We have a list of things (not sure what to call them - conditions, deal breakers, wishlist?) that we look for in a house-sit. Our list includes:
** Well trained and friendly pets. We don’t have pets sleep in bed with us but adore lap dogs & snuggle cats.
** Non-smoking households.
** Clean, safe and comfortable homes with well maintained facilities, including clean space in the fridge & freezer.
** A comfortable queen, king, or 2 single beds in the guest room with space to unpack.
** Has reliable internet and a clear work space, preferably including an adjustable office chair.
** Great communication
I’m interested to hear at what point others share their conditions with potential hosts. Do you do it directly by including them in (1) your profile, or (2) at application stage? Or do you do it (3) indirectly during a conversation before confirming a sit?
What have you found works best for you? Do you find being upfront about your deal breakers (please add!) saves time and sifts out sits that won’t work for you? Or do you wait to discuss in person?
If these are true deal breakers and there is no hint in the listing about any of the things you mention, you should mention them in your application. That will save everyone time, as many of these are not variables an HO can just fix for you.
As a telecommuter, I specify on my sitter profile that I need high-speed internet to Zoom.
I also note these on my sitter profile:
A friendly heads up about dealbreakers for sits:
• Your family members, roommates, tenants or guests can’t live at the home during my stay. (If you have a cleaner, gardener or pool cleaner who’ll be there, please let me know ahead of time, because I telecommute and wouldn’t want to be in their way.)
• No indoor cameras.
• No aggressive pets.
• No undeclared health conditions in pets, including pills or injections.
The above violate Trusted Housesitters terms. I mention that for hosts who are new to the site or are otherwise unfamiliar.
Plus, I note on my profile that I want to partner with hosts who’ve made firm travel plans and offer clean homes, with fridge and freezer space.
We’re basically a “go with the flow” senior couple - both very easygoing so don’t really have any “conditions”. We’ve been sitters with THS for 8 years and have never really had any bad experiences. Probably the only deal breaker is having a tv as we did arrive to meet homeowners for a potential sit many years ago only to discover they had no tv so declined. Despite homeowners saying their pets are well trained and friendly as one of your conditions, how exactly will you know that until you look after them? I personally detest video chats but have done them but for us, a video chat usually consists of a fun conversation getting to know the homeowners and their personalities and exchanging travel stories. Have never discussed “conditions” or “dealbreakers”. Has worked for us as we’ve had the greatest experiences in many luxurious homes locally and abroad and we have felt truly appreciated by the homeowners we’ve sat for.
Some of my biggest deal breakers are things I can see right upfront --my day to day comfort is really important to me so I pay a lot of attention to what the house is like in many respects-- or are often mentioned, so I just know right away not to apply. I also rely heavily on my intuition and that has seemed to serve me well over the years.
I get antsy in small spaces in general and since I sit with my husband, studio apartments–and also ‘regular’ apartments that look very small-- are non-starter unless it was a shorter sit to fill a gap in our schedule. This is something you can easily tell from the photos.
A ‘deal breaker’ I would mention in my initial message concerns housekeepers that are in the home on a daily or near daily basis. If there is mention of a cleaning person ,but not how often they come, or there is no mention of one, but it is in an area of the world where this is common, I always ask about this in the application message, letting them know right upfront we don’t do sits where this is the case.
While not a ‘dealbreaker’ per se, but more of a helpful FYI, when applying for international sits where I currently do not know where I will be just prior to getting there, I let hosts know this in case they only want sitters who are planning on purchasing their flights shortly after confirming the sit. So far this has never been a problem for any host.
I think the only ‘dealbreaker’ mentioned in my profile is that we need a decent Internet connection because we work from home.
I think if sitters have really strong preferences for certain things that are truly non-negotiable no matter what–no smoking in the house, no pets in bed, a minimum bed size-- putting it right into the profile,or at the very least mentioning it right upfront in the initial message is probably the best approach.
Agreed on a sit months ahead and then the host lets me know that their grown son would overlap my sit at their home, because he’d moved back to town.
Agreed on a sit, then the host sent me their welcome guide, which include references to a dog that needed letting out to pee overnight and another prone to diarrhea.
In both instances, those deal-breakers led to my withdrawal.
I know some sitters consider themselves easygoing. I’d say I am, too, but I have standards that I won’t sacrifice and I don’t worry if it puts off some hosts.
For me, sitting is icing. I do it only as it suits, and I don’t want to waste time talking with unsuitable hosts unnecessarily.
I’ve done 18 sits, with terrific reviews, and have felt appreciated as well. I sometimes sit luxury homes, sometimes not. That doesn’t weight heavily for me, because I own luxury homes.
Those points re the grown son overlapping the sit and the dog’s requirement should have been noted in the listing so can perfectly understand withdrawing. Sounds like you’re on the right track for you!
The grown son didn’t move back till well after we’d agreed on our sit, and I don’t think they knew when we agreed. With the dogs, that host clearly tried to hide issues.
My hope with declaring deal-breakers upfront is that hosts who think they can mislead and trap me into a sit won’t try it.
For context, if I encounter deal-breakers on arrival, I’m prepared to give 24 hours notice in writing to THS and the hosts, so alternative care can be arranged. I won’t stay beyond, because I don’t think hosts who lie or mislead should get to exploit sitters — me or anyone else.
We like video calls and usually enjoy the chats and exchanging travel stories too We’ve had only one that felt like a job interview, and another where the owners didn’t chat easily and felt awkward. As for having well trained & friendly pets, that’s to flag as part of our conversation but I take your point that it’s very subjective. All our experience has been on another platform here in Australia which is more relaxed (too relaxed sometimes! I get surprised that many listings have no photos and a single line of description for 3 week sits!!)
So far I haven’t included my dealbreakers. I read listings thoroughly (incl photos) and refrain from applying if there are potential dealbreakers or signals thereof.
I’ve also been declined a couple of times when I applied and asked questions because of their profile. It was a little unusual to be declined so quickly after an application, so I believe they didn’t like the question. It would probably be sits I would have declined if they answered, I guess. (One was a listing that stated cleaning pee and poo as task, I asked if the dog went potty inside of home. The other a dog I wondered about based on description, so I asked what the dog was like on walks, to other dogs, for instance, and what measures was to be taken).
I probably wouldn’t say «these are my dealbreakers», just pull out and withdraw/ decline should they occur. If it was a violation of terms I might mention to look into that as a favor to both host and other sitters. If violation in listing I have reported it to member services.
Thanks @Garfield, likewise we scrutinise the photos and listing, and if something isn’t clear, we’ll ask. I think you’re right in saying the hosts who don’t respond to your questions are probably the ones you wouldn’t choose to sit for.
If I had something that would absolutely make me unable to do the sit I’d note it in my application and give the hosts the chance to reject me at the start of the process.
Likewise if I’m not clear on some aspects they describe in their listing.
I did a sit recently which had deal breakers for me. Their cat was very elderly and incontinent and I was expected to clean up the cats messes from their very expensive wood flooring throughout a multiple level property. This involved removing the mess, disinfecting, mopping and drying each time. Not the cats fault but should have been disclosed to a sitter prior to accepting said sit.
I had another sit where they were building a new home next door and were banging/drilling between 7am to 6pm most days. As I work remotely often with call or video chats I had to reschedule a load of these and relocate to a local coffee shop for some.
I also had a sit were the HO forgot to advise one of her cats had started having seizures. The poor cat had 3 seizures during my sit. This is the sit where I rushed cat to the vet but the vet wanted 2500 euro’s for scans I didn’t have the ability to pay and was rejecting the HO offer to pay over the phone. It was resolved when the vet relented. Now I ask all HO what’s the situation with covering any vet bills in the unlikely event I need to rush their pet to the vets.
Sounds like you’ve learnt to ask some good questions @richten1 after some unfortunate experiences! Will definitely add the question about vet bills to the list, thanks
We don’t communicate our deal breakers to owners. Most of yours don’t need communicating at all, like these:
Non smoking households. - we put we are non smokers in our profile, which probably deters smoking households from reaching out to us (we have done 30+ sits and none of them have been smokers… and we didn’t say a word).
Clean, safe and comfortable homes with well maintained facilities - that’s evident in their photo’s, images are so crystal clear nowadays.
Fridge & freezer space - we’ve always had fridge space, and personally I wouldn’t expect freezer space, as they are going on holiday and have enough on their minds, trying to eat their fridge contents.
A comfortable queen, king, or 2 single beds in the guest room with space to unpack. - that’s all visual on the images.
has clear work space, adjustable office chair. - that’s visual in the photo’s or if there’s just a dining table then at least we know in advance which is fine.
Good wifi That’s usually written in their profile.
Great communication - the speed of their first message let’s us know that, because we typically get a response within 2 hours of applying for a sit, usually straight away.
But as for the pets-in-beds thing, in all cases the owners said they wouldn’t expect their sitters to have their pets sleeping with them, so we played it by ear once we’d met the pet and saw what they were like on a night, and obviously if they were smelly we wouldn’t have them in bed at all, but they’ve been fine anyway.
Good questions @DeeMcC
We don’t include any of these deal breakers in our profile . We select the sits that we apply for so we sift out any that don’t meet our criteria for a mutual exchange.
The point of putting these in a profile would be , I assume , in the event that an owner notices your profile and sends you an invitation. Whilst we have received 100+ invitations none of these have resulted in a sit since either the dates or locations didn’t work for us . On the other hand we have a very good success rate with our applications- where we search for suitable sits and apply .
One big deal breaker for us , that isn’t always stated in the listing , is if the pets can never be left alone . If how long they can be left alone for is not stated in the listing we ask pre-application .
By that I mean that we apply ( because that’s the only way to contact the host) and say your home and pets look lovely before we apply please can you tell us how long your pets can be left alone for ? Depending on the reply we will either withdraw or submit a full application .
Other deal breakers could be the arrangements for payment of vet bills ( are they expecting sitter to pay upfront ) , will they provide a Welcome Guide ( we want to see that as soon as sit is confirmed ) and where the dogs are exercised ( are we expected to transport them in our vehicle to the location of their daily walks ) We ask about all of these in our video chat before confirming a sit .
Interesting. To be completely honest, our primary focus when selecting sits is the dog breed. Once we identify dogs that match our preferences, we then look at the house itself. After that, we review the feedback from previous sitters and take note of what’s mentioned regarding the home and the responsibilities.
We’ve clearly outlined our boundaries in our profile, so when we apply, we tend to keep our messages brief. We usually mention how much we like their pets and then ask them to take a close look at our profile, as we’ve put a lot of effort into it. If they feel we’d be a good fit, we encourage them to reach out to us. This approach has always worked well for us.
We’re quite selective when it comes to dog breeds, so we don’t send out mass applications to homeowners. I really appreciated one host’s honesty in letting us know that their place might not be a good match, as there was nearby construction work. It showed me that they truly read and respected our preferences. That kind of consideration is always appreciated.
