"Pets are growing ever more popular. In 1988, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association, 56 percent of American households had a pet. By 2006, that figure had climbed to 63 percent, which works out to a national census of 88 million owned cats, 75 million dogs, 16 million birds, 14 million horses, 142 million fish, assorted small mammals and the occasional leopard or Madagascan hissing cockroach."
These statistics are not broken down by the demographics of the pet owners. Still, we can safely assume that as many as two out of every three of our potential exchange homes will contain a pet.
Clearly, limiting yourself to pet-free swap homes will greatly diminish your chances of working out a satisfactory exchange. Like me, many experienced exchangers may board their pets once or twice before declaring it a last-ditch option.
For me, one of the best things about home exchange is the fact that my cat and my kitten will stay comfortably ensconced in our home while we are gone. The poor things live with two young children and they don't need to become any more stressed out than they already are.
In the past, we paid a pet sitter to come in and feed them while we were away. This was not a great expense, but it also does not compare to having someone living in our place, giving the cats an occasional pat and observing their health much more closely than would be possible during the pet sitter's ten minute rounds.
So we no longer offer to board our cats. As a result, we have missed out on several very attractive exchange proposals. Of course, we live in an extremely popular vacation destination. I receive dozens of swap offers every month. If I lived in an obscure destination off the beaten path, my ideas about pet boarding would probably be different.
There is yet another alternative to boarding one's pets or keeping them in situ during home exchange. We'll explore that next time.
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