Pet Sitter Podcasts and Communities Worth Your Time
The fastest way to get good at pet sitting is to listen to people who already do it for a living. Not the general small-business advice that gets recycled everywhere, but the specific stuff: what to charge for a public holiday, how to write a service agreement, when to stop taking every enquiry.
This guide is deliberately short. It is not a directory. There are more pet care podcasts and groups than are listed here, and most of them are not worth your evening commute.
Everything below was checked on 13 August 2026, against the show's own website or RSS feed rather than a podcast directory. Where we could not verify something, we have said so and left it out. Podcasts go quiet, associations change their fees, and a recommendation to a show that stopped publishing two years ago is worse than no recommendation at all.
Start here: Pet Sitter Confessional
If you take one thing from this post, take this one.
Pet Sitter Confessional is hosted by Collin and Meghan Funkhouser, a husband-and-wife team who have, in their own words, "built and operated a multi-employee dog walking and pet sitting business" since 2012 — Funky Bunch Pet Care, serving Springfield and Sedalia, Missouri. That matters, because the hosts are not consultants who studied the industry from the outside. They still run the thing they talk about.
It is also unambiguously alive. Episode 725, "Building Your Succession Plan with Sativa Boatman", went out on 12 August 2026, one day before this post was written. The cadence is roughly twice a week, not weekly as some directory listings suggest, and the show carries a 4.9 out of 5 rating from 103 ratings on Apple Podcasts.
Seven hundred episodes is intimidating, which is why the useful entry point is the Starter Packs on their site: curated collections of episodes organised by theme — Business Basics, Pricing, Marketing, Hiring, and Self Care. Business Basics is the one they recommend if you are just getting started. Working through a single pack while you drive between visits is far more productive than subscribing and scrolling.
There is more around the podcast than the podcast. A resource hub covering software, certifications and trainings, business insurance, gear, discounts and conferences. An email newsletter. A community of professionals, which includes a Facebook group. And a continuing-education pathway: designated episodes come with a quiz and an emailed certificate you forward to NAPPS or PSI to claim one CEU. Both are US associations, so that credit matters only if you hold one of those credentials.
Who should skip it: nobody, honestly. But go in knowing it is American. The craft, the client psychology and the business thinking travel. The tax, insurance and employment specifics do not.
Three more worth your time
Prosperous Pet Business, hosted by pet business coach Kristin Morrison, is the most useful of the coach-led shows. It covers pricing, client acquisition, burnout and worker classification across pet sitting, dog walking and dog training, and holds 4.9 out of 5 from 144 Apple ratings. Be clear on the cadence before you subscribe: it is roughly monthly, not weekly. The feed shows one episode a month from March through July 2026, most recently Episode 177, "5 Steps to Recover from Pet Business Burnout", on 28 July. That is a feature if you want something structured and considered rather than a firehose.
Bella In Your Business, hosted by Bella Vasta of Jump Consulting, publishes weekly and was into the 470s by early August 2026, with 4.4 out of 5 from 78 Apple ratings. It is filed under Marketing, and that is a fair description: recent episodes lean toward websites, AI, hiring and scaling. The honest verdict for a solo sitter in year one is to skip it and come back when you are seriously considering your first employee or contractor. If you already have staff, it moves to the top of your list.
The Dog Sitter's House, hosted by April Hampton, is narrower and much smaller: home-based dog sitting, podcasting since 2024, roughly fortnightly to monthly, most recently Episode 78 on 4 August 2026. It has exactly one rating on Apple Podcasts, which means the star score tells you nothing at all. Treat it as one practitioner's experience rather than industry consensus, and take it if you host dogs in your own home and want to hear how someone else runs that specific model.
How to check a podcast is actually alive
Do not trust the date on a podcast directory. Twice while checking this post, Apple Podcasts showed us an episode a full year older than it actually was: it rendered Prosperous Pet Business Episode 177 as July 2025 when the show's own RSS feed says 28 July 2026, and The Dog Sitter's House Episode 78 as August 2024 when the host's own page says 4 August 2026.
Instead, open the show's own website or its RSS feed and read the last five publication dates. That tells you two things a subscribe button cannot: whether it is still running, and what the real cadence is. A show that advertises "weekly" and publishes every six weeks will quietly stop delivering the habit you were trying to build.
Communities: what exists, and what we could not check
The one substantive option for a sitter outside North America is Pet Sitters International, a US educational organisation that has operated since 1994 and says it has assisted over 40,000 individuals in starting pet-sitting businesses. That figure is PSI's own claim, not an audited number.
At the time of writing, membership is USD $155 a year for US members, USD $135 for Canadian members and USD $85 for international members, including Australians, plus a one-off USD $5 application fee charged in the first year only. That buys a private members-only Facebook group, a monthly member toolkit, Pet Sitter's World magazine in print and digital, customisable business forms and templates, a listing on PSI's Pet Sitter Locator and staff support. There is also a Certified Professional Pet Sitter (CPPS) credential with study materials, online courses, conferences including Pet Sitter World and the FOCUS Online Summit Series, and a free download called "Seven Steps to Starting a Pet-Sitting Business" that costs you nothing to read before deciding.
Now the part that matters most, and it needs saying plainly rather than in a footnote: PSI's group-rate insurance and bonding is available to US and Canadian members only. An Australian paying USD $85 is buying education, templates and peers. They are not buying cover. Do not let a cheap international membership become a reason you delay sorting out your own arrangements locally.
NAPPS, the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters, is real and currently active — a small US trade association registered in Huron, Ohio, tax-exempt since October 1995, which filed its most recent annual return in August 2025 for the 2024 financial year with revenue of around USD $252,000. We could not reach its website when researching this post, so we are not going to quote its fees or list its benefits. If it interests you, check its own site for current terms.
The Australian picture
The two bodies an Australian sitter is most likely to find are both, on inspection, aimed at somebody else.
The Pet Industry Association of Australia has been going since 1979 and is trade-only: you need a registered business with an ABN. Fees are set by annual turnover, and at the time of writing run from $75 for Associate membership up to $12,500 for the largest tier. A solo Melbourne sitter would sit at Level 1, $350 a year for turnover under $500,000, or take Associate at $75 — Associate being aimed at students, employees and hobbyists. Listed benefits include government advocacy, industry events, and discounts on training and legal services. Prices are AUD, and we did not verify whether they include GST.
The honest verdict is that PIAA represents the broad pet trade: retailers, boarding, grooming, aquatics, breeders, suppliers and manufacturers. There is no pet-sitting category. A sitter in year one will almost certainly get more per dollar from PSI's USD $85 international membership than from PIAA's $350.
The Australian Pet Care Association describes itself as the peak body for pet boarding, doggy day care and dog training businesses, and its member list bears that out — kennels, catteries and pet resorts. If you run a facility, look at it. If you sit in clients' homes or host in your own, skip it.
On Reddit and Facebook groups
A lot of the real day-to-day conversation between sitters happens on Reddit and in Facebook groups, and it is a different register to the podcasts: less business strategy, more "the dog will not eat and the owner is not answering their phone".
Three subreddits are worth knowing about. r/petsitting is the general one — the craft, awkward clients, rate questions, and the daily judgement calls nobody warns you about. r/RoverPetSitter is platform-specific, and it is the most useful room in the house if you are weighing up whether to stay on a commission platform: people there are living the fee changes, the deactivations and the search-ranking mysteries in real time, rather than theorising about them. r/melbourne is not a pet-sitting community at all, but if you sit locally it is where you will find the neighbourhood context, the recommendation threads and the occasional person asking who looks after their cat next month.
We are deliberately not quoting membership numbers for any of them. Subscriber counts age badly and are a poor proxy for whether a place is any good.
What we can offer is how to judge one yourself. Open the last week of posts. Are questions actually getting answered, or just posted? Is there a core of people who clearly do this full-time, or is it mostly hobbyists and people advertising? A group with 500 engaged professionals beats one with 50,000 members and no replies, every time.
A note on language
Nearly all of this material is US English-language. That is a real limitation if you read in French, Spanish, German or Dutch: the peer support is genuine, but anything about tax, insurance, employment law or certification will not map to your market. Take the craft and the business thinking. Verify anything legal or financial locally.
What to actually do in your first ninety days
Pick one podcast and work through a Starter Pack, rather than subscribing to five and finishing none. Join one community, not four. Treat every US-specific detail as an analogy, not an instruction. And write down the three things you change as a result — if you cannot name them by day ninety, you were consuming, not learning.
We are a young, Melbourne-first platform, so take this for what it is worth: sitters here pay a flat annual fee and keep 100% of what they earn on their bookings, and owners pay nothing. If that model interests you, the pricing page sets out what each plan costs, our comparison with Rover lays out the difference against commission, and you can start a sitter profile without a card. Our own resources are there too, though for craft and business fundamentals the shows above will serve you better than we will.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best podcast for new pet sitters?
Pet Sitter Confessional is the strongest single recommendation for a new sitter. It is hosted by two people who run their own pet care business, publishes roughly twice a week, and organises its back catalogue into themed Starter Packs so you can work through one problem at a time instead of scrolling hundreds of episodes. Start with the Business Basics pack.
Is Pet Sitter Confessional still running?
Yes. As of 13 August 2026 it was publishing roughly twice a week, with Episode 725 released the previous day. It carries a 4.9 out of 5 rating from 103 ratings on Apple Podcasts.
Who hosts Pet Sitter Confessional?
Collin and Meghan Funkhouser, a husband-and-wife team who have run a multi-employee dog walking and pet sitting business since 2012 — Funky Bunch Pet Care in Springfield and Sedalia, Missouri. They still operate that business alongside the podcast, which is the main reason the advice tends to be concrete rather than theoretical.
How much does Pet Sitters International membership cost?
At the time of writing, USD $155 a year for US members, USD $135 for Canadian members and USD $85 for international members including Australians, plus a one-off USD $5 application fee in the first year only. Prices are in US dollars and can change, so check PSI's own join page before signing up.
Is Pet Sitters International worth it for an Australian pet sitter?
It can be, but only for the education and the peer network. PSI's group-rate insurance and bonding is available to US and Canadian members only, so an Australian member is paying for the members-only Facebook group, magazine, templates, toolkit and CPPS certification path — not for cover. Read PSI's free "Seven Steps to Starting a Pet-Sitting Business" guide first to get a feel for the material.
Do I need to join a professional association to work as a pet sitter?
Nothing in this guide is about legal requirements. The associations covered here are for education and peer connection, and we did not research licensing, registration or insurance obligations in any market. Check those locally with an accountant, an insurer or your state authority rather than assuming an association membership settles them.
How can I tell if a pet sitting podcast is still active before I subscribe?
Open the show's own website or RSS feed and read the last five publication dates, rather than trusting a directory listing. Podcast directories carry stale metadata: while researching this post, Apple Podcasts displayed a July 2026 episode as July 2025 and an August 2026 episode as August 2024. The feed dates also reveal the real cadence, which is often different from what the show advertises.