Thank you. I will definitely check. I am talking about over the years though, not just recently.
Wow, itâs startling to read that only 25% of sitters have responded to invites! Always interesting to see things from the perspective of a home owner. I donât quite understand the mentality of not responding. Itâs courteous to do so, even if the sitter is booked during those dates. I hope you are able to find someone suitable for your sit.
As @anon27523372 mentioned, it should work both ways with communication. Iâve ended up putting a note to this effect on my profile, asking home owners to respond as it is a horrible feeling to spend a while adhering your application to a specific sit, and to get excited about it, only to receive radio silence! I also donât think it bodes well, since good communication and mutual respect are so essential to a successful sit.
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Totally understand that. I only invite people who have specified the sort of thing and area i am offering, and very rarely local anyway.
The question is, why is it rude for a HO to not reply, to the point they are being limited to have only 5 responses before being forced to take some action, yet not rude for a sitter to not reply?
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Thatâs a good point Petermac, thank you.
For clarity, my question wasnât meant to be combative at all, but a genuine reflection. Itâs never bothered me before, it was just something that had been raised in the thread and got me musing.
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No! Didnât think you were! Just didnât want anyone to think i was setting up an âUs and Themâ thing 
Thatâs the trouble with me, my brain goes off in tangents which does not always translate well!
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I think the ideal situation would be to acknowledge the invite or application, whether youâre a sitter or home owner, even with a stock response. It doesnât feel great to contact someone and it go unacknowledged. Then again, I find invites to be relatively infrequent so perhaps if someone is inundated with invites, it would be quite understandable to ignore them.
When it comes to whether to travel or stay locally, itâs another case of âeach to their ownâ. I am also from Glasgow, and I prefer to sit in Scotland and the north of England. This has suited me really well, and I find that many home owners like the assurance of having someone who is fairly local. Iâm sure there are other home owners who enjoy the variety of meeting people from further afield who are travelling, and donât always want to have the same sitter. Looking through these forums, one thing is for sure and that is that there is no âone size fits allâ when it comes to house sitting! Itâs just about finding the right âfitâ.
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Yes, I think this is a great idea for discussion. This element has not been really changed at all as far as i can see, and as you say is probably not really useful. When I have not had any applicants in the past i have gone through and searched on certain criteria, but it is like a needle in a haystack in reality, especially now there are a lot more sitters than back in the day. Either lose it, or do something clever and more efficient with it that would benefit both sitters and HO.
My dream sitter would be someone in the same country, or region, who loved to come and sit for us, and who was close enough to consider coming back repeatedly if they liked it enough, so that would suit me as a HO too!
Also, when a sitter is not looking for sits, they may have notifications turned off.
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I wasnât thinking of immediate replies at all in my situation. My sits usually have a few months notice so it would not be about urgency, though I guess for those HO who are looking for an urgent sitter then that would matter.
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I would like to add that I always respond to invitations within 24 hours, and in most cases, within a couple of hours.
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I had a couple of invitations come through when I was out of cell/mobile range last week. I was camping in a national park. When I looked at the sits in question, they were no longer needing a sitter.
As for your glitch, I suggest you start a new listing.
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Iâm definitely in agreement with this! As a sitter, I prefer to have regular sits too. I think there are benefits for both sitters and home owners (and, of course, animals) in the familiarity. Itâs so lovely to be recognised by the animals, and to know where everything is. Definitely easier than starting from scratch in a new environment.
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Iâm sure youâre right that most sitters would prefer to go somewhere other than their home town. Iâve definitely stayed closer to home than Singapore, but Iâve seen some beautiful areas I didnât even know existed! Iâd love to do a sit abroad at some point, but would be nervous about being so far from home if anything were to go wrong. You are obviously very familiar with Singapore, but Iâve heard of people from Australia coming to Scotland for sits when they donât know the area, which is very brave!
I have been to Britain twice (2013 and 2015) and would go there in a heart beat. Me and my husband are both super nerds (trivia lovers) and enjoy history. While everyone would be on the London Eye or at a main tourist attraction, weâd be looking at the british museum looking at archives or go to Yorkshire and check out old rugby league grounds and old archives in libraries.
However, we are animal lovers mainly and our little princess bengal only likes us doing short term sits at the moment. When we travelled to Asia in 2019, we got a dear friend to take her in for the duration and now that that dear friend is back in the same city, we will be utilising her next longer term holiday which is hopefully England (family there and I am half british!). We have young kids but they are always supervised during any house sit and I am like a hawk!
I hope you find someone & yes, communication is crucial. I have been invited to two local sits, without a personalised centred greeting and despite the dates not working for us , I have been friendly and introduced myself and asked to be kept in mind but of course, asked them to have a look at my profiles first. Both HOâs did not indicate they were family friendly but after a detailed response to the invites, I have worked them over âas long as the kids donât break anythingâ and one is changing their advertisement to âfamily friendlyâ. I am pretty sure Boodie, you read each one before sending an invite, thoroughly unlike these HOâs.
Can I just say, bengal cats are the absolute best! 
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i agree. I would love to go somewhere other than the city I live in. I would love to see more of Asia.
I wanted to add something to our little conversation about this, just for info. THS sorted my issue where there was a glitch and they had had my listing showing a âreviewing applicationsâ when I had not had an application yet. I had an email to assure me that my listing was now back on as a new one (though they did not tell me how it happened in the first place).
However, it was this advice in the email that made me think:
âRemember you do not need to wait for sitters to apply to you, you can reach out to those you like using the sitter search page, where you can use the filters to find specific results and matches. You can then invite them to apply and start a conversation between you both to find out if it is the right match.â
So interestingly, TH do advertise this as a viable option to owners. Just thought is was worth flagging.