International housesitters NatnJodie talk pets and bucketlists
International housesitters NatnJodie have been travelling around the world by housesitting and petsitting since 2013. In a recent interview hosted on our weekly @Housesitmatch Twitter #HouseSitChat session, we asked them a series of questions about their love of petsitting, how they started travelling by housesitting, and how they support themselves as digital nomads by generating a roaming income. Read on for their Questions and Answers:
International housesitters – by chance rather than design
Digital Nomads, Nat and Jodie work while they housesitQ 1. Welcome to the chat Nat & Jodie! Please tell us about yourselves
A 1. We’ve been 100% nomadic since Feb 2013. We’re Aussie but no longer residents of Australia. And so now we’re officially residents of nowhere #HouseSitChat
Nat is a former Australian Federal Police Agent and Jodie a former Resort Accommodation Manager. This year Nat celebrated her 50th birthday in Bangkok during Songkran, the Thai New Year celebration ( which has the world’s largest water fight!).
Songkran Thai New Year water festival,Bangkok
Nat at Songkran
Then in March 2020 Jodie will celebrate her 50th sugar shacking in Quebec. We’ll follow that with her ultimate bucket list birthday gift, a trip to Columbia starting with a housesit in Medellin #Bucketlist #HouseSitChat
Jodie preparing to snowshoe in CanadaProfessionals working abroad then travelling housesitters
Q 2. And how did you start housesitting and travelling?
A 2. We left Australia in Oct 2011 when Nat was offered a job in Dubai as a BDM for a Police Training Company. Not recognized as a couple, Jodie could only enter the UAE as a tourist. That meant she had to leave every 30 days to renew her visa… #HouseSitChat“
Nat’s boss suggested starting a Company to ‘buy’ visa’s for his friends and for Jodie. It was a very expensive exercise. The startup was an epic fail, even with Nat leaving her job to help. After 16 months in the Middle East, we were broke & broken…
To leave the UAE we had to sell off everything and offload the biz registration name in order to cancel our visas. This left us with enough money to buy a one-way flight to London and just $300 USD cash. No credit left. All savings gone.
Those first few months of housesitting in London then SW France healed us. The unconditional love from the pets, the space, the time to re-evaluate our lives and of course, zero overheads let us breathe again.
Jodie with two of our pet chargesThen we just kept saying yes to opportunities that felt right & there’s nothing in our lives that has more ease & flow than lining up housesits around the world, nearly always back-to-back for 7 years. It’s our universal confirmation we are meant to be doing this.
The Nomadic Lifestyle
Q 3. What #tips can you give to who want a nomadic lifestyle, but haven’t developed multiple income streams?
Cost of living – Nomadic housesitters vs Homebased
Digital nomads spend time with the pets at homeBut the cost of living of this lifestyle, as international housesitters, is a helluva lot less than living at home, or just staying in a fixed location, for us 70% less, for others even more!
@HouseSitMatch #HouseSitChat hosted Fridays 10am (UK)Housesitters – can anyone become one?
Q 4. How would you inspire this audience to “think out of the box” and embrace #HouseSitting?
International housesitters and digital nomads
Digital nomads can make great housesittersQ 5. You have both achieved so much, but what is next? Are there any specific challenges for you as international housesitters?
Fancy becoming a digital nomad?JOIN HOUSESIT MATCH AS A HOUSESITTER
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