I heard an interview on a podcast a couple of years ago, of a guest who had spent several years traveling the world inexpensively by house sitting for others who were temporarily away from their homes. That led Maricela and me to look into it further.

We found there are several websites that connect house sitters with those needing the service. In about 99% of cases, the homeowner has one or more pets, which is the primary reason they need someone to stay at their house while they are away. A house itself can usually be left alone, but not so for pets that aren’t able to travel with their owners. The ability for the pet to stay at home in familiar surroundings is a much better experience for the pet than to leave them in a dog kennel, for example.

We also found there are a wide variety of sits available – short term (a weekend), long term (some are 6 months or even a year), domestic, international (Europe and Australia are popular), dogs, cats, even some with farm animals.

Maricela and I signed up on a website while we were still in California, and did a couple of house sits while we were working, to try it out. We wanted to get a feel for it while we were close to home.

Once we were in Mexico, we checked the listings occasionally. There aren’t as many listings in Mexico, but eventually we found one in Mexico City, about four hours away from where we were staying. So we traveled to Mexico City for ten days. While there we were responsible for taking care of three dogs and two cats. They could be left alone for several hours during the daytime, giving us ample time to explore the city. It worked out great for both us and the home/pet owners and the pets, and it reaffirmed the experience we had in California.

As mentioned in another post, we checked to see if there were any interesting listings in the US, since we had to leave Mexico at least briefly to renew our visas. We liked one we found in Kentucky, and that’s where we are currently.

The website we go through is TrustedHousesitters.com. There is an annual fee to join and to be able to see the full listings, although it does allow non-members to see some information. The last time I checked, the fee was $119 per year. If anyone is interested, use the following link for a 25% discount: https://www.trustedhousesitters.com/refer/RAF123171/

Let us know if you try it out!