Our Trusted Housesitters Experience In this episode, Les is going to join me as a co-host as we talk about our experiences with Trusted Housesitters. Housesitters come in handy when you need them – and you can count on them to look after your pets. They stay in your home for the time you are gone and take care of everything. I have both served as a housesitter and used the service when we went on a trip. Today, we are going to talk about my experience of being a housesitter and how it felt to use the service. I really appreciate the service as it lets me travel to other places for free! I wanted to see how it felt like to be a housesitter and gain some experience on the platform. About my first Trusted Housesitters client My first client was a sweet couple who needed a housesitter on urgent basis. They lived in a 1,000 square foot house near the beach and had two large dogs weighing around 90 lbs. The first time I went to the house the dogs jumped on me as soon as the owner opened the door- that was the first red flag I noticed about the dogs and showed the dogs were not well behaved. The couple also asked us to lock the doors as the dogs loved to chew on their pillows! Never Do More Than You Think You Can! One day, Les took me out to dinner, and we came back to witness a real mess. It was just an hour and a half hour that we were gone. When we came back, we see something strewn all across the floor. We realized it was the remote control for the ceiling fan – the dogs made it a treat for themselves! The situation did not get better, and the dogs kept on chewing and eating other things – including our favorite magazines. This taught me a valuable lesson, and probably I won't be doing dogs in my next assignment, especially big dogs. I can handle cats, small dogs, and birds but big dogs can be quite difficult. It also taught me to ask more questions about the job before taking it up. It’s Mostly Great! Next time, I had to housesit a cat, and it was in a beautiful house with nice people. I only felt vulnerable one time – there was news of a criminal in the neighborhood. But apart from that, the whole experience was good! Les and I also opted for housesitting service when we were going on a trip and wanted someone to watch our dogs. Les was skeptical in the beginning about having a stranger in the house, so we did a Skype call to see how our housesitter looked. It's always better to interact with beforehand with your housesitter so that you can see their face and know about them a bit. A Few Precautions Help We also took a few precautions which would save us landing up in a false situation. We chose to lock the master bedroom and explained to the housesitter that it was for their own good. I constantly keep forgetting where I have kept things and didn't want to blame someone unnecessarily if they are not at fault. Also, Les doesn't find it very comfortable that someone would sleep in his bed! I also locked my office as it contained sensitive information related to my clients. We have a guest room where the housesitter was put up. She even brought her own bag with covers and all and didn't use our things. Other than that, the whole house was open to the housesitter and we also asked them to share our food. The housesitter did a very good job of taking care of our dogs, and both of us were really happy with the service. The Trusted Housesitter platform has three levels of security checks which can go a long way to prove the worthiness of a housesitter. You can look for third level security which involves a background check of the housesitter. The first two levels are related to verification of mobile numbers and Facebook accounts. You can also sign up for a housesitting service or become a housesitter yourself by using this link