Madolline Gourley says she’s discovered a great money-saving strategy for travelling abroad – and it only requires 30 minutes of work per day.
The 32-year-old, based in Brisbane, Australia, travels the world house- and cat-sitting. In exchange for her half-hour of labor – which includes feeding, snuggling and cleaning litter boxes – Gourley receives free lodging. In the last four years, she estimates that she’s saved roughly $28,000 in travel expenses while visiting almost 50 homes across Australia and the U.S.
Back in 2017, Gourley was working a contract job writing copy for state government websites in Queensland when she heard that some of her coworkers were living rent-free by housesitting, using an app called TrustedHousesitters. At the time, Gourley was feeling a need to travel – and didn’t see the point of watching homes for free in Brisbane, where she already lived.
So she created a profile on the app, broadened her search to all of Australia and the U.S. and added her experience as a life-long cat owner to her profile. Today, she also uses platforms like MindMyHouse, HouseCarers, Aussie House Sitters, House Sitters America and House Sitters Canada to travel abroad, in between and during time off from contract copywriting jobs.
Gourley documents her journeys on a blog called One Cat at a Time, and while her venture into international cat-sitting involves a degree of wanderlust and spontaneity, she sees her experiences as practical – even though some of her friends find her adventures unusual.
“If you take out the fact that I’m from Australia, it’s not that much different than a friend or a neighbor watching your pet,” Gourley tells CNBC Make It. “Their place is the only form of payment I get.”
Planning and budgeting for international cat-sits
Gourley calculated her $28,000 figure – a conservative estimate, she says – by looking at nearby AirBnb and rental prices. For instance, an average one-bedroom in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood – where she stayed during her most recent trip – costs roughly $3,200 to rent per month, according to Zillow.
That recent trip was among Gourley’s longest cat-sitting adventures yet: Through 75 days, she stayed in nine homes and watched 15 cats in seven U.S. cities, starting in Seattle and crisscrossing the country before ending in Portland, Oregon, she says.
Since December 2017, Gourley says she’s visited nearly 50 houses between the U.S. and Australia.
Madolline Gourley
Of course, travel involves expenses beyond lodging. In total, Gourley estimates she spent roughly $7,200 during the trip, or an average of $96 per day.
Gourley’s round-trip plane ticket to the U.S. was a particularly big-ticket item, at $1,300. Her costs varied from city to city: During her 21 days in …….