A woman has escaped the rental trap and saved £14,200 a year by pet sitting in multimillion-pound properties completely free of charge. Fay Locke, 32, from Newquay, Cornwall, was paying more than £1,200 every month on rent and bills when her landlord decided to sell her three-bedroom home in February 2023, forcing her to move back in with her parents in August 2023.
Finding her circumstances "not ideal," Fay was desperate for her own space but lacked the funds to get onto the property ladder. She discovered the Trusted Housesitters platform in December 2023, which operates on an exchange basis — offering pet sitting in homeowners' properties while they are away on holiday.
A "gamechanger" for Fay, she has since completed nearly 100 pet sits, travelling and staying for free in locations ranging from the Cotswolds to France, paying just £199 per year for her subscription — saving her £14,200 compared to her previous rental outgoings.
Moving from one visit to the next with only her car and a suitcase, having placed the bulk of her belongings in storage, she even travels with her own emergency pantry in her boot, selecting locations based purely on personal preference. Having grown "addicted" to the lifestyle, Fay kept her remote nine-to-five role as a digital marketer and saved enough to purchase a £5,250 campervan, which she has begun renovating.
In March 2026, she launched her own professional sitting business and left her former job behind — now dividing her time equally between her new venture and securing house sits across the country. Fay, a pet sitter and digital marketer, explained: "I had to move back in with my parents for two months which is not ideal in your late twenties and I was just like 'I don't want to live in this house and would love to buy and live in a van but it's not feasible at this point.'"
"I discovered Trusted Housesitters in late 2023 and it was just sort of a game changer really. I did my first one up in the Cotswolds. I was staying in a sort of multi-million-pound Cotswolds house with an electric gate and underfloor heating. There were two lovely dogs and I was just sat there feeling like Kate Winslet or Cameron Diaz in The Holiday. I got addicted and hooked on to 'where is the next one, where am I going?'"
"I got addicted to it and kept booking sits. It was amazing to get the travel aspect of things and getting to basically live in peoples houses for free – and I don't have rent or overheads and can still work my remote nine to five job as long as there's good Wi-Fi where I'm at."
Fay reveals she always experienced an element of "feeling different," and following an ADHD diagnosis in 2024, she "made sense" of why she felt discontent living in a conventional home while maintaining a standard nine to five routine. "It wasn't fulfilling me," she explains. "I was quite unhappy so having this lifestyle of being on the move and sort of getting a dopamine fix so to speak from being somewhere different all the time was amazing."
"I've been doing it just over three years now and I'm enjoying it. I've managed to buy a campervan which I'm going to do up. I'm half living in the van, half pet sitting. I've turned it into a business of my own now." After leaving her position as a digital marketer in November 2025, she went freelance and now operates a social media marketing business alongside her pet sitting enterprise. She spent time last year volunteering on a farm, before resuming pet sitting in March 2026.
Her possessions are stored in a unit costing £110 monthly, though she intends to "get rid" of it once her van conversion is complete and transfer everything into her mobile dwelling – anticipating a total renovation spend of £10,000. "I don't have a massive pot of savings. I'm just enjoying myself but it is a lifestyle where if someone was being frugal they would be able to save loads," she explains.
"My favourite trip was when I decided I wanted to go to France. I did two weeks at the top of France and found another sit two days later and drove eight hours down to Montayral and stayed in Airbnb's along the way. And then I stayed there in the mountains looking after two chickens for a week – it was really easy. It was wild as well. I didn't meet the owner as they had to leave before I got there so they left me a key. They said there was a jazz festival in the village and had organised for a friend to pick me up at 7pm. I had no idea who these people are. A little old French lady in her 90s picked me up and didn't speak a word of English."
Fay is aiming to complete her campervan transformation by winter this year and begin accepting bookings as a house sitter @travellingpetsitter on Instagram. To sign up to Trusted Housesitters and claim 25% off, you can register using Fay's code.
Previous monthly expenditure: Rent - £750, Council tax - £110, Gas and electric – £150, Wi-Fi/TV - £50, Phone - £45, Car - £60, Fuel - £70, Food - £240, Total - £1,475.
Current monthly expenditure: Utilities - £0, Phone £50, Food - £150, Fuel - £200, Storage unit - £110, Trusted Housesitters subscription: £16.58, Insurance (for car and van) - £120, Van tax - £29.16, Car tax - £2.50, Total - £558.24.
Total savings on rent - £1,183.42 a month (£14,201.04 a year). Total savings after all current outgoings - £916.76 (£11,001.12 a year).
