Hello everyone. My name is Kedi (it’s Turkish for cat. My humans have a weird sense of humour). I want to tell you about my first TH experience. First of all, I have to explain that I am a princess. I fully expect humans to do my bidding, and I am very good at communicating exactly what I want. So anyway… my usual humans decided that they wanted to go somewhere for a few weeks. No idea why they’d want to leave me. As I say… weird. But they replaced themselves with 2 more humans (Brianna & Aaron). Now I’m quite reserved usually. I don’t go in for all this lovey-dovey stuff with humans I don’t know. But these two seemed ok, so I tried a bit of a snuggle on the sofa. Perfect fit! Lap cuddles? Perfect! Lying on feet? Perfect!!! Oh - I was in heaven! They even let me lie on the laptop when they were working. (Regular humans take note). And then when they started taking photos of me… BLISS! Anyway, long story short. TH is fantastic, and I get spoiled rotten, and I rather like that. Now if someone could just make my usual humans go away again…?
Kedi wow you are so clever, who taught you to use the keyboard? Kitties I sit just lie on it … supporting the old adage “If cats could type they probably wouldn’t” I’m so impressed your Highness, I didn’t mean to address you so informally.
Human replacements with comfy body parts a cat’s purrfect pet sitter, also we accept that some felines might not want to be lovely dovey, we know our place, loyal servants.
Welcome to our community forum and we look forward to hearing more from you … happy #Caturday for tomorrow.
Angela and the Team
What amazing pictures
Our first experience with TH was as a HO in 2012. My Dad had been living with us, he had recently died &, rather tentatively, we decided to go on holiday. We found a fantastic sitter who came all the way from Australia to the UK to look after our rescue cat & new bantams who had just started laying. It was amazing as we’d never imagined a complete stranger staying in our home! She was so reassuring and it opened our minds to a whole new world. Three years later we became sitters ourselves too, and we’ve been been travelling and sitting ever since!
Our first sit in 2015 was in our own county, in a lovely village we’d never visited before, with fabulous windswept walks on the South Downs. We had a wonderful time, looking after hens & 3 lively terriers. On our first morning the clocks went forward to British Summer Time. The dogs and ourselves had to adjust our body clocks, but they looked after us and kept us on our toes!
Phoebe, thank you for sharing such wonderful memories of your journey with TrustedHousesitters, 2012 gosh we were just in our pet sitting infancy then and your thoughts as a new owner have not changed with members across the years and still the experiences being shared prove just how special our community is … based on a love for animals, the one thing which connects us all.
Thank you again, happy pet and housesitting wishing you many great new experiences to come and we look forward to sharing in more of them.
These are the cutest pictures ever!
Anchorage, AK. By phone, I was told that a certain herb was legal to grown in Alaska and would I mind taking care of the plants as well as the 2 cats and a dog. I had a green thumb so said, “sure”, picturing 6 little plants. HAH!
The couple was leaving the next day. When it was time for bed I was shocked to find that their 2nd bathroom was a FOREST! I went to bed amongst bags of soil, grow lights, etc.
In the middle of the night, I freaked out fearing I was in an Iffy legal situation so sent the owner an email expressing my concerns. I re-packed. In the morning, I was cheerfully greeted and reassured about guidelines.
I had reached out to a Meet-Up hiking group so Ted and I got to go on several hikes. With permission, one night I locked the cats indoors and Ted and I headed for the Kenai Peninsula where I had rented an Air BnB Trailer,
Oh my gosh … what an experience that takes plant care to new and dizzy heights @ShulasMom, did it make you Xtra careful when applying for future sits which required you to “water the plants”
Thank you for sharing your lovely pics and a wonderful story.
Hi all. I’m on my very first housesit now in NYC. I just arrived a few hours ago. I’m actually from NY so just came for a visit to my hometown, and wasn’t expecting any issues, but…I’m hoping for some advice.
While the apartment looked great in the posting (clean, modern)-- and also during my Zoom chat with the owner-- now that I’m here I can see that’s it’s quite dirty. The first thing I did was go the store to buy toilet cleaner, it’s that bad. On top of it not being clean, it smells heavily of cat urine - tolerable on it’s own (hey it happens), but combined with the general uncleanliness it just makes it worse. I can deal with the lack of general tidiness–things are “in order” but clearly nothing has been wiped down in ages. But it’s the fact that the owner thought it was ok not to clean either of her toilets that has me upset.
And I’m stuck here for 5 weeks.
I have another sit lined up for August that I don’t even want to go on now because this one is so disappointing. Really, it’s unacceptable, but I can’t leave 2 cats here to fend for themselves so what can I do? Has anyone else had issues like this? And how is it typically handled? The owner is road-tripping and said she won’t be able to regularly check her phone.
Definitely. Actually the guy had it all synchronised with Alexa. Alexa turned fans off and on, provided them with music and turned the lights on and off, etc. I just watered and tried to live with open windows as the smell was overwhelming.
My Alaska home was like that. I spent 1.5 days scrubbing. After that it was fine. In the review from the owner, she commented that I left the house even cleaner than it was before—-a low bar was superseded. I learned to ask for several interior photos and FaceTime videos after that.
Thanks, ShulasMom. I was thinking that I should request a Facetime tour next time. If there is a next time that is…I’ll see how my August sit goes.
For now, just keep thinking about the kitties you are helping. If the urine smell is coming from a particular spot, I recommend Angry Orange, a Bio-Enzymatic Pet Stain and Odor Eliminator that you can buy on Amazon. It does a great job of eliminating the urine smell from carpets. Hope the next pet sit meets your expectations better. It’s a drag sitting in a place that is non-functional or dirty.
Hi @romanholiday80 welcome to our community forum. I’m sorry that your very first experience is making you feel uncomfortable because of the poor level of cleanliness, this is totally unacceptable. You mention the owners are on a road trip, is it possible to connect as they might be able to help by getting a cleaner and providing some pet friendly plug-ins for the odor etc., Try speaking to them, explain you are feeling uncomfortable and would like their help.
If there is no resolution and you want to leave contact Membership Services who will help as you will need to arrange hand over cover and pet care with the owner.
I’m sorry for the position you find yourself in and empathize completely but please don’t be too disillusioned, you will naturally be questioning and wondering about your next sit. Each sit is different the key to having the best possible experience is communication before confirming a sit, we can help guide you with this and our experienced members will have many tried and tested tips.
House sitting is an amazing lifestyle and presents opportunities to enjoy wonderful experiences, I’ve had many over the years but a few less than perfect too.
I hope this helps, feel free to reach out to me by DM.
Our first ever sit turned into a non pet sit but we didn’t mind. We made a fantastic life long friend who we regularly message and meet up when we can.
We were accepted for a sit in Bethesda, Washington DC many many moons ago. The pet was a black Labrador called Ben who was exactly our kind of dog. The owner was travelling by car to Canada to see her grown up daughter and grandchildren. It was all arranged. A couple of days before the sit the owner messaged to say her daughters had persuaded her to take Ben with her. They missed the family pet. But she insisted we stay in her apartment for the sit period. We agreed.
That was the beginning of our friendship. Sadly Ben died before we got to meet him but we have stayed in the owners apartment many times and she has gone sailing with us when we were in Annapolis. We message each other regularly and each knows there is always a bed when we are in town.
Our second sit did involve beautiful dogs. The owners and us connected immediately - a Scottish connection - and we are in contact regularly. When they are in the UK they visit and we have had some really fun trips. Likewise in the US. Best one was to the Braemar Gathering. Trying to explain what was going on to a pair of Yanks was hilarious.
Yes, looking after wonderful animals and travelling is our aim but it’s amazing the firm friends we have made doing it.
Thank you THS.
Elsie
Really sorry to hear this. I guess we all have different standards of cleanliness.
You could try a cleaning blitz to make it more bearable ? You shouldn’t have to, but better to get to an acceptable standard than spend 5 weeks being unhappy ?
To reassure you I have completed many sits and without exception all houses have been very clean, so maybe you are just unlucky with this one.
@romanholiday80 , @Alisonlea is right. If need be, get the cleaning done at the outset. I have had similar experiences. I could not use the bathrooms at one sit until I had cleaned the toilets and removed mildew in the shower/tub. I had to buy a toilet brush because they didn’t have one (put that on my “dream request list!” I’ve run into this at more than one sit. 
) At another, I did not want to put my food in the fridge until I had cleaned it. Once these were done, I felt much better about being there.
Yes, we had one like that on our first pet sit abroad, in France.
We had to clean the green algae from the hen containers, and one of the cats was pitifully ill.
We had to take her to the vet, nurse her like a baby & try to give her medication, against her will.
We soon learnt to look at previous reviews - in this case none - and begin to ask more questions beforehand.
What kept us going was to focus on the poor cat and to value what was good about being there.
Instead of most people who try to go easy, I, with zero horse experience, sat three giant horses and two tiny dogs 
quite the initiation hahaha. I happened to be in the area and got to meet the owner so she gave me a chance for a first sit.
I feel SO fortunate, as a homeowner (well, more of a small-farm owner), to have had the astonishingly competent, caring and cheerful help of Mike and Judy, who looked after the homestead while I traveled for 5 1/2 weeks in May/June 2021.
They are a delight, and I consider them family, now - whether they want to be, or not!
They looked after my farmstead indoors and out, as well as doting on the cats, chickens and horses who populate the place. Can’t say enough good things about them, nor can I thank THS enough for creating this ‘platform’ for homeowners and house sitters to meet, get acquainted and - work things out.
Here they are, on the day they headed out for new adventures 