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Professional Housesitters Being Paid To Stay

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Jun 15, 2008 4:06 pm US/Eastern

Professional Housesitters Being Paid To Stay

 CBS News Interactive: Eye On The Economy

CEDAR HILL, Texas (CBS) ― Home sales have dropped 12 percent in recent months. But there is a sunny side to this dark economy, and it may mean a free place for you to live.

Babysitters. Petsitters. Housesitters?

With foreclosures up and home sales down across North Texas, a number of realtors and owners are calling on housesitters. There is actually a growing career where some will pay if you promise to stay.

Hundreds of burglaries have been reported in vacant, furnished and unfurnished homes across North Texas over the last six months. Realtors like Donna Wheat with Ebby Halliday Realtors are regularly discovering homes stripped bare, missing lighting and plumbing, CBS station-KTVT reported. Thieves even take the kitchen sink!

The career of housesitting is now advertised online, and touts living rent-free. Employees actually get paid to stay at home and deter thieves from entering.

Professional housesitters like Damiene DeWit of Dallas have embraced the concept. "I do whatever it takes to make your home look occupied," she explained. "I turn on the porch light at night. I change the lights and drapes during the day."

"Several companies out there do this and they provide housesitters," said Wheat. "They come in and they move furniture in."

For those who wish to have a housesitter but cannot afford the $400 to $1,500 per month fee, experts advise having a friend or neighbor pick up mail and newspapers, and turn on lights intermittently.

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