Intro
So you are planning an extended holiday and thinking of using a house sitter to look after your home whilst you are away -- think again!
- How would you like to arrive home after your dream holiday to find your swimming pool green and fermenting, dog faeces ground into the carpet of your living room and patches of dog urine on your nubuck leather lounge?
- Would you be prepared to send a thousand dollars to the house sitter only five days after you'd flown out?
- Could you handle numerous abusive phone messages and e-mails from your house sitter, up to eight in one day?
- How would you react to the police telling you that you couldn't move back into your home for up to three months?
- If you don't think you could handle this, and much more, then I suggest you forget about using a house sitter -- because that's what has just happened to us.
This website has been created to tell that story and, hopefully, save other people from the misery that we have just been put through. Put simply, using a house sitter just isn't worth the risk.
And it's not just us who it has happened to
The house sitter boasted to one of our neighbours that she had financially ruined a camel breeder in the Northern Territory who she house sat for and did a similar thing to a buffalo hunter up there (no wonder she fled from the NT!!). She also recently walked out on a house sit in Ballina.
If you think you know one of these people who the House Sitter from Hell has made life hell for, ask them to contact us by email - the QLD Police would like to know their story.
It could still get worse
Already, the house sitter from hell has cost us nearly $8,000, but that's not the end of the story.
During the two months she was in our house the house sitter had access to all our personal and business information, and to all our incoming mail. Some documents are missing from a filing cabinet in my office, mail is missing and so is a cheque book.
She has a copy of our driving licences, knows our credit card details (but not the security codes) and has pretty much all the information she needs to steal our identity. We have online access to all our bank accounts so are checking these and our credit cards each night. We are also keeping the amount of money in our cheque account low so that if she does attempt to access it, she won't be able to get much.
Could this happen to you?
In one word - YES.
We thought we had done a pretty thorough job of checking her out, but events proved that we hadn't.
The House Sitter from Hell is well dressed, speaks well, and comes across as quite charming when you first meet her. We checked out her reference (she only provided one, in hindsight that should have been a warning sign, given that she claimed to have been house sitting for two years) and that was glowing. But it was a mobile phone contact (which no longer responds) and the police have told us that it was probably an accomplice.
She claimed to be a nurse - the most trusted of all professions - and that was probably the single most important factor in our decision to use her. But since our return we have checked with the QLD Nursing Council and discovered that she is not registered with them in any capacity. It was disturbing to find out that currently anyone can call themselves a nurse in QLD, without any qualifications. This will change after July 1 this year.
We had a QLD police check done on her before we engaged her and that came up clear. But we now know that she has a police record in the Northern Territory and is wanted for questioning by QLD police.
We had previously used house sitters without any major problems. But since we last used a house sitter the BUSINESS MODEL OF HOUSE SITTING AGENCIES HAS CHANGED - AND IT IS NO LONGER SAFE TO USE THEM. Send us an email if you would like this explained in more detail.
Where is she now?
The last contact we had from the house sitter she was using MXXXXXX Post Office as her mailing address. But she changes this when she moves to another area. She used both BXXXXXX and CXXXXXX Post Offices whilst she was house sitting for us.
Her mobile phone no longer answers so I assume she is now using a different number.
She no longer responds to emails. She was using a Hotmail account and no doubt she has several of them. They are free.
My guess is that she is heading south, into NSW or VIC, but who knows. The only thing I am sure of is that she will try and do to someone else what she did to us.