The old saying goes, "God save me from my friends, but I can handle my enemies myself!" And indeed, sometimes even the closest people around us, judging by their actions, turn out to be far worse than our enemies. At least we know exactly what to expect from our foes - but not from our friends...
Well, the user u/jessibook, the narrator of our story today, was completely unprepared for her friend to blatantly overuse her trust when she agreed to house-sit for her while she was in the hospital. However, let's not get ahead of ourselves and just take everything in order.
More info: Reddit
When you hire your old friend to house-sit for you, and wonder what could actually go wrong - in fact, literally anything, as this story proves
Image credits: The Yuri Arcurs Collection / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The author of the post recently underwent serious surgery, demanding she be in the hospital for about a month
Image credits: rawpixel.com / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The author had an agreement with a house-sitter, but then her plans changed, so the author needed to improvise urgently
Image credits: jessibook
Image credits: dmytrenko.fsk / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The woman made an agreement with her friend and gave her the keys, both to the house and her car, for urgent drives
Image credits: freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)
However, after returning from the hospital, the author found her house had been turned into a complete pigsty
Image credits: pvproductions / Freepik (not the actual photo)
Turned out that the woman had brought her useless boyfriend with her, and the couple only littered the whole month, without cleaning
Image credits: javi_indy / Freepik (not the actual photo)
The woman kicked them both out and called another couple of friends to help her with cleaning
Image credits: pvproductions / Freepik (not the actual photo)
Another unpleasant surprise awaited the author with the car, since the "friend" had apparently driven about 1K miles during her absence
Image credits: jessibook
The author demanded that the "friend" pay her at least for the car's extra mileage, since it was still on a lease, but she said that their friendship is now over
The Original poster (OP) says she recently returned from the hospital, where she underwent a quite serious surgery. Initially, the author arranged for a pet sitter to look after her cats and the house as well, but the pet sitter's plans suddenly changed, so she had to adapt quickly.
The author finally made arrangements with a friend, who agreed to stay at her house for about a month. The OP left her some money and gave her the keys to her car. However, our heroine stipulated that she could only use the car for urgent trips, as it was still on a lease. It would seem that nothing could go wrong.
As it turned out, literally everything could. Returning home, weak and tired after surgery, the author discovered a real mess at home. It turned out that her "friend" had brought her useless boyfriend there, and throughout the OP's hospital stay, they hadn't cleaned the house at all, only littered. And it also turned out that the couple had put over 1K miles on the author's car that month!
Our heroine kicked them both out and, having invited other friends, with great difficulty, got the house back in order. God only knows how much effort it took. As for the car, the original poster sent a message to her now apparently ex-friend, demanding reimbursement for the excess mileage. The author also asked netizens if she was right to do so.
Image credits: freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)
According to experts, housesitting actually requires a great deal of trust between the homeowner and the housesitter, because we are essentially entrusting the fate of our home to another person. So it's no surprise that our heroine chose her friend to carry out this task. And, as we can see, she had seriously miscalculated.
Most likely, the OP should've drawn up a written agreement with the housesitter, so that in case of an unpleasant outcome, there would be grounds for legal claims. "A written housesitting agreement is even better and doesn't have to involve a legal housesitting contract - just a list of what is expected during and at the end of the housesitting job that you have all agreed on," this dedicated post at Housesitting Magazine says.
In an update to her post, the author notes that her friend also left her cat at her house, which she later asked to be returned to her. As for our heroine's reasonable complaints, the lady stated that now, after everything that had happened, their friendship was definitely over. However, unlike the cat's fate, this apparently didn't bother her too much.
People in the comments were simply shocked by this outcome, although they sadly noted that such cases, alas, are not all that rare. "Honestly, the number of people in this world who use others is off the charts," someone wrote sadly, yet reasonably. So what do you, our dear readers, think about this story? Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.
Most commenters unanimously supported the author, and also noted that such stories are, alas, not that rare nowadays
