Five ways to build trust with your sitter
Entrusting a stranger with your home and your pets requires trust. How can you build sufficient trust with a prospective sitter?
- Use a housesitting site. Most housesitting sites screen potential sitters upon sign-up for ID, proof of their primary residence, bank account and liability insurance. Some also offer criminal record checks. If not then ...
- Ask your sitter for a police check, or a "certificate of good conduct", ideally renewed once a year.
- Read sitters' reviews. Many housesitting sites have a review system in place that allows hosts to assess sitters' reliability, cleanliness and pet care competence. This creates a dynamic of openness and accountability. While most sitters are keen on receiving positive reviews, hosts benefit by choosing a sitter that others have deemed trustworthy.
- Look at photos of your sitter interacting with pets, usually found on sitters' profiles or their websites. You will be able to tell the pets' level of comfort by their specific body language.
- Get to know your prospective sitter and discuss all essentials in advance. Some hosts prefer to meet candidates in person, others are happy to skype. My own inital contacts with hosts were 50% in person, 50% via skype.