Hello @SarahBritain and so glad this thread has inspired you to give this a go. I can’t think of a better way to introduce children to the world of pets!! I can’t believe however, you can’t put kisses in your thread and need to check that out if it’s a Discourse restriction. so I’m just testing that here 
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That is a shame . We are happy to have children in our home . Narrabri NSW Australia.
@Mal Have you found some homeowners more reluctant to welcome children into the equation even with the “family friendly” option? Our daughter is still a baby and we really hope we can get back to sitting/traveling some day soon
just looks like not too many homeowners want young children in their homes…which is totally understandable.
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@SarahBritain Yay! I am so happy for you guys to start 
Just throwing it out there since you mentioned your pets - we also own 2 dogs & 3 cats (lots of foster fails 
we clearly LOVE animals haha), so we book back to back pet sits to travel around as sitters, and then post the entire trip as an owner listing to have sitters come stay with our own pets while we are gone. We benefit from the site on both ends 
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Hi all, I’m new to Trusted Housesitters and have set up my first local sit in Seattle (solo). When traveling I’d likely be with both my husband and 16-year-old daughter or just my daughter. In looking over sit requests I’m seeing a lot of descriptions that imply they want a solo sitter or couple (“sitter will stay in guest room,” for example). I’m curious if I should be looking only for sits that are marked “family friendly”? Or if others have found that for the right family HOs will be flexible? Thanks very much for your insights!
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Hi @emjgee my advice would be to message the HO’s and ask if they would be comfortable with an older “child,” I think you will find that while some homeowners may not have selected “family friendly” they may be comfortable with an older teenager in their home but perhaps not a toddler. I find that it never hurts to ask and sometimes you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
best of luck!
Kelly
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HI @emjgee I agree with @Kelly_U that many HOs who might not be comfortable with younger children would be fine with older children or teenagers. I sit with my husband and 2 sons aged 13 and 11, and sometimes just with my sons, and some of the sits we have done had not selected “family friendly”.
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Hello everyone. I am new in the community so I would like to welcome everyone 
I am 36 y.o. married woman, with 2 little kids (1 y.o. and 4 y.o.). We are nature and animal lovers. 
I grew up surrounded with a lot of animals and spent huge part of my life on a farm.
We would like to start our adventure with house and pet sitting. But… I am wondering if we have any chance to get some opportunities for doing that. My concerns: there are 4 of us, isn’t too many? And our kids are little, isn’t it an obstacle? They are really easy going, very sensitive with animals and plants, and well behaved, but still they are children.
What do you think? Do we have any chance to find a house for sitting? Would you have any advice for me?
You are more then welcome for comments
Justyna
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I think HOs that are a family unit will be open to you as their pets are used to small children already. There are plenty of families house sitting no question. Best of luck 
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Hi @JustynaW welcome to the TrustedHousesitters community forum. That is awesome you and your family want to embark on a new adventure with THS. We have many families who pet sit together. You can read about some of them below.
Was there anywhere specific you were hoping to travel to first?
You can search for family friendly sits, where a house might be more suitable for young children (toys, bedrooms, safety). I think it does limit your options a bit to be traveling as a family with young children. As a homeowner, I wouldn’t accept a family with such young children, simply because I think someone with two young ones would be too busy taking care of them and not able to give appropriate attention to the pets. Additionally, I think it could stress out the pets if they aren’t used to young children. There is a difference between a child loving animals and knowing how to behave around them. However, if you find a family looking for sitters that has children of similar ages, that could work. The pets will already be used to having young ones around. Good luck!
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Hello @JustynaW and welcome to TrustedHousesitters and to the Community Forum 
How exciting! You will find many great THS adventures for your family I’m sure and there are many who do this currently. Whereabouts are you hoping to travel to? 
Welcome. We have had families sit at our home.
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Hello @JustynaW
Your question has been asked before several times on the forum. As you posted this question I think some links would have come up that are similar to save you repeating it. However, here’s one of those I found when I did a search:
Thank you very much. 
I ma really happy to read that.
First I would like to travel around Canada. We are living here just two years so we have planty places to visit 
And then… Rest of the world 
It nice to meet you.
Thank you for your words. 
I hope it will be.
First we would like to travel around Canada a little bit, and then we will see. We love traveling so we are open for whole world.
Oh. Sorry for replying this topic then. Maybe I searched too less. Thank you for this information.
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Hello, we’re newer to this platform. My family of 5 has been full-time travelling for the last 2 years while remotely working and doing homeschool. We’ve used airbnb and our motorhome. I signed up for TrustedHouseSitters but am finding difficulty finding sits. Even the ones that say family friendly don’t offer enough beds or rooms. Are there any suggestions or is this platform meant more for singles or couples to housesit?
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Hi @IHeartAnimals
A big welcome to the forum community. It’s so nice to have you here.
Please do add your profile link here >> https://forum.trustedhousesitters.com/t/how-to-add-a-listing-or-profile-link-to-your-forum-profile
as we can then meet the whole family and looking forward to hearing about all your travels and interests.
I really do believe you will find the right sit as a family. There naturally will not be as many, but there are many PP/owners on the website who do welcome families.
They will naturally be the bigger homes with probably more animals, and this will be a fantastic experience for your kids.
Best wishes
Therese
Hi @IHeartAnimals ,
We are a family of 4 based in the UK and we housesit during every school holiday. There are definitely bigger houses out there that would be suitable for your family, but there are also lots of smaller properties, or homeowners who prefer singles or couples.
Getting your first sit can be hard, and many sitters have to send large numbers of applications before securing their first sit. In order to get started, and get that all important first review, it helps to be flexible. Maybe look for local sits, short sits or those that start very shortly.
So far we have only done sits in the UK, and we are very flexible as to where we will go. We rarely start searching with a particular destination in mind. This has taken us to places we’d never have thought of taking a holiday that were wonderful and we would definitely return. On the rare occasion that we have a particular location in mind, it has been harder to find a suitable sit.
Sits in cities are harder to secure as they are popular with sitters who use public transport. We really like more rural sits and find these tend to be easier to secure.
Next week is our school half term holiday, and we are doing 2 short housesits, each in a property that would have enough rooms and beds to accommodate your family.
It can sometimes be tricky to work out if a property has enough rooms or beds to accommodate a family, as not all homeowners provide this information.
Keep trying and I hope to hear that you have accepted your first housesit soon!
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Welcome, @IHeartAnimals!
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FYI, your profile link has the wrong url, so I asked a mod to fix it for you.
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You’re in Dallas and your husband is a coder? I am just east and my hobby is making iPhone apps. =)
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@Debbie’s detailed advice is great. I don’t have a family, so I’ll defer to her.
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However, I want to clarify expecations of “family friendly.” From the PP view, it’s literally answering this question:
- Now that I think about it, I would say “yes” though I live in a tiny home. That’s because I know some sitters are a “family” of a single mom and her teenage son.
- Another way to think of it is some PPs will think, “Is my sit suitable for all families?” vs “The “average” family?” vs “At least some families?”
- Because you don’t know how the PP was thinking about the question when they answered it, my suggestion is to not worry about that flag.
- If you want to use it for an initial search, okay, but don’t expect every sit to be suitable for a family of 5. And it depends on their ages, right? If you have 3 kids who are teens they might be fine in a home with lots of stairs, but 1 toddler might be a no-no.
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And if you’re searching only for houses, I would consider also apartments. Some may be as big as your motorhome, right?
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There’s not a great way to search listings for what you want. There’s no filter for X bedrooms, Y sq ft, or Z guests like you might find on Airbnb. You can suggest that by contact Membership Services.
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However, TH is meant for anyone/everyone who loves pets. I’m a solo male 40s sitter who especially likes cats, so I could bemoan when PPs seem to expect a female/couple/retired/dog-experienced/etc. But it’s fine, really. Now that I’ve got a couple sits under my belt, I feel I could find a sit almost anywhere, except maybe super popular places like NYC or London.
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So my suggestion is to be patient, diligent, flexible, positive. For example, if you have a motorhome, how many bedrooms do you really need? You could have fun rotating family members between the motorhome and the apartment/house.
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Oh, search these forums for similar topics. Like “family.” You’ll see lots of tips, ups, downs, and memorable stories!
Best of luck!
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