TrustedHousesitters 2022: a year in review

And that’s a wrap! Well, nearly. The New Year is a-knocking — but before we crack open the treat tin, we’re taking a moment to ‘paws’, to look back on a great 2022 and raise a paw to the pets — and people! — who helped to make it happen. 

Suffice to say, it was a pretty special year for TrustedHousesitters. We hit 140,000 lovely members (not to mention, welcomed a lot of new furry faces!). Ever eager in our quest for knowledge, we asked our special holiday elves (aka, our data team) to dig a little deeper - and as ever, they were happy to oblige. 

This year-in-review shines a light on you — our members! — and all your furry friends. We also paw into some interesting insights around travel and pet parenting trends. Without further ado, let’s dive in…

Firstly, we welcomed a lot of new pets in 2022… 

Over 63,000, in fact! With all those new pets joining our ranks, we wanted to find out how exactly how many woofs, purrs, and chirrups that amounted to. And as ever, the results didn’t disappoint.

Unsurprisingly, we found that dogs and cats sit top of the class when it comes to our overall pet database. In 2022 alone, we welcomed over 40,000 new dogs and over 18,000 new cats to our platform. Woah. That’s a lot of paws and happy, wagging tails! 

Here’s how it looked when we crunched the kibble (uh, numbers): 

Of course, we were eager to dig a little deeper, and find out more about all those new furry, pawed, and clawed pals. 

Firstly, let’s take a look at our canine companions… 🔍

Top 10 dog breeds in 2022 

1. Mix-breed
2. Labrador Retriever   
3. Golden Retriever
4. Cocker Spaniel   
5. Chihuahua
6. Jack Russell Terrier   
7. Border Collie
8. Cockapoo   
9. Dachshund
10. German Shepherd

Mix-breeds take the crown! That said, the ever-popular Labrador Retriever came in at a very close second, with just over 4,000 happy-go-lucky Labs joining the TrustedHousesitters community in 2022. 

Next up: the cats. When we dug further into the nitty gritty of all things ‘kitty’, here’s what we learned about our feline members… 

Top 10 cat breeds in 2022

1. Mix-breed
2. Rescue cat
3. American Shorthair
4. British Shorthair   
5. Ragdoll
6. Maine Coon   
7. Bengal
8. Siamese   
9. Russian Blue
10. Burmese 

It’s official: mix-breed pets reign supreme! 

Top 10 most unique pets

Of course, it’s not just all about the cats and dogs. In fact, our data wizards spotted a number of particularly unique pets in amongst our pack - and here they are. 

1. Mallard
2. Stinkpot turtle
3. Wild turkey
4. Snowy owl
5. Rainbow boa
6. Pigeon
7. Desert iguana
8. Brown quail
9. Jackson’s chameleon
10. Australian water dragon

We’re not sure about you, but we’re setting up a saved search for snowy owl house sits immediately.

Top pet names in 2022

Next, we wanted to find out what our lovely members have been calling their furry family members. So, we purr-used our archives to find the most popular pet names for dogs and cats alike. 

Top 10 dog names - 2022

1. Bella
2. Luna
3. Charlie
4. Lola
5. Daisy
6. Max
7. Rosie
8. Molly
9. Lucy
10. Poppy

Top 10 cat names - 2022

1. Luna
2. Coca
3. Bella
4. Charlie
5. Loki
6. Leo
7. Milo
8. Lily
9. Max
10. Nala

Lots of Lunas, Bellas, and Charlies knocking about this year! 

In our quest for the most popular pet names, however, we also stumbled across a number of rather unique pet names lurking on our database… 

Most unique pet names in 2022

1. Clawde Meowet
2. Ice Cream Sandwich
3. Pablo Pawcasso
4. Pumpkin Spice
5. Madam Fluffypaws
6. Ramen Noodles
7. Post Meowlone
8. Professor Karl Barx
9. Sir Purrcival
10. Mr Dom Perignon

You sure are an imaginative bunch! To the punny pet parents that named their pets Clawde Meowet, Pablo Pawcasso, and Post Meowlone… um, fancy a job on our Copywriting team?! 

Members in review

Now, on to our less furry members… you lovely lot!

This year, we welcomed a lot of new pet parents and sitter members into our community and reached an incredible 140,000-member milestone. Hello, all of you! Pull up a chair, take a look around, we think you’ll rather like it here…

Sitters: here, there, and everywhere

First up: our lovely sitters. In 2022, our pet-loving sitters jetted off here, there, and everywhere to explore and care for furbabies in need. Hey, it’s a tough gig (*sigh*), but you lot managed it!  

Let’s take a look at some of the most popular pet sitting destinations in 2022.

Top 10 cities to go pet sitting 

1. London
2. Seattle
3. Portland
4. Austin
5. Denver
6. San Francisco
7. Melbourne
8. Sydney
9. Berlin
10. Brooklyn 

Top 10 countries to go pet sitting

1. United States
2. United Kingdom
3. Australia
4. Canada
5. France
6. Spain
7. Germany
8. Switzerland
9. Netherlands
10. Ireland

From Ireland to Australia, it sure was a busy year for our sitters - but especially for one sitter in particular. That’s right - out there somewhere, one sitter wracked up the most sits of all - a total of 42 house sits in 2022.

Another adventurous sitter visited a total of 35 different cities while house sitting in 2022. Mostly, these took place in Old Blighty, in cities including Bath, Brighton, London, Oxford and Reading.

Pet parents: who had the biggest menagerie?  

With 140,000 members and over 63,000 new pets joining our ranks in 2022 alone, it got us thinking… could there be a pet parent out there with a massive menagerie of pets? 

Well, imagine our surprise when our data wizards told us that one pet parent in particular had a whopping 44 pets under their belt! 

When we dug into the data a little further, we did discover that this included a large number of geckos. Still, if you’re a reptile-loving house sitter, we think this might just be the house sit of your dreams…  

A sitter-pet parent match made in heaven  

Lastly, it warmed our hearts to learn that one pet parent and one sitter connected time and time again, arranging a total 14 repeat sits together in 2022. Can you say ‘five-star review’?!

Now, on to some pet parenting trends… 

Pet parenting trends

We surveyed over 1,000 of our members to find out more about their pet parenting habits, thoughts, feelings, and innermost desires… and boy, did you lot spill the (toe)beans! 

Over 54% of Millennial pet parents and over 56% of Gen Z pet parents said they’d rather give up their guilty pleasures (social media, alcohol, coffee, sleeping in, and their favorite TV show) than leave their pets in an overnight kennel. 

1/4 of our pet parents went one step further - and admitted they’d rather run into their ex and their new partner on Valentine's Day than entertain the thought of their furbaby staying in a kennel… 

When we prodded our members further, 75% of pet parents admitted they’d used their pet as an excuse to avoid a social gathering (we’re definitely guilty of that one…), while half of our respondents said their pet had been key to their overall happiness in the last 18 months. Well, we knew that one already!

Related article: Our top blogs of 2021

While we hope you won’t be bumping into your exes anytime soon, we sure hope you enjoyed reading all about the incredible pets (and people) that helped to make 2022 such a brilliant year for the Trusted community. And, if after reading this, you’ve been inspired to become a part of the TrustedHousesitters story yourself, here’s a little more about how it all works and how to become a member.