Taking Care of the Household while on a World Cruise

We are planning our first world cruise - three months away from home. We have picked up a lot of good ideas from the World Cruising threads. We thought it might be helpful for us (and others) if there were one thread that focused on ideas regarding taking care of the household while away for several months or more.

We realize that some of you have downsized to a condo or apartment that can be more easily closed up while you are gone. But we still have a house with a big yard, lots of plants, etc. Plus some other things we will face affect everyone.

House Sitter - Unfortunately we don't have a relative who could watch over the house during our trip. We were wondering if anyone has used a third party as a house sitter. We met someone while in Jamaica who does exactly that. They have 3 to 4 houses that they house sit for all over the world several months at a time. Unfortunately they were booked during our trip. But we are interested in hearing anyone's experience (good or bad) with someone other than a relative watching over your house for such an extended period of time. Did they live in your house or just visit periodically and how often should they visit?

Pets- Fortunately, our only pets are a very large salt water aquarium. We are currently trying to find some place to put the fish during the trip. Alternatively we could have our regular aquarium service person continue his normal servicing, with the house sitter or a neighbor looking in on them periodically. Anyone have any thoughts about pet sitting for such a long time?

Finances - We are planning on putting all of our recurring bills online over the next couple of months so that we can pay them from anywhere. We already have bill pay set. But we are concerned about any nonrecurring bills that might come in. We are sure that there are other household finance problems that we should be thinking about. Any comments about past disasters (or disasters avoided because of something you have done.)

Mail - We found out on one of the threads that the post office will not hold mail for this long. Any suggestions on how to handle the mail during our trip?

Other household issues - If there are any other issues you have encountered while being away from home for an extended period, please let us know.

We appreciate all of your input and hope this will be helpful for anyone who will be going an extended vacation.

Lots of views, but no comments. :mad:

Please understand, we are not looking for someone who can answer all of our questions. If you have input on ANY of our questions (or a story to tell), we would love to hear it.

I am going on a world cruise next year and this is what I am doing.

House sitter - not sure I know anybody I would want in my house for 4 months. I do have wonderful neighbors who always look out for me and cut my grass. They will be keeping an eye on my house and I know it will be as safe as if I was at home.

Pets - no longer have any

Finances - everything that I can, I pay on line. The two bills that I cannot pay on line, my daughter will write checks and mail. She is also going to do my income tax return for me.

Mail - my daughter will be picking it up. If you are in the US can have your mail boxed up once a week and sent to someone. I think this is about $17 a week.

We were only gone 72 days, 65 cruising with a week before in Auckland, and this is what we did.

Our wonderful neighbors checked the house, started the car, and watered my roses when the rain and irrigation schedule weren't enough.

We had a pool service and someone else for the lawn,so had a fair amount of usual activity around.

We paid our taxes before we left in March and had most of our bills online. We were able to see these and pay them onboard with our devices.

Our mail was forwarded across town to my husband's office and held there. You could use a friend for this.

If we had still had our dog, our daughter and son in law would have kept him.

All this worked for us. I wish you a wonderful trip.

We are planning our first world cruise - three months away from home. We have picked up a lot of good ideas from the World Cruising threads. We thought it might be helpful for us (and others) if there were one thread that focused on ideas regarding taking care of the household while away for several months or more.

 

We realize that some of you have downsized to a condo or apartment that can be more easily closed up while you are gone. But we still have a house with a big yard, lots of plants, etc. Plus some other things we will face affect everyone.

 

House Sitter - Unfortunately we don't have a relative who could watch over the house during our trip. We were wondering if anyone has used a third party as a house sitter. We met someone while in Jamaica who does exactly that. They have 3 to 4 houses that they house sit for all over the world several months at a time. Unfortunately they were booked during our trip. But we are interested in hearing anyone's experience (good or bad) with someone other than a relative watching over your house for such an extended period of time. Did they live in your house or just visit periodically and how often should they visit?

 

Pets- Fortunately, our only pets are a very large salt water aquarium. We are currently trying to find some place to put the fish during the trip. Alternatively we could have our regular aquarium service person continue his normal servicing, with the house sitter or a neighbor looking in on them periodically. Anyone have any thoughts about pet sitting for such a long time?

 

Finances - We are planning on putting all of our recurring bills online over the next couple of months so that we can pay them from anywhere. We already have bill pay set. But we are concerned about any nonrecurring bills that might come in. We are sure that there are other household finance problems that we should be thinking about. Any comments about past disasters (or disasters avoided because of something you have done.)

 

Mail - We found out on one of the threads that the post office will not hold mail for this long. Any suggestions on how to handle the mail during our trip?

 

Other household issues - If there are any other issues you have encountered while being away from home for an extended period, please let us know.

 

We appreciate all of your input and hope this will be helpful for anyone who will be going an extended vacation.

Art, we have done five full World Cruises and will be on the next one with you.

1. We have a neighbor check on our house. This includes walking the inside and outside of the house, starting our cars, running water down the drains, flushing toilets and the like. We reciprocate during the year and we do some special things for them. Whatever you do, you need someone to watch the house.

2.I would have whoever watches the house watch the aquarium.

3. I don't know where you live but if it is in a cold climate you will want someone to check the house if it gets very cold. Be sure to take all of your contacts with you in terms of maintenance contractors if there will be an issue such as electrician, plumber and the like. Be sure to have your insurance company contact with you. About two weeks before our last world cruise ended we had a terrible hail storm and our roof had to be replaced. I was able to get things started by getting the process started with the insurance company before we left the ship.

You really need someone you trust to watch the house. Things can go wrong.

Keith

We are planning our first world cruise - three months away from home. We have picked up a lot of good ideas from the World Cruising threads. We thought it might be helpful for us (and others) if there were one thread that focused on ideas regarding taking care of the household while away for several months or more.

 

We realize that some of you have downsized to a condo or apartment that can be more easily closed up while you are gone. But we still have a house with a big yard, lots of plants, etc. Plus some other things we will face affect everyone.

 

House Sitter - Unfortunately we don't have a relative who could watch over the house during our trip. We were wondering if anyone has used a third party as a house sitter. We met someone while in Jamaica who does exactly that. They have 3 to 4 houses that they house sit for all over the world several months at a time. Unfortunately they were booked during our trip. But we are interested in hearing anyone's experience (good or bad) with someone other than a relative watching over your house for such an extended period of time. Did they live in your house or just visit periodically and how often should they visit?

 

Pets- Fortunately, our only pets are a very large salt water aquarium. We are currently trying to find some place to put the fish during the trip. Alternatively we could have our regular aquarium service person continue his normal servicing, with the house sitter or a neighbor looking in on them periodically. Anyone have any thoughts about pet sitting for such a long time?

 

Finances - We are planning on putting all of our recurring bills online over the next couple of months so that we can pay them from anywhere. We already have bill pay set. But we are concerned about any nonrecurring bills that might come in. We are sure that there are other household finance problems that we should be thinking about. Any comments about past disasters (or disasters avoided because of something you have done.)

 

Mail - We found out on one of the threads that the post office will not hold mail for this long. Any suggestions on how to handle the mail during our trip?

 

Other household issues - If there are any other issues you have encountered while being away from home for an extended period, please let us know.

 

We appreciate all of your input and hope this will be helpful for anyone who will be going an extended vacation.

Art,did the input I provided earlier help or do you need something different or more?

Keith

Sorry Keith,

All of the comments have been helpful. We are interviewing people to house sit as well as looking for places to store my salt water fish. Three months is just too long to expect that something will not go wrong with the aquarium in between the time that someone watching the house will catch it in time (fish, tank, blackout, chemistry etc.) .

We live in California so freeze proofing the hosue is not necessary. It also helps that the weather will be cool for my garden. In the summer, three months away and everything would be dead when we returned. We were away for just under two months a couple of years ago in January-February and everything was beautiful when we returned.

We will be filing an extension for our taxes and paying a little extra with the extension. Still working on the rest of our financial planning.

Thanks

Thanks, Art. I just wanted to be sure we were getting you the feedback you needed.

I have found when we are away for the world cruise to be certain they do run the water down the drains and flush toilets. I realize that some people just shut their water off and their are pro/cons to this but we have found that it's better to have someone run water down the drain and to flush toilets.

In terms of the financials, do get everything automated as soon as possible just so you can make sure it is all working properly. Think about those annual bills on top of the recurring ones.

Take contact lists with you for all your vendors in case you need to get a hold of them.

I recommend checking things on line often from the ship.

Yes, file tax extensions.

We have also eliminated most of the paper bills since automating them. A side benefit is that when we arrive home we have far less mail to go through.

In terms of mail check with your post office as some post offices will hold the mail beyond 30 days. It is up to the postmaster. Ours do not. The first couple of years we had the mail forwarded to a post office box at the same post office and then a neighbor went up to the box once a month to get the mail. The last few times we have forwarded the mail (temporary forward) to a relative and then we get the mail when we return. If you went this route pick a start date about two weeks before you go and submit the form about 10 days before then to be sure all is working. The good news with this is not of the junk mail forwards so when we get home most of what we receive is important mail.

Keith

Greetings all,

I am finding all of this helpful. My question, Keith, pertains to having someone periodically run water in the drains and flush toilets. I was planning on shutting my water off -- having once suffered a leak while I was away for three days -- tremendous damage! So what are advantages of periodic water usage? Thanks!

IBCrusin'

There is some kind of fitting in each drain (at last in our house) so they advise running water down them every couple of weeks. It's not a major deal but the water level in the toilets goes down quite a bit if not flushed. The types of faucets we have have cartridges in them that evidently can be a problem if the faucets are not used even for a few seconds and turned from hot to cold.

If you ask a plumber each one has their own opinions on all of this.

If you are away and no one is checking your house frequently then I would turn the water off and drain one of the faucets.

We do turn the water off to our washer.

Keith

I know it's not the same thing, but my parents were snowbirds for many years, living in their house here in Florida in the winter and in a trailer in a campground in North Carolina in the summer.

They lived in a gated community here in FL so they weren't too worried about their house since there are always neighbors close by. They shut off the water, put saran wrap over the toilet seats to keep the water from evaporating out, and turned off the ice maker. They left the A/C on but turned up to about 82 - in FL you would have a mildew problem if you turned it off.

They have no pets or houseplants, because they didn't want to worry about them when traveling (they were fulltime RVers for several years before becoming snowbirds). Aquariums - especially salt water - do not like to be untended for that long. If you trust them enough, giving a service the key to your house to take care of it while you're gone is the only way you'll keep that tank from getting all out of whack.

For mail, they tried different things through the years but what worked best was to forward their mail to me and have me call them if anything needed immediate attention. I sign on their bank accounts so I could pay bills and so forth. Every now and then I would bundle up a bunch of their mail and forward it to them. I know there are also services that will handle your mail for you, but you might not need that kind of setup.

Your situation isn't so different from RVers so you might check on RVing websites to find suggestions.

Have a good time on your cruise!

frisbeewife, we do the same as your parents did with the mail. We forward it to our daughter. It works out well.

IBCruisin I wanted to add the other things to think through if you turn off the water is the water heater. You could leave it on but you have to think that through and also freezing pipes.

There is no right or wrong on this and over the years I had asked various plumbers and they all had different opinions.

We do have a neighbor come over any night it will be very cold to drip just a couple of faucets that are on outside walls.

I may have covered this earlier but then there are the cars. We have the person watching our house start up each one once a week. Some people disconnect their batteries and others put on a device that keeps them charging.

Keith

Thing to remember with all drains is that they have a trap. The trap is a water seal that prevents odors and dangerous gases from coming up into your house. Even the Toilet has a trap. If the water evaporates then the gases from septic can entire the house and if concentrated can harm or kill someone. Anyone who has ever removed a toilet to fix will know the smell. For me it gives a headache in about 5 minutes.

1. This is one discussion that makes me grateful to CC. These are all issues that have convinced us to have a house sitter for our WC.

2. I think we can have our home mail forwarded to our post office box and then a trusted family member can sort through for anything urgent.

Thank goodness my summons/call to jury duty came this month and I am good for 2 years. That is something else to watch for in the mail.

Thanks to all.

This is a great thread, and I fir one am learning a lot. We are booked on the Crown around the horn, and then taking the train, back to the east coast. So we will be gone for 55 days. I have lots of questions, but y'all are answering lots of them.

Cyndi :)

I've read that people in the UK have issues with their home owners insurance when a house is left empty 3-4 months. Anyone have any trouble like this in the US?

IBCrusin'

 

There is some kind of fitting in each drain (at last in our house) so they advise running water down them every couple of weeks. It's not a major deal but the water level in the toilets goes down quite a bit if not flushed. The types of faucets we have have cartridges in them that evidently can be a problem if the faucets are not used even for a few seconds and turned from hot to cold.

 

If you ask a plumber each one has their own opinions on all of this.

 

If you are away and no one is checking your house frequently then I would turn the water off and drain one of the faucets.

 

We do turn the water off to our washer.

 

Keith

The issue w the water is not the stuff coming into the system but the wastes going out of the system. You could turn off the water to the house and then have someone pour a bucket of water into each sink, tub, shower, and toilet once every few weeks. That would take care of the traps, etc. and would only take a few minutes.

Considering the total cost of the world cruise, another option would be to contract for a plumber to come in and check things out every month or so. As a percentage of your total cost, the plumber cost would be round off error.

DON

Don, you got the word. It is the traps.

We could do as you suggested but we also prefer to have the toilets flushed as well.

We also have faucets that need to be run each week or two and then the knob turned from hot to cold for a few seconds.

I know there are a lot of pros about turning the water off. In the end each person needs to figure out what works best for them.

We have a really good neighbor who watches our house and we do the same for them. Honestly I would not want a plumber in my house and also don't want them to know we are away.

Keith

Another cost saving idea - if no one will be driving your vehicles, put them on comp only insured.

We know some people who do this.

We don't because we have someone run our vehicles to keep the batteries in good working order.

Yes, there are all sorts of things that one can do to save money including temporarily canceling satellite/cables services.

Keith

I checked on our cable service yesterday and we can cancel, keep our cable boxes, and restart when we get home. I did not think of this until I read it here. We will have our cars started but not driven. We already do this every winter with our convertible.

I checked on our cable service yesterday and we can cancel, keep our cable boxes, and restart when we get home. I did not think of this until I read it here. We will have our cars started but not driven. We already do this every winter with our convertible.

We do this all the time - even if we are gone for only a month. You can also downgrade your phone service to local service only. Every little bit helps.

DON

Another cost saving idea - if no one will be driving your vehicles, put them on comp only insured.

Be careful with that. Doing that would void our umbrella policy and if someone got hurt on one of our properties.......We live in California the land of golden lawsuits.

I would also be careful on other items.

For example, I would not turn off your internet.

I think people can get too carried away.

Just my opinion.

Keith

We are gone for 4 months every summer.

We live in a condo and we have a neighbor check things out every week or so

No pets so that is not an issue

The same neighbor collects our mail. If he thinks something needs an immediate reply, he opens the envelope and scans the letter and emails it to us. For example, dh got a jury duty notice and we emailed our neighbor what to do about it after reading the letter that he scanned and emailed to us.

We pay all our bills online so no worries there

In case of an emergency our neighbor will call our daughter.

We may be traveling for a long time but we do stay in touch