Country Teachers avaliable NSW school holidays

Melina & Richard

1 review

Join to Invite Melina & Richard

Melina & Richard

Country Teachers avaliable NSW school holidays

Griffith, New South Wales, Australia

1 review

Join to Invite Melina & Richard

Sits for free

About Melina & Richard

We are two country teachers, my partner is the deputy principal at our School and I am the careers adviser. We both will be on holidays and would love to look after your house and pets. We are extremely experienced and have had many house sits in city areas. We started housesitting when original communication was through newspapers and agencies. See our profile for the list and details. Of course we are neat and tidy and respecting owner’s homes is a priority for us. As we our both teachers with permanent jobs, we have the appropriate criminal checks. We hope that we hear from you soon.

Why we want to house sit

Originally we started Housesitting to help out when I answered a newspaper add to housesit in Stanmore. I had never heard of Housesitting before. That was in 1996! We had a great time and our host was lovely as were her fur babies. It was a nice change from a hotel room and we got to get know different areas of the city. We even got a repeat sit where a Melbourne couple would always check with us first to see if we would look after their place. So some of our school holidays are spent sitting. Meeting lovely people and of course having fun caring for all our furry friends keeping and keeping fit, is a nice way to spend our holidays.

Our experience

We are two country teachers. My partner is the Deputy and myself the Careers teacher. We are both experienced housesitters. We have house sat in Sydney x 9
(Valcluse, Glebe, Monteray, Bexley, Stanmore, Mortdale, Concord, Croydon, West Ryde) Melbourne x 6 a repeat housesit (Northcote), 5 occassions in Wollongong.( Woonona and Shellharbour) 2 x Gold Coast.
This is the first time we have used this site, therefore do not have star ratings but we do have references. We have been housesitting since 1996 in a number of our school holidays. We have looked after various homes and pets.( We also had a great housesit where, we were to stay so the family's teenage children could not come back to throw pool parties (and according to their mother 'use very towel in the house!") We usually get housesits through word of mouth, or friends of homeowners we have housesat for.

We will care for your home and pets as if they were our own as well as respecting your privacy.We own our own home and caring for others homes as we would our own is straight forward to us. We are pretty easygoing, but extremely responsible.We love exploring new areas, especially new locals and eateries. We walk a bit and my partner is into every sport imaginable.

We love pets we have looked after dogs, cats, fish, birds and 10 chickens over the years. We have looked after young puppies as well as ageing pets that need medication and special attention. Neighbours of homeowners have commented on how settled the pets are, whist we are there which is a good sign. We also had one pet as we were leaving at housesit on the home owners return sneak into the car thinking we were off for our daily walk, which was very funny to all parties. On another occasion when we were housesitting a rented property and the landlord visited asking if we could look after his pet too! We are also able to tend to your plants and garden.

We are flexible have our own transport.....so whenever the NSW school hoidays are on, we are avaliable.

Hope to hear from you soon.

* Please note that as we are teachers police checks are done otherwise we cannot be employed with the Department and we have references too. Below are some emails from homeowners that we did not get to see when they returned for the exchange.

From: Louise & Patrick
Sent: Thursday, 14 January 2010 6:09 PM
To: Ragusa, Melina
Subject: Greetings from Melbourne

Thanks for looking after our doggies and our house. It sounds like you had a good time in Melbourne. Thanks too for leaving the house so clean, it was lovely to walk in and find everything clean and secure. Leonie looked after the dogs after you left. I'm glad they behaved themselves.

What did you see in Melbourne? Did you go to some nice restaurants or see something through half-tixs? We have booked a holiday in the mid-year school holidays to Bali for 10 days. You would be welcome to come down again if you want, but it will be cold!! in June/July. Let us know if your interested.

Thanks again. Enjoy the rest of your break, Louise and Pat.

From: Patrick
Sent: Tuesday, 5 November 2013 7:46 PM
To: Ragusa, Melina
Subject: Re: Hello

Thanks for $ and all was good.
Our time in Sydney was an excellent experience. We only had 4 hrs training with the office systems and other hands on stuff but somehow all went like a well oiled ship. The guests were alot of fun and some challenges with w/end groups that required a bit more supervision . The boys (dogs)we missed too much but knew they they were in good hands.
At the moment we are at Kira beach gold coast for a 40th and go home tomorrow, phew ! a lot of big trips this year.
Trust you both are doing well wrote patrick Lou cooking

From: Heather
Sent: Sunday, 27 January 2013 6:41 PM
To: Ragusa, Melina
Subject: Hi from Rocky

Hi Melina and Richard
I hope you have travelled safely home, and have some cooler weather.

Thank you so much for taking such good care of our home, pool and of course Rocky. He has indeed become a cafe dog. When I am free on Thursdays, I walk him a little later at the park, when there are 3 other pugs and some other dogs. After the walk, he followed the other dogs to the cafe and actually drank out of the cafe water bowl. Previously he won't drink out of other bowls at all and would hold out until he gets home. Funny.

We unpacked the outdoor furniture and set it up in the outdoor area under cover. All the rain we have had would have collapsed the packaging anyway. They are not home upstairs yet.

Thank you again for the way you looked after everything so well. It was so nice to come home to a clean house and a happy dog. If you are in Sydney please let us know. You are welcome to stay anytime.

Hope you can ease back into work the first week.

Cheers
Heather

Heather

Hi Melina,

A big thank you from Mahei and I for looking after our cats and our home with such care.

It was wonderful to walk into the house yesterday after a long flight and find it clean and inviting. The cats are happy little fur babies too. Both of them seem completely normal and chilled out ~ especially Noah who is being more cuddly than usual!

We will definitely think of you and Richard again if we take a school holiday vacation, and we hope that you both had a relaxing and enjoyable stay in our home.

Thank you for leaving the money and taking care of all the things on our watch list.

We wish you all the best for 2015 and please feel free to use as a reference or any other house sitting jobs you get.

All the best,

Bridget.

Bridget Davis
Chef, Consultant and Food Writer
The Internet Chef
+61 40559Xxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Ps I also have a sister that can housesit her name is Antonia. She works at Little Jazzy's daycare in the city of Melbourne. She is able to do house sits in the Melborne area only, if you are interested. She loves cats and and is responsible and experienced.
ANTONIA 's PROFILE
To give you some background on myself I am 40, a non smoker and very tidy. I work at a childcare centre and part time at jewellers, so obviously I have to be extremely trustworthy.
I have housesat a mature cat on repeat occasions for a genltleman who was retired and was travelling overseas on many occassions. The cat was quite special to him as he had lost his wife and the cat was his only companion in the house. I made sure I followed his instructions to a T and would do the same for you.
I have completed housesits in Griffith NSW, Sydney and now 5 in Melbourne Clifton Hill and Croydon.
Please contact me if interested.
Antonia
Contact

Reviews (1)

Eve - Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

11 July - 19 July 2018

Melina and Richard looked after our two slightly mad dogs, the cat and our fish while we were overseas in Bali. They did the most amazing job - leaving the house in perfect condition and we came home to very happy pets. Can't recommend them enough. No hassles or worries - took everything in their... + More

Melina and Richard looked after our two slightly mad dogs, the cat and our fish while we were overseas in Bali. They did the most amazing job - leaving the house in perfect condition and we came home to very happy pets. Can't recommend them enough. No hassles or worries - took everything in their stride - made sure we were kept up to date with the dogs' wellbeing etc.

Organised

Reliable

Self-sufficient

Tidy

Pet care

- Less