Pet Sitting Takes Off in Greece as Pets Become Part of the Family

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Once a solution limited largely to friends, relatives and neighbours, pet sitting is gradually becoming an organised pet-care service in Greece.

Dog walks, home visits and even multi-day stays now feature among the services pet owners seek, with demand reaching its peak during the summer holiday season.

“Demand for pet sitting has increased significantly since the pandemic,” 39-year-old Nikos, a professional pet sitter on Keeppet.gr for the past decade, told the Athens-Macedonian News Agency (AMNA).

He attributes the increase partly to the growing number of people who have acquired pets in recent years. At the same time, owners have changed the way they view animals and their place within the family.

That shift becomes particularly apparent during the summer holidays.

For August bookings, owners who want access to experienced professionals with strong reviews should ideally make arrangements at least one to one-and-a-half months in advance. Some people begin searching for summer pet care as early as immediately after Easter.

How much does pet sitting cost?

The cost depends on the service, the sitter’s experience, location and the animal’s individual needs.

A home visit or dog walk can cost around €10, while full-day care or an overnight stay at the sitter’s home generally costs around €20-€25 per night for a dog and €12-€16 for a cat.

Nikos says prices have increased by approximately 15%-20% in recent years, driven both by stronger demand and by greater recognition of the responsibility involved in caring for someone else’s pet.

Even so, prices remain considerably lower than in Northern European markets and the United States, where an overnight stay can start at around €60, he says.

Photos, videos and four pages of instructions

As people’s relationship with their pets changes, so do their expectations about their animals’ daily care.

At Keeppet, sending photos and videos has become standard practice, according to Nikos, while sitters generally communicate with the owner at least once a day.

Some owners, however, request several updates each day or even a video call with their pet.

Over his decade in the profession, Nikos has encountered some particularly unusual requests.

He recalls looking after two Labradors for around 20 days. Their owners arrived with their personal belongings and an entire suitcase filled with snacks, along with four A4 pages of detailed instructions covering training games and discipline exercises.

On another occasion, he cared for 15 cats in one home.

He also remembers a small dog that almost never went outside. The dog used a nappy when relieving itself and, whenever it left the house, its owners carried it constantly in their arms.

How quickly do pets adapt?

One of the biggest concerns for owners is how their pets will react once they leave.

Based on Nikos’ experience, around 60% of pets adapt almost immediately to their new surroundings. Another 30% need one or two days, while approximately 10% may struggle considerably or fail to adapt to staying in another home.

Some animals can display behaviours that they had never previously shown, ranging from excessive barking and damage to the home to, much more rarely, aggression.

Nikos considers the first 24 hours particularly important, as well as the way the sitter collects the animal and establishes the first contact.

The sitter may need to spend many hours with the animal and could even lose sleep during the first night while building an initial relationship of trust.

Not every pet, however, suits staying in an unfamiliar home.

Fearful cats, elderly animals, pets with vision or mobility problems, and dogs accustomed to living in a garden may feel safer in their own environment.

House visits offer an alternative

For these animals, owners can opt for a house-visit service, in which a professional visits the home once or several times a day, depending on the agreement, without staying overnight.

Animals adopted from the streets or animal welfare organisations may also require particular attention because they can experience greater separation anxiety.

There are also situations in which a pet sitter will refuse to take on an animal.

Nikos says he has refused only one dog during his 10 years in the profession because of aggressive behaviour.

“There are cases where we have to decline a pet, and this usually has more to do with whether the animal and the circumstances of the stay are suitable than whether the animal has bad behaviour,” he said.

“Truly aggressive animals are rare. Personally, in the 10 years I have been a keeper, I have refused only one dog for this reason. It bit me twice without provocation during the introductory meeting, even though its owner was standing beside it. In such a case, of course, you cannot take the risk.”

“Pets are now treated as members of the family”

The biggest change Nikos has witnessed concerns not so much the profession itself but the people who own pets.

“They really treat them as members of the family now,” he said.

In his experience, owners have become better informed and place greater emphasis on prevention, nutrition, weight management, vaccinations and regular veterinary check-ups.

More people are also adopting animals with disabilities or serious health problems.

At the same time, owners increasingly turn to organised platforms to find pet sitters, where they can check reviews and learn about a sitter’s experience.

The shift suggests that pet sitting in Greece is moving beyond an informal favour between friends and neighbours and becoming part of a broader, increasingly professional pet-care market.

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