Allen Trottier
ReliableHousesitters.com - For the last seven years Allen has been living the ‘digital nomad’ lifestyle, travelling around the globe while working from his laptop.
While frustrated with the cost of accommodation he stumbled across housesitting and that was a major turning point in how he travelled as well as his financial stability.
Allen has now been housesitting internationally and full-time for three years. As a solo male housesitter he has combined his love of animals and travel to explore new cultures and make new friends around the world.
Amanda Walkins
AmandaWalkins.com - Amanda is a full-time freelance writer and content marketer who has fallen madly in love with house- and petsitting! After losing their own sweet pup quite suddenly, petsitting became a way for Amanda and her husband to snuggle other furbabies until they can rescue another of their own.
Housesitting is also Amanda’s favorite way to connect with people in other countries. You can learn about local life and explore areas you otherwise wouldn’t have visited, all while making new friends.
As a serial expat, she also encourages folks to consider long-term housesitting before taking the leap to move overseas. You can learn about the 7 countries Amanda has called home on her website, where she shares photos of the furbabies she gets to cuddle.
Angela Laws
TrustedHousesitters.com - A founding member and award winning Social Media & Community Manager with TrustedHousesitters, Angela works full time whilst continuing to housesit staying fully connected to the community she cares so passionately about.
With animals at the very heart of her life, Angela began her house and pet sitting journey 14 years ago after losing her beloved Springer. As an owner she has experience engaging sitters and in 2016 sold her Canadian home to pet sit full time.
Her love of travel has kept her in perpetual motion since the age of 23 when she emigrated to Canada and with 30 years of expat living in Europe, Asia, & Australasia she’s well placed to know the delights and challenges of international house and pet sitting.
Annmarie Talbot
pdsa.org.uk - Annmarie has worked within the Veterinary industry for 10 years, starting out in private practice as a Registered Veterinary Nurse and then moving to the fabulous Veterinary Animal charity PDSA.
She currently spends most of her working day out in the community educating pet owners on the importance of animal welfare, which she has a keen interest in, and promoting the services that the PDSA has to offer.
If you are a Veterinary Nurse then with that title comes a house full of your own animals, of which she currently has, dogs, cats, horses, chickens and ducks that all keep her busy outside of work.
Brooke & Buddy Baum
TrailingAway.com – Brooke and Buddy are full-time house sitters and travelers who first decided to ditch their traditional life in early 2017. They sold almost all of their belongings, got rid of their home base, quit their desk jobs, and set off to create a new lifestyle on their terms.
For their first year as nomads, they lived in a motorhome while they pursued online work for the first time, but always craved more adventure and flexibility than that rolling home could provide.
Luckily, they stumbled upon house sitting and fell in love with the unique experiences and wonderful interactions they get to have with animals and their owners. They can’t imagine a lifestyle more suited for their personalities!
Debbie Streather
Debbie has 30 years experience working with dogs. She spent her early years working the summers in her family-run boarding kennels looking after 80 dogs on a daily basis. She has since worked in an animal sanctuary, as a kennel maid for 8 gundogs, and in a cattery.
Debbie lives in her offgrid wooden cabin throughout the summer, spending the winter months split between travelling/petsitting and visiting her cavehouse in Southern Spain, acquired through a frequent sit.
She is currently in the early stages of starting her own petsitting business in her home village, but continues to petsit for free while travelling, and frequently returns to her previous sits.
Debra Sofia Magdalene
facebook.com/DebraSofiaMagdalene - Debra has been home-free since 2011 when she sold her house and gave away most of her possessions so that she was free to travel extensively and escape the matrix! She invests extensively in her own personal development and has a huge toolkit to draw upon.
Debra founded HUGS House and Pet-sitting Service on 1 January 2017 and bookings come from her facebook page, through referrals and repeat clients. She has a small team of trusted friends on her team and between them, they cover sits all over the UK. Debra also does Bed & Breakfast Sits and runs businesses as going concerns whilst owners go away.
Whilst doing sits, Debra runs Magdalene Wellness - her essential oil business which provides a residual income. She’s a qualified coach and mentors people who join her team to live a happy, healthy, balanced, life whilst achieving their financial goals.
Debs & Rich Southwood
TwoNorthernSouls.com - In 2017 Debs & Rich ditched the 9-5 for a new life on the road. Through house sitting and remote work they are breaking free from the chains of society and living life on their terms.
Since beginning their journey they’ve spent 6 months travelling Asia and have completed 25 house sits across Europe and the UK. Debs has set up her own remote design agency and Richard is working towards consulting in the field of well-being.
They’ve recently launched their own website to document their travels and provide support and inspiration for others who want to live a life less ordinary.
Ian Usher
HouseSittingMagazine.com - In 2008 Ian made world headlines when he listed his "entire life" for sale on eBay. He followed that adventure with two year of global travels, tackling 100 lifetime goals in 100 weeks. He has spoken at TEDx in Vienna about living an unlimited lifestyle. UK documentary show "Ben Fogle: New Lives in the Wild" featured Ian at his Panamanian home, where he first discovered house sitting as a home owner.
Since 2014 Ian has been travelling the world as a full-time global house sitter with his partner Vanessa. Together they have completed over 60 house sits, specializing in off-grid remote locations. Passionate about the house sitting lifestyle, Ian is also co-publisher of the free online community publication House Sitting Magazine, and developed and runs the house sitter meetup website, mapahub.com
Jenny Ives
JensFunancials.com - Jenny is a Money Coach who guides her clients and students to map their money to their lives and not their lives to their money. Jenny teaches techniques to instil financial confidence to live boldly.
Although Jenny Ives is a Chartered Financial Planner, Fellow of the Personal Finance Society and advisor for the Society of Later Life Advice, she is not your typical financial planner.
Instead, Jenny, together with her husband George, has chosen to live alternatively as a nomad. Since 2014 they have been housesitting and vanlife-ing full time in order to slow travel around the UK and abroad and have more than a 1,000 nights of house and pet sits under their belts.
Jenny Lincoln
JennyLincoln.com - Travel is the best personal development program money can buy! It takes you from the safety of your comfort zone at home, through a series of exciting, adventurous and sometimes challenging moments. And delivers you to a new level of capability and courage to live your life with. How wonderful is that!
Jenny has been living her life in the Courage Zone since 2015, when she packed up her belongings and rented her house in Sydney so she could house sit and volunteer her way around the globe! With the most immense feeling of freedom she skipped away from 30+ years of corporate life.
Jenny seeks unique sits ... from living off grid on the side of a volcano in Guatemala, overseeing a Pitaya plantation in the jungle of Belize, caring for a 300 year old Spanish Manor to looking after a herd of 26 horses rescued from death row.
Jodie Burnham
TravelLifestylePlan.com - A full-time house sitter from Australia, Jodie has been on the road enjoying back-to-back house sits all over the world since Feb 2013.
Along with partner Nat, as the founders of the House Sitting Academy, Roaming Income Club and Travel Lifestyle Plan, over the years Nat and Jodie have helped thousands of people start and maintain their International House Sitting Travel Lifestyles with their ongoing mentoring, online courses, support and advice.
Singles, couples and families of all ages, backgrounds, and levels of experience have applied their proven system to land the best house sits worldwide ensuring the ethos of trust, mutual respect and exceptional service remain standard within the community.
Lamia Walker
HouseSitMatch.com - Lamia has travelled from a very young age, but her addiction only took hold when as a student she found she could afford the low-cost airlines and their budget routes across the Atlantic and Southern Europe. During a 25-year marketing career selling a range of brands, from Dell Computers, to Staples and KPMG, she found herself taking jobs managing international teams and markets.
One day a visiting Australian friend talked about how she had been house sitting for a year in Perth, Australia, saving $50k Aussie dollars in rent! Suddenly, the penny dropped. Working together they found a way to open up house sitting opportunities for anyone to travel the world on a fixed budget. HouseSitMatch.com first went online in 2013.
Michelle McDines
TheHappyHousesitter.com - Michelle has been fulltime housesitting around Europe with her dog Eddie since 2017. Originally from the UK, she lived for several years in Cyprus - where she rescued Eddie and fostered many other rescue dogs. Having given housesitting a try she sold her belongings and became a nomad in 2018.
Finding homeowners willing to accept another dog into their homes was a challenge at first but Michelle persevered and has been housesitting fulltime for two years - with Eddie always along for the ride. By introducing Eddie to new homes, new dogs and cats on a regular basis Michelle developed a keen interest in canine behaviour and she is currently studying towards a number of animal behaviour diplomas to add a new string to her bow.
Michelle has created a website selling fun apparel and accessories for housesitters. She also creates websites for small businesses, property owners and housesitters.
Naomi Peters
naomipeters.com - Naomi has been location independent since mid-2007 and full-time nomadic (housesitting full-time) since mid-2016. She works full-time, running 3 businesses, while traveling as a solo sitter internationally.
As a professional storyteller (acting & stunts) in theatre, film, & TV for over 2 decades, communication is at her core. So, when she started a new company in 2018 to focus on fun ideas (wabithra.com), the first project came from a marriage of her sitting lifestyle plus a love of easy & comprehensive communication. This will soon result in an app for sitters & homeowners called Book of the Home.
Naomi is a triple citizen of Australia, the UK, & the US, and is always voting or filing taxes somewhere.
Philippe Lalonde
TheAmazingStroll.com - Philippe, alongside his wife Sophie, is semi-retired since the tender age of 41 years old. Together, they embarked on a year of travels, alternating between backpacking and house sitting on three different continents. During that year of traveling and self-discovery, they realized that part-time house sitting was the right fit for them.
Now, Philippe and Sophie split their time between house sitting internationally and being at home in Canada, spending quality time with their she-devil of a cat Minette and doing local house sitting assignments. Philippe loves writing about house sitting and depicting life on the road with the help of illustrations, animations, and comic strips.
Embrace the journey!
Richard Brabbin
Richard is a 53 year old homeowner who lives with his husband Stuart and their 8 year old cat Marley in North Kent just outside of London. Richard works full time in local government whilst Stuart is now retired. Richard and Stuart both enjoy travelling. Marley doesn't!
They have been regular users of house sitting services since April 2016 when they came across an article on social media. Since acquiring Marley, house sitters have become a critical part of enabling their holidays to continue.
Using house sitters means they are able to enjoy holidays and still be reassured that their home and Marley are being well taken care of.
Sharon Fields
NomadicWidow.com - In September of 2011 Sharon lost her husband, the love of her life, to cancer. Having her life turned upside down and processing her grief she came to the realization that “all the stuff” in her life was not bringing her happiness and that what did bring her joy were the people and experiences in life!
Thus began the journey of “letting go” of everything that held her back from living a fulfilled life.
Sharon has now been house and pet sitting full time for 6+ years, a lifestyle full of purpose, mutual exchange, trust, respect and love! Being part of a community of like minded people giving her encouragement, love and happiness!
Simon Berry
Simon has been petsitting on and off for over 20 years. Through Kate, his wife, he revived his passion for the profession in 2017 and, when they're not at home, they're usually travelling the world petsitting together.
Simon spent most of his adult life working in the disaster recovery and property insurance claims sectors, after natural catastrophe incidents, at senior management level, when not knee deep in water.
After a career of training and mentoring others, he is now essentially retired. He has encountered a number of unusual calamities over the years, some of which he has had to manage as a petsitter.
Tracy Downing-McDermott
McNomads.com - Tracy is one half of an Australian/American duo who began housesitting in 2013 after an idea erupted while binging-watching House Hunters International. They wondered if they could travel on the same money they spent to live at home and decided to experiment on themselves to find out. Turns out, they spent less traveling than mouldering in a California retirement village.
They've zigged and zagged around the world ever since and house sitting has played a big role in their "why-stay-home-if-you-can-roam" lifestyle. Their goal is to encourage others to pursue their dreams. Tracy often says while it's true that none of us are getting any younger, by getting off the couch to try something new you'll feel like you are.
Vanessa Anderson
HouseSittingMagazine.com - Vanessa has been a full-time international house sitter since meeting partner Ian in 2013. Keen to experiment with alternative ways to live and fund semi-retirement in their 50's, they sold-up to become nomadic world travellers.
Utilzing her passion for house and pet sitting, Vanessa has created valuable resources to help others achieve their own lifestyle transformation. She now co-publishes House Sitting Magazine, a free publication dedicated to the trust based house sitting community, and has developed a comprehensive online video course to help newcomers understand and sustain best practices.
She blogs regularly about house sitting, actively hosts one of the largest support and advice groups on Facebook, and loves a good cuddle with a furry animal or two!
