Here’s How to Travel for Free in Exchange for Pet Sitting Services

This morning, I noticed my friend Emily made a post on her personal blog about traveling with her family this summer. Traveling can be expensive, especially with kids. They eat and need sunscreen and all that nonsense. The biggest expense though is the accommodations. It's kind of ridiculous to spend two months mortgage on a broken down condo that supplies you with one roll of toilet paper and *GAH* teflon cookware for a week but I do it EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR. Emily's family though wants to extensivly travel all summer, so they are on the lookout to go visit friends throughout the country. If I didn't live 15 minutes from her, she'd be welcome to crash at my pad.

It got me thinking about a website my cousin uses to travel. It's called trustedhousesitters.com. I have a 100 lb very sweet akita who suffers from kennel anxiety,  a grouchy old chihuahua who just wants to be left alone, and an indoor-outdoor cat. Kenneling just isn't an option. So, when I leave my home, I either have to pay a few hundred bucks to have someone come stay at my house with our dogs and cat or bribe my mom to let them all come to her house which she isn't thrilled about. This website matches up people like me who want to go but need someone to watch the pets and people like Emily who want to travel but want to keep costs down. You stay at my house for free - just watch my dogs.

I know what you are thinking - how do I know the people staying in my house aren't serial killers or creepsters who will steal all my stuff and eat my dog? Okay, well no system is perfect. Let's just make that clear but they do have an application process, references, reviews from other pet owners, and background checks. There is a fee for signing up but that fee is used to do the background checks and host the website. And it's significantly less than renting rooms or homes. Plus, this website is world-wide. You can travel almost anywhere.

Check out more about trustedhousesitters.com here!