Hi everyone!
I don’t bother applying for a sit when there’s too much to do and the owners seem to be taking unfair advantage of the imbalance between offer and demand on the house sitting market.
For example, yesterday I saw a new sit where the title was “very clean sitter wanted”, which in itself did not raise any flags. But then the HO detailed a slew of daily pet care tasks and housework chores that had me thinking : "wait a minute, now… this is a full-time job !!! "
I’m sorry, I have a job.
And, no doubt, in this COVID context, some sitters are now “trapped” in a foreign country and so desperate for accommodation that they will accept any house sit.
Fortunately, that is not my case, so I just don’t bother applying.
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Hi @Catherine welcome to our community forum, thank you for joining we are looking forward to getting to know members better and sharing in in their TrustedHousesitters journey.
It would be great to hear where pet sitting has taken you and about some of your favourite sits (although we know they are all different and special in their own way, it’s the animals that make them so)
Thank you again for being here and enjoy connecting with other members …
Angela & The Team
Very useful conversations. Thanks.
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Hi @Jill-catlover welcome to our community forum … we are looking forward to getting to know you better and thank you for being here, glad you found the conversation useful.
Angela & the team
Bonjour ! And Welcome from Quebec…
I understand your point. THS assignments must be a win-win situation, which most of the offers are. Personally, for examples, I do not wish to mow the grass nor shovel the snow unless it’s the entrance steps.
No problem to do any tasks related to the animals as this is the main reason that I am there. I take care and keep the house clean, collect the mail, can cook a meal for the owners when they come back, water plants and garden but I have no skills at repairing plumbing.
But I will make sure to contact the owners and the good persons to fix what need to be fixed. I know though some members are very handy and can do some repairs themselves. It has to be discussed with the owners before accepting the assignment so everyone is in the same page.
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If it’s a place I’d like to go, I apply. I know I’m a “catch” and have great reviews so I just go for it. On my last trip, to a lovely apartment in downtown Montreal, the woman had had several responders. The lady said that as soon as she saw my profile, she had a good feeling. It turned out to be a wonderful trip and we have become FaceBook friends. I also invite people to look at my House sit profile. Once they see how I keep my home, that can be comforting.
That said, if 150 people have already applied for a sit in another country, I may not bother—especially during Covid. Transportation isn’t reliable and I wouldn’t blame people for wanting someone “in-country” or someone who will already be in that area for additional travel.
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We don’t usually bother to apply on sits after they have 4-7 applicants but on two occasions we did apply on sits that had 20-50 applicants and we got both the sits. I think some homeowners make quick decisions and other like to go through many applicants. If I was a homeowner I’d probably be the one that would look at a number of profiles of sitters prior to choosing.
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I will not apply if there are no photos of the pets or the interior of the house or the interior of the house looks a mess. However I am suspicious when the photos are real estate photos as that may not reflect what the condition of the house is actually in.
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I don’t quite understand why real estate or sales brochure photos are used by HO… surely its not too much effort to take some real photos in this day and age!
I agree, a little bit off-putting
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The only thing that puts me off applying for a sit is pictures of unmade beds, untidy garden, sink full of unwashed dishes, dogs in dirty beds. If a pet owner can’t be bothered to tidy up for pictures and leave their pets in a dirty environment then I’m not interested.
Number of applicants doesn’t put me off but I probably don’t put as much effort in if I’m the 50th person but I’ve always got the thought “maybe I’ll get lucky”.
Elsie
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Hi Martin @Noelene Real Estate images are not always the best representation of a home although it might be that owners believe “professional” images used to sell a property are an improvement on their own photography also those very images may be the ones that motivated them to view and buy their home and they feel it they will have the same motivation for sitters, not to buy the home but to apply for the sit.
Imagery is so important and we do have a blog piece to help owners choose the best pictures for a listing …
I don’t mind real estate photos because they show the house clearly, well lit etc. Sometimes people aren’t great with digital photos themselves. Also, sometimes the listing info is available on the photo and you can easily find the (former) listing online and find out more details about the house that are nice to know.
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I can’t stand to write the “we went with someone else” message, so I usually pause my dates as soon as I get a good potential application. This probably limits my choices considerably, but I haven’t been able to get good at sending “Dear John” letters 
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If the sit fits my needs or personal requirements, then I’ll apply. I’m not fussed by number of applicants as there have been sits where there were dozens of applicants and I was chosen within hours of applying.
Things that make me not apply for a sit:
- A smoker’s home. Whether they allow smoking inside or not, if the owners are smokers, it’s going to stink and that stink will get on you.
- Cameras IN the house. I won’t even apply. I don’t care if they might be willing to turn them off.
- A type of pet I don’t enjoy sitting for (I don’t generally like small dogs or reptiles)
- A date/location I’m not interested in
- A short sit unless it’s in a city I REALLY want to visit, one I can do between other scheduled sits, or timing works out perfectly (once I needed to be in Cambridge for a specific weekend between sits and a listing popped up for those specific dates. It was pretty perfect)
- No real information in the listing. A friend just posted a listing for a sit that I can’t do and she included very little info so I gave her some tips about beefing it up.
- Bad/few pictures. I want to get a feel of the home I will be living in. I had a couple not great surprises early on so I’m more stringent about this now.
- Unrealistic expectations. Examples:
~ excessive non-pet related work - one place bred orchids and the maintenance plan for those was MUCH more detailed than the pet requirements
~ excessive walk requirements or an extreme schedule - 7 30+ minute walks a day is a bit OTT for me, and one sit made clear that the first walk had to take place by 5 am. That’s too early for me to be up and out. I can let them into the yard for their first pee of the day but clothed and coherent enough for a walk? not going to happen at that time of day.
~ excessive time with pet requirements - I spend the majority of time in the home with the pet or out with the pet. being around the pet is why I do this. but one listing said you couldn’t leave the pet alone for more than 20 minutes. That’s not even enough time to go grocery shopping, much less have lunch or dinner somewhere.
~ excessive training requirements - I think arriving the day before is a good idea for most sits. For a more complicated sit like multiple types of animals, a complicated house, etc. maybe 2-3 days. one sit wanted someone to be there for a week. the owner was literally only going to be gone 12 hours on the last day. but apparently their dog was intense enough that you needed a week of training to care for it for 12 hours. - gut feeling. Some listings you just get a gut feeling about. I’ve been doing this long enough to hone that. And it may make me miss out on some good sits, but I’ve ignored it in the past to my regret. I’d rather miss out on a good sit than get stuck on a bad one.
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I think I’ve come across a few of those sits and given them a wide berth! 
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Dear John letters are never easy. We as sitters must do the same occasionally when we’re invited to sit and it doesn’t work with schedules or requirements. But ultimately, a kind, respectful ‘No thank you’ is always appreciated. We as sitters know that we’re not going to get every sit we apply for, so don’t worry too much about letting us down 
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We usually apply within hours of a listing being put up and try to within the 4-7 range. It’s very rare that we would apply for a sit with more than 7 applicants (at the very least they are probably already talking to 1-3 people and we don’t want to flood them with further applications).
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I am new but would hope the owners would weed out the most qualified and not just those who want to sit for the house because it was pretty stellar in a great beach town or where ever. I see a lot of super boujee houses getting a ton of applications but as a pet owner myself I would weed out the top 4 most qualified and then have a video chat with each but keep the other applicants to the side I still liked and decline those that did not interest me especially having a stellar home. I want the best sitter for my own pets-would not matter who applied first or those with average experience or even those with massive reviews. I think the video meet and greet is a tell all and then for me as the sitter it may be a great home but if something was not to my liking say they were smokers or had a platform bed (I can’t handle those) or dogs that could not be left alone or details not mentioned in the posting then just as they interview you out, you interview them. I want to be able to give them the best sit possible even if they lived right on the beach or in a castle. It’s more important that we connected and a win win for both if I get that opportunity and if not there are many more sits-wasn’t meant to be.
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Completely agree. When we post a sit in good time, we get all excited to see all the applicants but there are many dodgy looking ones so we hesitate and go for a “best of a bad lot” and wait a bit and suddenly a gem comes in. Can’t say I’ve ever had 40 applicants, but definitely 15!
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It surprises me that you have to choose between the “best of a bad lot”. Are there really a lot of bad sitters in your opinion? Is so, what makes them bad? I have rarely seen a bad review about a sitter but maybe a review hasn’t been done if they’ve not come up to scratch….I’d be interested to know
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