When housesitters first discover the joys of housesitting and the many advantages of petsitting travel it can be quite a revelation. In this article Ellen reveals how a short weekend with some West Highland Terriers near home lead to housesits further afield across the UK, then to Hungary and finally her current location in Brazil. Read on to learn more about how petsitting offers many ways to discover a new location and the fascinating discoveries it can offer on a surprisingly affordable budget.

From a Weekend with Westies to Budapest & Brazil: Petsitting Travel Changed How We Travel 

Our first house sit was hardly the beginning of a grand travel plan. Instead, it was more of an experiment, a way to dip our toes into the world of pet sitting. My fiancé and I were graduate students in the UK and wanted to travel more and go on more holidays, but we had the stereotypical student budget, which didn’t exactly align with comfort.

We were initially a little wary of the concept, so deliberately chose to do our first house sit with HouseSit Match just a 15-minute drive away from home in Buckinghamshire, over a weekend, to see what it was really all about. 

That weekend, we looked after three friendly Westies and fed the fish in the koi pond, while exploring the local woodland of the Chilterns, spending time in the garden with a book and enjoying our little staycation. Two of the dogs were brothers, alongside an older Westie with arthritis in her back legs, meaning she would shuffle around when she got too tired. The dogs were surprisingly independent, but the oldest would always come and curl up on our laps as soon as we sat down, wanting the calm company. 

We were surprised by how comfortable the whole experience was, quickly getting into a routine of feeding the dogs before heading out for a morning walk through the woods. What we didn’t realise at the time was how this little weekend would eventually lead to many more pet sits, and how those experiences would shape the way we travel now. 

Starting Petsitting Travel Close to Home 

Looking back, I realise we approached that first weekend much more cautiously than we would approach a house sit now. We took all the steps we still take today: speaking to the owner over a video call, arriving early to meet the dogs, and taking time to learn their routine. What’s different now is the absence of nerves, the confidence to ask umpteen questions (there is no such thing as a silly question) and the confidence in ourselves to take care of someone else’s home and animals. 

What surprised me wasn’t simply that the weekend had gone well, but how quickly it changed what felt possible for our next trip. It was a great experience in low cost vacation. As any traveller will know, accommodation can eat up a significant portion of a travel budget. As students, we didn’t always want our budget to dictate how comfortable a trip could be, but our initial question was often, “what country can we afford to visit, and for how long?” rather than thinking about where we actually wanted to go. 

Petsitting Travel Changes Your Travel Budgets

House sitting changed that calculation for us. It doesn’t make travel free, but on our sits, it removed the accommodation bill entirely, meaning we could afford to stay longer or consider destinations we might otherwise have ruled out. It created an opportunity for affordable travel through housesitting. Staying in someone’s home also meant we could cook from scratch rather than eating at restaurants every day, another significant saving.

That first house sit in the Chiltern Hills showed us that affordable travel didn’t have to mean uncomfortable travel. 

Petsitting Travel Took Us From Buckinghamshire to Budapest 

Not long after that cautious weekend in the Chilterns, we embarked on our first international pet sit: ten days looking after a Dachshund called Chilli in Budapest. Hungary had always been on our bucket list, but we assumed our budget would limit us to a long weekend. So when we saw a house sit listed for a five-bedroom home with a garden and private swimming pool, just a short bus ride from the centre of Budapest, we knew we had to jump at the chance. 

We spoke to the owners, booked our flights, and took care of their home, garden, and adorable dog while they went away on a family holiday. 

Budapest didn’t feel like a normal city break 

Our trip to Budapest didn’t feel like a normal city break, and the biggest difference wasn’t even the swimming pool or the money we saved. It was having a kitchen where we could cook using fresh ingredients from the local supermarket instead of eating every meal in busy tourist areas. It was also having ten full days.

We actually had time to explore the city slowly, mixed in with days spent lounging by the pool and not doing very much at all. That felt surprisingly special because we didn’t have the sense that we’d “wasted” one of only a handful of days away. Staying in a residential neighbourhood rather than using a hotel as our base also made the trip feel calmer. We could spend the day sightseeing, then return somewhere that actually felt like a home. 

How Affordable is Petsitting Travel and What it Means to Us

That trip changed my idea of affordable travel and more specifically petsitting travel, moreover it changed my actual travel budget.

Previously, I’d viewed affordable travel as finding the cheapest flights, staying in hostels, taking short weekend trips and squeezing as much as possible into those few days — often resulting in 18-hour days and 20,000+ steps, no matter how tired we felt. But that first international house sit showed us that affordable travel could also mean staying somewhere longer, travelling more slowly, cooking from scratch and having a comfortable place to return to.

With accommodation often being the expense that made longer trips unaffordable for us, removing that cost shifted the balance and opened up places we had always wanted to explore. 

Housesitting also changed what we noticed when we travelled. Walking through residential neighbourhoods, visiting local markets and taking part in a pet’s ordinary routine gave us a chance to see more of everyday life in a place rather than constantly chasing headline attractions. It’s a real advantage to petsitting travel, you see the world on foot from a local’s perspective.

Fast-forward to Brazil 

Years later, petsitting followed us to Brazil, although in a much less formal way. In December 2025, my fiancé and I moved to Porto Alegre, the capital of Brazil’s southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul. While living and travelling throughout South America, we’ve kept our eyes peeled for house-sitting and pet-sitting opportunities. 

We’ve found the concept much less familiar in South America, although it does seem to be better understood within some expat communities so petsitting travel does exist here.

Despite this, we recently spent a week looking after a dog belonging to two friends of ours while they went on holiday. 

Petsitting travel and in particular dogsitting has become such a familiar experience to us now, and something I really like is how a dog’s routine can alter our own. Looking after Violetta, the Dachshund, meant getting outside every day for walks, exploring different streets and parks and trying coffee shops that we would usually walk past without thinking twice. 

The experience gave us a different relationship with Porto Alegre despite already knowing the city well, which is another reason we’re continuing to keep an eye out for pet-sitting opportunities. 

Looking after our friends’ dog in a city we already lived in made me realise that the thing we’d come to value about house sitting wasn’t just the free accommodation anymore, although that is still part of it. It’s also the opportunity to learn a neighbourhood on foot, try different local places and settle into a different, temporary routine. 

Affordable doesn’t mean responsibility-free 

Of course, none of this means that housesitting is simply a way to get free accommodation. If you take on petsitting travel it naturally comes with a built in responsibility. With the accommodation comes home and pet care responsibility. The pets come first, and sometimes that means planning your days around feeding, walking and, in some cases, medication. It can mean that you can’t disappear overnight, and your travel dates may need to be flexible around the homeowner’s needs. 

Flights, attractions and other experiences still cost money, but removing the accommodation bill in exchange for caring for a pet and home changes the nature of the trip entirely.

When we agreed to that first weekend with three Westies in the Chilterns, I don’t think either of us imagined it would influence the way we’d be travelling years later. What started as a cautious weekend, 15 minutes from home eventually took us to Budapest and taught us that travelling on a budget didn’t have to mean rushing through a place or sacrificing comfort. Years later in Brazil, we’re still finding ourselves drawn to that same slower rhythm, often with a dog in tow. 

BIO

Ellen Carter is a British writer currently based in Brazil. Herbert travel writing has been published by Go World Travel and Experiences not Stuff, with further features forthcoming in autumn 2026, and early 2027.

@connor_and_ellen

Further Reading

At HouseSit Match we like to share useful blogs and practical advice about housesitters, housesitting and pet sitting. We hope you find this small selection of our blogs useful, including this one petsitting travel.

Housesitters keep pets safe at home and save money

What a housesitter does – Top 10 responsibilities

Top 10 tips for catsitting

Top dogsitting tips for beginners

The Affordable Alternative to Dog Kennels

What is House Sitting?