Whaaaaaaaat? No. Not possible. Really?
For me it was a room spray in the home owners toilet from The White Company in the UK that I fell in love with. Their Winter Home Spray that just smelt like Christmas to me - cinnamon, clove & orange. I paid GBP18 for a small 100ml and I thought that was expensive! No where near your GBP70.
A hand wash that I love and now buy regularly, thanks to discovering it at a sit, is from Bondi Wash, an Australian company. I’ve since bought many of their products, just beautiful.
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Does it come with jewelry? 
I’m very new at this. So far we’ve had one pet sitter. We gave them a $50.00 gift card to Publix Supermarket. That way if they used something they could just replace it. I’ve heard of leaving wine and cheese etc. but this seemed to be more practical. The rest of the stuff I really don’t care what they use. Just so I have milk and eggs when I get back 
. Am I wrong?
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Hi @WingNut , that sounds like a good idea but be sure to be clear with your sitters about what the gift card is for. If a home host left us a gift card we would assume that it was for us to treat ourselves to whatever we fancied rather than to replace items that we have used.
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As a HO, I would leave plenty of whatever is needed to ensure the home and pets are well supplied and any other consumables present are there for the sitter. I would not expect them to be replaced. I would ensure basics of tea, coffee, bread, milk, butter, spreads are present on the sitters arrival and then leave it up to the sitter to get whatever else they wanted/needed during their stay and to take that with them or leave - as they wished.
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As a sitter i tend to use very little from the HO in terms of food. But would expect cleaning supplies and toilet roll etc to be provided. I would replace if completely used up, but not if theres still some left.
As a HO, i tend to leave all the basics and dont expect them to be replaced. However, it was a little inconvenient recently when i returned from a trip to find that the sitter had not left even 1 single tea bag or any milk for us. As HOs we like to ensure our sitters have everything they need for the first day, so it would be nice to get home and make a cup of tea after a tiring journey! I think its mostly just common sense and common courtesy really x
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The only problem with your well thought out plan is house sitting abroad. I go to Hong Kong, Australia and other countries not in my own country of the U.K. So it’s a matter of getting to know the area of the country you’re staying.
I’ve been with T.H.S. eight years and have never had any issues with replacing supplies or not being left house hold cleaning products. Maybe I’ve been lucky.
Kind regards, Charlotte
During my last unreviewed sitting with an owner who had terrible hygiene standards in his own kitchen, he reminded me to watch out with the rubbish as in Switzerland, the bin liners cost 2 USD/EUR each so he just left me with one bag for 1 week. I left the flat cleaner than when I got in but refused to sit on the couch or use both the oven and microwave because they were filthy. Took pictures as usual when I got in and left the flat and sent them to THS Customer Service just in case 
Post moderated to remove sensitive info.
I only ask for 4 eggs and a quart of skim milk. 
We’ve just done our first 2 formal pet sits but through another site so new to this. Having said that, we got 2 glowing reviews but in fairness we couldn’t have asked for better hosts or pets.
Our own guiding principle was to leave the hosts with roughly the same they left us and of the same or similar quality/brand. That included any fresh produce they may have left.
Great your first 2 sits went so well @ianninga. Hope you left your owners great feedback too.
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Of course:-)
We even asked the pet sitting site (not this one, sorry THS) if we could revise our review of the first one as it didn’t do them justice which they allowed by exception.
I never run our own supplies down to such an extent and always have spares stored, so we wouldn’t put our house sitters in this position, but if they did use something up I would expect them to replace it. We’re very generous with our house sitters, provide a fridge full of food, a car full of petrol etc so I don’t think replacing a bottle of sunflower oil or replenishing loo rolls is a lot for a house sitter to do in return. Your situation sounds different though, and I’d be mortified if our sitters had to replace all the items you list in full! A box of dishwasher tablets is pretty expensive on its own, and lasts for ages. I would communicate with them, they probably just haven’t realised how run down their supplies are, and might offer to pay for the replacements and appreciate coming home to a stocked up house! You could always suggest shopping for for the items (maybe list them so that they understand the cost), and covering the fraction of the cost that’s proportionate to what you will have used? If it were me as the HO I would reply that I would cover the whole cost. The only thing I would add is that it’s frustrating to come home to empty supplies…we once arrived back from 2 weeks away and realized our house sitters had used every loo roll in the house, including our back up supplies. We had no loo rolls, and it was a Sunday and the shops were shut! Thankfully we still had tissues!
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Nice thinking. But if you don’t have a car…
Hi. I’m new to the site, although I’ve been animal -sitting professionally for a few years. I’m currently on my first sit with THS and loving it! - Super homeowners, super animals. But one question is preying on my mind, now the sit’s drawing to a close:
How much should I replace of the owners’ food and drink to which I’ve helped myself (with their permission)? Of course, I totally get that if I’ve scoffed a bottleful of their expensive whisky or eaten my way through their prime French cheese, I should replace that. And I would always make sure they come home to a full stock of the basics and anything else they’ve requested I get.
But I’ve been tying myself in knots trying to write down every potato chip and piece of fruit I’ve eaten (and it’s a long sit, so a lot of the stuff would have gone off anyway) so I can buy more. Also, they use expensive laundry and home-care products, some of which were almost empty when I arrived. It’s cost me a lot to buy new ones.
I want to do the right thing, but I’m not sure what that is. What do other sitters do?
Thanks.
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@Mehitabel I would like to wish you a very warm welcome to TrustedHousesitters and to the forum community. That is great news that you are on your first sit! As the questions around replacing food etc in the owner home has been asked on several other threads, I will merge these questions so you can see the previous answers.
I think you have nailed it already! Personally I would mostly replace expensive items or “basics” so that they don’t need to run to the store right away.
@Mehitabel As a sitter, on a long sit, I would probably buy cheaper laundry detergent and other personal care products, and use those while I was sitting. I buy my own detergent, soap, TP, at home, so why not do it when I’m sitting?
As for household cleaners - some HOs are particular about the cleaning products they use (allergies, environmental reasons, etc), so I wouldn’t substitute my own choices. I would buy replacements and mention that the others were almost finished. This was suggested above. Maybe the HOs will offer to pay.
I wouldn’t worry about replacing perishables although most HOs like to come home to basics like milk, bread, butter.
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I simpathise on this one, especially in a foreign country. When in Australia, I used what I thought was a very common item/brand. Only found it after going to 3 supermarkets😂
If I want to use something, that is unopened, I’ll google the local supermarket to see if the stock it.
Regarding other items, I replace anything that I use that was unopened. Interestingly, I don’t replace toilet rolls/kitchen towels.or detergents/cleaning products.
Intend to carry a lot of my own stuff, especially spices, as I follow a whole food plant based diet.
If I land in a new place/country, I’ll stock up from the local before I go to the sit. Generally I don’t leave the pet by themselves on the first day, sometimes even the second, the owner leaves.
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