# Housesitting. Is it common?



## mxfan (Jun 7, 2014)

I've not searched for finding a house to sit in but I am curious if the practice is common or done at all by homeowners in MX.


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## TundraGreen (Jul 15, 2010)

mxfan said:


> I've not searched for finding a house to sit in but I am curious if the practice is common or done at all by homeowners in MX.


I have had people live in my house while I was traveling outside of Mexico. But it was not an organized situation, but rather, just friends of mine who needed a place to stay while I was away for a month or so.


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## ojosazules11 (Nov 3, 2013)

My husband's niece is doing a long-term "house-sit" for us, as we don't want to leave the house empty when we're away. When we come down, there is another family house where she can stay. The other house is further from town, so she prefers to stay at ours when we're not there. 

My husband and other Mexicans say it is not advisable to leave a house empty for too long, or you are inviting trouble (vandalism, stolen fixtures/electrical wires, squatters). I don't know what other part-time expats do.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

As we live at Lake Chapala about half the year (summer and fall) and San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas about half the year (winter and spring), we hire a house sitter for our Lake Chapala home to stay in and caretake our house and feed and entertain/walk our five dogs and feed our two cats. We pay her a daily fee for that service which we will not reveal but the fee is quite reasonable considering that a house sitter with whom we are familiar and consider to be a friend from the Chapala community to be an essential service or we would not be able to leave our house and pets at the lake for several months each year as we do. She is entirely respectful of our property rights and maintains the home in perfect order. 

I can´t speak for everyone but we would never leave our home or pets in the charge of a housesitter with whom we were unfamiliar nor would we entrust our home strictly on the basis of references from folks with whom we are not personally familiar and who we trust implicitly.

As further security, we not only retain a trusted housesitter at Lake Chapala but both of our houses are fully alarmed and centrally and constantly monitored by local security firms who are oblígated to investigate any tripped alarms by immediately phoning us and, if we are unresponsive, rushing to our premises in case of a possible home invasión. The fact that we have a full-time housesitter and loud and incessantly monitored alarms system has prevented at least one serious breakin where the intention was to ransack our home. That alarm system scared the bejesus out of those morons the one time they tried to break into our home and it was "feets don´t fail me now" time. I´ll bet those guys didn´t slow down until they crossed the Jocotepec Municipality and then they had to change their underwear.

As an aside, we don´t need a housesitter in Chiapas because we live in an all Mexican neighborhood there where the local neighbors look out for each other and, if the alarm sounds from any home on the street, they pour into the street and beat the hell out of anyone roaming about who does not belong there - especially at night. The difference between a largely expat community as is our neighborhood at Lake Chapala and a mostly Mexican neighborhood as at Chiapas is like night and day. Our Mexican neighbors know the cops and other authorities are not to be trusted and know that they are on their own. Usually, down there, it´s the ladrones who beg for the cops to come ASAP to rescue their asses from irritated locals hammering them mercilessly. I don´t know that a housesitter would fare that well down in Chiapas but that is probably a good side vocation at Lake Chapála especially with all the part time expats living there.


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## Meritorious-MasoMenos (Apr 17, 2014)

mxfan said:


> I've not searched for finding a house to sit in but I am curious if the practice is common or done at all by homeowners in MX.


Mexico has, or used to have, anyway, some laws that give great protections to people who inhabit a town for a length of time, so that I don't think it's common for Mexicans to put ads in newspapers or craigslist to seek strangers to housesit, fearing that they could claim ownership after only a while. But as posters have already said, only family and friends. Maybe Westerners will trust stranger Westerners, I don't know.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

_


Meritorious-MasoMenos said:



Mexico has, or used to have, anyway, some laws that give great protections to people who inhabit a town for a length of time, so that I don't think it's common for Mexicans to put ads in newspapers or craigslist to seek strangers to housesit, fearing that they could claim ownership after only a while. But as posters have already said, only family and friends. Maybe Westerners will trust stranger Westerners, I don't know.

Click to expand...

_Good points MMM. That´s why our housesitter is both a friend and accepts the assignment for remuneration. Mexico, like most Latin countries, is not a good place to turn your house over to strangers for any serious length of time.

My wife is also a Latina from the Latin country of France and, many years ago, we contemplated buying a house for future retirement in the Lloire Valley because we had uncovered a great deal on a beautiful riverfront residential property there. My French wife warned this Alabama boy that owning a home in France left deserted and uninhabited for any serious length of time was imprudent as squatters could move in and, over time, claim title to the property as their own with a good chance they would prevail. 

Everthing worked out in the end as we ended up in Mexico with a far more favorable climate and across the pond from and out of shouting range of my mother-in-law.


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

Among Mexicans, house sitting is not common AT ALL, we prefer to ask a relative or friend to make sure things are ok by going to the house once in a while than to have someone living in it


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

So Mexican do not have paid house sitters or strangers staying in their house but they have help or relative who do , same thing, people like to have people living in the house.


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## Isla Verde (Oct 19, 2011)

citlali said:


> So Mexican do not have paid house sitters or strangers staying in their house but they have help or relative who do , same thing, people like to have people living in the house.


If you're referring to Gary's post, he said that Mexicans like to have someone they know stop by their house when they're not there to check that everything's OK. He didn't say that these friends or relatives actually live in the house while the owners are not in residence.


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## Longford (May 25, 2012)

Hound Dog said:


> As we live at Lake Chapala about half the year (summer and fall) and San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas about half the year (winter and spring), we hire a house sitter for our Lake Chapala home to stay in and caretake our house and feed and entertain/walk our five dogs and feed our two cats.


Is there a reason why you don't take your pets with you when you're away for such a long period of time?


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## Isla Verde (Oct 19, 2011)

Longford said:


> Is there a reason why you don't take your pets with you when you're away for such a long period of time?


Maybe the pets don't enjoy long car trips .


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Sorry I misread what he said. We have help stopping by and cleaning house when we are not there but mo people I know have relative or help living there.

The reason we do not take our dogs to Chiapas is simple. We have a large garden in Ajijic, a full time gardner and a friend who stays there when she comes back from work.
We have 5 dogs and 2 cas and I do not see taking all ov them to the middle of a city and to a two patio house. I miss them but they are way better off in a place where they can run and where they have people there all the time. When in Chiapas I am gone consantly and I do not see taking 5 dogs on colectivos or buses...


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## Anonimo (Apr 8, 2012)

HouseSitMexico

I have no experience with this; I just Googled "Housesitting Mexico". Various friends of ours in Pátzcuaro have had house sitters. It was arranged on a personal basis, not via a website nor an agency.


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## Schort (Aug 9, 2014)

We do a little house sitting & pet sitting here in Playa del Carmen. We returned to a 3 month gig last year that made it easy to come back. We dog/house sat for the US couple before. 

We also do this for another US couple here who call us when they travel. They're busy for sure. We just lost our dog of 18 years, so it is good therapy too. 

< snip >


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

_


GARYJ65 said:



Among Mexicans, house sitting is not common AT ALL, we prefer to ask a relative or friend to make sure things are ok by going to the house once in a while than to have someone living in it

Click to expand...

_Gary:

While my wife, Citlali, already responded to this, just a point of clarification. The reason we employ the services of a housesitter, a Mexican native of Lakeside who is also a long-time friend, to stay in our home when we are traveling or resident in our home in Chiapas, is so we have someone to feed and care for our five dogs and two cats. We may sometimes take one or perhaps two dogs with us when we go to Chiapas for an extended stay - driving two days to get there - but, even so, there will be at least three dogs we leave at Lake Chapala since, as Citlali wrote, five dogs in an urban patio home in crowded San Cristóbal de Las Casas and walking them on congested streets in the heart of the city is impractical when the dogs can stay at Lake Chapala under the care of our houssitting friend and run the garden and deserted beaches to their hearts content. Also there is the issue of two demanding cats requiring daily feeding and they have no sense of humor in that regard. 

As I earlier wrote, we also have a constantly monitored, movement sensitive alarm system at Lake Chapala and our neighbors know to watch our house for any unusual activity plus they respond to the alarm when we are away for any length of time. Same alarm system n Chiapas where, as I wrote earlier, woe be unto the ladron who enters a home illegally in that nearly all-Mexican barrio since the attitude among Mexicans is very different than the attitude among expats at Lake Chapala and that could turn into a near-death experience for the miscreant if the cops are delayed in getting there.. 

As we do not like anyone staying in our home when we are away except this close friend who has demonstrated tremendous respect for our property while staying there on assignmment, we will not rent either home when we are not there because who needs that hassle.


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