negative view about all the things that could go wrong, rather than through a positive lens. In the end we did a risk based analysis, in other words a pros v cons list. To help us do this we engaged fully on this forum asking heaps of questions and getting some great advice (and making some wonderful connections along the way). This process made our decision for us.

We advertised and were inundated with applicants. We got a varied bunch of applications from great to not great. We met with a few potentional sitters via video call and chose some fantastic sitters. The sit hasn’t happened yet so we can’t yet provide any feedback on how it went.

Don’t rush your decision, do your research, ask your questions and listen to your gut instinct. You will then make the right decision for you and your pets.

Happy to answer any questions.

5 Likes

Thanks for this perceptive input, @Crookie ! My husband and I are brand-new sitters on this site, and he is very reluctant to have anyone in our home when we might be away for longer sits. I just read your message aloud to him, and a glimmer of interest may have appeared…

And @Monica1 , best of luck with setting up your profile. It looks as though you have plenty of support from admin. We don’t have any plans for international travel just yet; we’re going to start local (Ontario, Canada and maybe Quebec) to build up some experience before venturing further afield. I’m sure you’ll find some great people on THS to dote on your sweet Maltese-cross!