012- House Sitting

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The main topic today is house sitting.

When do you get their key? Can you eat their food? What do you do with your time? All that and so much more!

The Role of a House and Pet Sitter

What exactly is a house/pet sitter? A house sitter is an individual hired by a homeowner to maintain the home while the homeowner is away. A house sitter may be compensated by an agreed upon pay or the ability to live rent free in the home while the owner is not there. In exchange, house sitters assume general responsibilities involved in the maintenance of the home such as watering plants, taking out garbage, checking mail, and deterring intruders. If you would like for your house sitter to take care of your pet as well, make sure to discuss this prior to their first visit. Make sure you go over feeding and walking schedules and anything else they must know to keep your pet healthy and happy. Put simply, a house and pet sitter will make sure everything runs smoothly with your home and your pets, just as if you were there.

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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

Provided by otter.ai

0:16

I'm Collin. And I'm Megan. And this is pet sitter confessional. An open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter.

0:25

Hello and welcome to Episode 12 where today we're going to talk all about how sitting and this is when you go to the client's home and you stay there overnight. So there are those that travel internationally for house it like Kelly, the house it diva on episode nine. And there are those that house it more locally, like Alex and Beth from episode six. So check out both of those episodes for a recap on what they do and how they house it. Many times international housesitting is done for free and as a trade because the owner is providing accommodation while the pet sitter is providing obviously pets. setting. So locally based housesitting, particularly in the night in the United States is for a fee.

1:07

Do you want to think about the duration of the city that you would like? Would you be willing to take a house it for a week or less? What would you be doing long term housesitting. I know for us I think the longest housesitting that we have done was about a month as some clients traveled over to Europe. So that was quite the investment of time on our part. Make sure you get the pet schedule so that you can mimic it as much as possible. This is really important, especially to do that before the owner leaves. When do they eat? When do they get up? How often do they usually go out? All those things? And then there's the big question, do you eat their food for international housesitting, it's typically customary for the owner to provide the house sitters first meal or so during this day, and the house sitter to provide the owner's first meal when they return home. So that's for international travel. If you're a stay more local, you'll definitely want to check with the owner before you Start chowing down on anything in their freezer or their fridge. That's a question to bring up during the meet and greet. Sometimes they'll bring it up right away. We've had clients ask us if they could make us anything during this day and that's been very nice. But buy us groceries or buy groceries before we get there. We always say no, no, we provide our own food. But if they do say you can eat whatever you want, that is certainly very welcome.

2:23

And of course there are those stories of the dogs that are comes over and drinks all the alcohol and eats all the food and please don't be one of those

2:30

down. That's not a good you don't want to be that person.

2:32

Another question that you'll want to ask the owner before you stay there is can you do laundry there? Do they even have a washer and dryer at their home? Or will you have to go to a laundromat? Are there any parts of their house that are off limits to either you or the pets? If the dogs aren't supposed to be on the bed or the couch or if there's an upstairs you'll want to know where the pet is not supposed to be or if there's a locked room. Obviously you and pat are not supposed to be in that A lot of owners have gun safes and so they keep them locked in the closet, will you be able to use their car is another question that you will want to ask. So we have house that before and we have used the owners car because either the dogs were too large to be in our car, or they were just more comfortable and able to access the owners car better. We had a 16 year old Rhodesian Ridgeback and a 13 year old Beagle mix that we had to take in their van to be walked every morning at the local walking track at the college, and the Rhodesian Ridgeback would not fit into our car. So the owner allowed us to use her car every morning. So if you like your house really hot or really cold, that's something that you'll want to check with the owners about because homeowners sometimes want a guarantee that you won't crank their heating or AC built through the ceiling when they're gone. So you'd want to settle this in advance so that you aren't stuck with the Or they aren't stuck with the bill at the end of it. Another crucial question is Where are you going to sleep? Do they have a guest bed for you to sleep in? Or will you be sleeping in the master or even on the couch?

4:11

Sometimes that'll depend on where the dog is going to be most comfortable. If the dog is used to somebody sleeping in the master bedroom, they may ask you to sleep there or if the dog just couldn't care less, they'll say sleep wherever went now sitting, a rule we like to go by is leave it cleaner than when you found it. How should you clean their house using their products like their vacuum mop, dish soap, etc. This can be problematic if the vacuum is not good at vacuuming, or

4:37

we've had that before.

4:38

Yeah, where it was almost like a toy vacuum for a large house or something. And it just it didn't work at all. So if they don't have those cleaning products there, you may have to bring them over to clean. I know that sounds like a lot to do and go through for this. But it's a way of telling the owners that you care about their home and that you respect being there. At the meet and greet, you'll need to discuss where This applies are for the dog or cat. Make sure the owner has enough food or medications for the entire state plus a little extra just in case they get delayed. We've had that happen before where medications ran out because the owner had to stay long. And we had to get those supplied from the vet just like we said in the boarding in your own home episode. If you are doing a long housesitting, be sure to include pictures of different settings. clients want to see their pet doing different activities, playing outside, cuddling in their bed and playing with their toys and all of those things. Make sure you include them in as much as you can. During your stay. You want to ask the client if they have a preferred walking route, places to avoid or places to encourage the dog to go to do they have friends in the area that the dog would like to play with while you're there. And then there's cameras. Do they have any? Will they be using them? And where are they located?

5:52

More importantly, though, are you comfortable with cameras at all?

5:55

For us, that's a really big turnoff if somebody says I've got cameras throughout the entire Your house. That's not something you really want. We really want to be a part of. And

6:04

I don't want somebody videoing me in the bathroom

6:06

or watching us while we sleep. That's really not okay

6:10

for us. And it's a it's an invasion of privacy, but for other sitters, they welcome it and they don't mind it because they have nothing to hide and we have nothing to hide either. I just don't want to be washed off sleeping. When your house sitting, you want to think about what you want to do and inclement weather and in case of emergencies, also, does the client want you there? 24 seven, is that something that you can even do or do you have a job that you have to go to some clients and their dogs need you there all the time. It's good to know if you can accommodate that or not. And obviously a lot of people charge higher prices if they are not allowed to leave even to go out to dinner somewhere

6:45

because that sacrificing other potential clients that you could be having during that time while you're seeing that other 124 seven. This came up recently for us when there was a retired couple going to their son's wedding their dogs were used to somebody being there to 24 seven, and they asked us to continue that. So we charged a little extra than we normally do. Because we were sacrificing our time and other clients that we could potentially be sitting in lieu of that. I stayed there that whole day and never left. And that was something I don't think we'd really like to do again.

7:20

So in those cases of inclement weather and emergencies, it's good to have an emergency contact, getting that before the owner leaves. also getting the veterinarian info and making sure that you are the person that can make those decisions in case there is an emergency. In those emergency situations. If the dog happens to get out of the house, you need to talk with the owner beforehand at the meet and greet if the dog digs holes or jumps over the fence or if the cat likes to bolt out the door. Both of those the digging holes and the jumping over the fence. Both of those have happened to us during a house it and it was not a pleasant experience. Thanks for We got both of those dogs back. But we were much more cautious throughout the rest of the city.

8:05

And we have had owners say, oh, if the dog gets out and just wait a little bit, they'll come back or they'll be on the front porch or those kind of things. And that's very reassuring, just to know that we don't need to immediately freak out at least we need to watch and wait for a little bit. Part of that discussion of where does the dog go when it gets out is does it dig holes or jump over the fence? Have they had problems with that? Are there problem areas that they've continually had to deal with over time? Because both of those, again, as Megan mentioned, have happened to us during a set. And if we had known at the time that they were diggers or jumpers, we would have changed how we supervise them in the yard.

8:40

During your duration of how sitting? Will you need to take the dog in the car anywhere while the owner is away? Will the dog need to be groomed or taken to the vet for a checkup or shots? If there's a dog park nearby, are you going to need to take the dog there as well? Those are all really good questions to know beforehand

8:57

and do you have a way of safely securing the dog For that travel while you're going around, so do you have a harness or Kindle or create that you can put the dog in? Or how do they transport the dog? Typically, when we're at a house, we really limit how much we spread out with all of our stuff, even if we're going to be there for a while, because it keeps our footprint low. So we're less likely to lose things, and less likely to impact how the owner has things organized in their house. If you have kids or a significant other, is the owner, okay with them coming over? You've got to ask that before the state even begins with and that's something that we bring up as husband and wife with two kids. That's questions that we ask, do you mind if there's suddenly four people in the home? Or would you rather just be one of us? And how whatever they prefer to answer that's fine with us?

9:45

Well, and also likely the house owner is going to tell the neighbors that they're going to be away that somebody else is coming over to the house to be watchful of, you know, any suspicious activity around the house and so you definitely need to talk with the owners about Any one that could potentially be coming over because they may, if if somebody comes over and they don't know about it, they are unlikely to hire you again,

10:08

making sure the owner notifies their neighbors that there's going to be a pet sitter over there. So you don't get the cops called on you for being a strange car in the driveway or a light on in the house, that everyone, at least in the neighborhood can can know that you're supposed to be there and let let the owners know that they should probably go ahead and do that. While you're there. You want to bring in the mail and packages and ask beforehand if they're expecting any, so that you can make sure that you bring those off the porch as fast as possible. You'll be you'll you should ask if you need water, any plants doing those inside and out if they've got a big garden or if they've got plants inside that they like and do you need to pick up poop on the outside when you're there? We've had clients that say Don't worry about it. It's not that big of a deal. And then we've had clients that have specifically asked us make sure you pick up the poop

10:58

on the last day of this day. We Always take out the trash so that the owner doesn't come back to a stinky trash can. If you are thinking about housesitting, another good question to ask yourself is are you willing to watch animals other than dogs and cats? There are a lot of people who live on farms and have horses or chickens, lizards, etc. So if you have experience and caring for those kinds of animals, that's always a plus. But if not, and you're willing to take care of those animals, then it's a good way to gain experience. Also, for very long stays, like we've stayed upwards of a month before, will they need yard work done? Or will a house cleaner come by? You'll want to ask them so in case a house cleaner comes over to the house and you didn't know about it, you'll be spooked if somebody is in the house.

11:44

What should you do if you Oh, I don't know, break their oven or something else. So there's, we were house sitting for a client very early on and they had they said we could eat whatever food was in the house and use the house like it was our own. And so I had started the other into warm up to be intimate dinner for us while we were there. And a little while later, I looked over and noticed that it was glowing, bright orange from inside. I totally freaked out opened up the door. And when I looked in the heating element along the bottom was just melting, infusing to the bottom of the oven, quickly turned it off. And we sat there for a hot minute trying to figure out how do we communicate this to the owner that we just melted down their oven. And finally, we crafted a message and apologized profusely and sent it over to them. And they sent a message back to us with laughing emoji and saying, finally, we have a reason to get rid of that old oven. Thank you for letting us know. They were very gracious about that. And that was very kind of them to do that for us. And to us. It was just a lesson in be prepared when you're living in somebody's house. accidents do happen and you may end up breaking something. So that is just a word to the wise and caution. fairy tale to be up front and honest when you break things or when things go wrong, so that the owners know that. And again, it's about building trust and respecting each other.

13:10

And that's a good thing to have in your contract as well, of any liabilities that happen. Who's, who's going to take responsibility for those if you break their oven or break their vacuum? Are you responsible for those charges? Or is the owner responsible for those charges?

13:25

Because at that same house at a separate stay, not too long after that, we turned on the faucet and all of these plastic beads started spilling out of that. I don't know if you remember that or not idea. Yeah, they had a specialized water softener filter in their garage. And the whole thing had ruptured internally. And so all of these beads, plastic beads were spilling out of through every faucet and toilet. We didn't do anything but again, we had to communicate that bad news to them of when you come back from your nice holiday and vacation, there's kind of going to be an expensive bill and repair repair that you're going to need to take care of.

14:05

But again, they were very kind and understood. And you know, it's honesty is the best policy. Another question that often gets asked when housesitting is how do you keep yourself occupied? So you're playing with the dogs and you're at somebody's house. But other than playing fetch and taking them on walks, what do you do?

14:23

cable anyone has graduate students when we first started, that was a huge plus seeing people who had big cable packages. So you could sit there and watch all those TV shows and documentaries and things that you wanted to catch up on.

14:36

Now, of course, there's Netflix and Hulu and Amazon Prime and all those other things.

14:42

And sometimes owners will give you access to those and thank them profusely and watch to your heart's content. You may even decide that you want to catch up on sleep, since you know generally very busy with pet sitting. If you're in school, it's a great time to catch up on homework, or just recreational reading, doing extra sizes. You know, there's a lot of time in the day, but you can fill it by the time you've cleaned up in the house, and taking care of the pets, and done a few of these other things. The time really does go by quickly.

15:13

And I think the last thing that we think you need to consider, but when your house setting is how will you get a key before this day? And what should you do with it when you're done? Typically, the owners for us, we'll leave it under the mat, or we get the key at the meet and greet and then we leave it under the mat when we leave. But that's not always the case. And so where you will leave the key or if there's a code, it's good to know that as well.

15:37

That's a wrap for this episode on housesitting. If you have anything else that you think we missed, or have questions, send feedback to feedback at pet sitter confessional.com. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram at pet sitter confessional. join our Facebook group sitter confessionals. We're also on Twitter at PS confessional. Make sure you're subscribed on iTunes. Good Play Spotify or wherever you listen to so you never miss a new

16:03

episode. Thank you for joining us.

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