‘Choosing a homeless retirement means we can serve Christian missions around the world’

When my wife, Jeanie, and I retired 14 years ago, we made an unusual decision. We gave up the idea of owning or renting a home and became what we now affectionately call “homeless by choice”. It was a risk, but it wasn’t a reckless leap into the unknown. It was a prayerfully considered move that would allow us to offer ourselves fully to God’s mission – wherever and whenever needed. 

In the decade and a half since, we’ve completed more than 70 house sits across 52 locations on five continents – from a sheep farm in rural Australia to a ranch in Texas, a flat in the shadow of Mount Everest in Nepal to a bungalow in Kent, the Garden of England. We’ve even stayed on an organic banana farm in remote Queensland.

Jeanie and I have always enjoyed travelling. Our God-inspired love of adventure can be traced back to 1999, when we first met in New Zealand. We married 18 months later and went on to live in different parts of the world. 

While in Dubai in the early 2000s, I was encouraged by a friend to start a coaching business, using the knowledge I had gained after being made redundant years earlier. Sandpiper Coaching was born and Jeanie joined me in the company. Soon, we expanded into corporate coaching and team development, too. 

When we retired to Australia in 2011, we weren’t sure where to live, so rather than renting or buying a place, we started housesitting. We created our own website, wehousesit4u.com, and joined Christian house-sitting platforms online.

We began to look for opportunities to use our skills to serve as volunteers. The director of the global evangelical missionary organisation SIM (Serving in Mission – formerly Sudan Interior Mission) recognised the benefit that coaching could bring to their missionary teams and invited us to coach their ‘Home Team’ in Sydney. We had connections with Operation Mobilisation (OM) from our time in Dubai and our offer to coach their team in Melbourne was readily accepted. Soon, SIM asked if we would go to South America to coach some of the SIM teams there.

We may not own a house, but we’ve called dozens of places ‘home’

Since then, we’ve travelled to Australia, Bolivia, Uruguay, Chile, Ecuador, Nepal, Bangladesh, Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Vietnam, Thailand, Spain and the Philippines. We’ve served in churches, schools, hospitals, Bible colleges and mission organisations, offering leadership coaching, mentoring and pastoral care to strengthen missionary teams working on the frontlines, equipping them to work together more effectively, and helping individuals identify their personal strengths.

People often ask us how, as retirees, we have funded this lifestyle for so many years. 

We estimate that not paying rent or a mortgage saves us more than £15,000 a year. Using our pensions and savings wisely, this covers our daily living expenses and travel to the countries where we’ve been invited to serve. With no home to tie us down, we are free to go wherever and whenever God opens a door.

Home and away

Most of our housesitting takes place in Australia, which allows us to be near our family, but we sometimes find places overseas that align with our travel schedule. Often, we have been generously hosted by the organisations we’ve served while overseas.

While a few occasions have required only house and garden care, most assignments have involved beloved pets with set routines and often special needs. We’ve cared for everything from retired racehorses to rabbits, chickens, guinea fowl and ferrets. From dogs of many sizes and varieties (including a rescue Doberman and three adorable husky snow dogs) to cats of varying temperaments – even the ‘illegal’ cat of an owner who wasn’t supposed to have pets in her rented flat!

Over that time, we’ve also had our fair share of excitement and challenges: emergency visits to vets and callouts to plumbers for burst pipes, handfeeding six kookaburras, bottle-feeding baby lambs and searching for runaway pets. When the refrigerator failed at a property near Sydney that was only accessible by water, we coordinated a replacement that arrived by barge and funicular – a small cable-driven railway – as the home was located up a steep slope. Maintaining a swimming pool during Australia’s rainy season presented a unique drama when a mudslide landed in the pool! Some pets were so poorly trained that it tested our patience and grace, and we were taken by surprise when we arrived at a house on the south coast of Australia to learn that the owners expected us to hand-feed a very large, hungry, noisy, injured cuckoo! 

Adventures abroad

We once presented workshops at a church retreat in Bangladesh surrounded by armed guards. In a remote part of Pakistan, we had to be escorted to and from the meeting venue because of the risk of kidnapping or mugging. In Sri Lanka, Jeanie contracted potentially life-threatening dengue fever and had to be hospitalised for five days. 

One of our most immersive ministry assignments was living and working aboard Operation Mobilisation’s Logos Hope for a year, a ship run by more than 450 volunteers – mostly young people – from 60 nations. The ship calls at ports around the world, offering Bibles, Christian books, educational resources, community development and humanitarian assistance. They will be calling in six UK cities this summer. 

We’ve cared for everything from retired racehorses to rabbits

When the ship visited twelve ports in the Caribbean in 2017, we represented OM in recruiting new volunteers to join the ministry. This was also a great opportunity to share the gospel with visitors every day. Many of the young crew members were away from home for the first time, living in close quarters with complete strangers and learning new jobs. As the oldest members of the crew, we were privileged to act as unofficial surrogate grandparents, providing hugs, shoulders to cry on and a listening ear. 

While volunteering in the Middle East in 2019, we had the joy of spending time in Jerusalem and visiting the Garden Tomb, one of the possible locations of the burial and resurrection of Jesus. People from all around the world visit this beautiful garden, located just outside the Old City walls, to reflect, pray and have communion. As we talked with the guides in the garden, we sensed that God was directing our passion for serving in a new way and in 2020, our application to serve as volunteer guides at the Garden Tomb was accepted. After Covid interrupted our plans, we returned in 2023 to serve for three months. We were kept busy working alongside other volunteers, guiding people around the garden and sharing the gospel with up to 50 coaches full of visitors (around 2,000 people) every single day. We plan to return to Jerusalem to serve for another three months as soon as circumstances allow.

A tapestry of grace

It has been liberating to free ourselves from the burden of owning, valuing, caring for and carting around possessions that once seemed essential. This has allowed us to respond quickly to new ministry assignments without the hassle of packing up our belongings. 

Looking back, we have no regrets. We may not own a house, but we’ve called dozens of places ‘home’, and felt released to focus not on our possessions, but on our relationships, faith and service. For us, this wasn’t a retirement gap year, it’s a tapestry that displays God’s grace, where housesitting and volunteering have been interwoven in a way only He could design. 

With no home to tie us down, we are free to go wherever and whenever God opens a door

Through it all, our Christian faith has guided us. We miss our family when we are away, and although we know they miss us too, they also understand that we feel called to serve in distant lands. Along with our church, Jannali Anglican in New South Wales, they are very supportive. We have been blessed with their consistent prayer and encouragement and are thankful that we can be in regular contact via WhatsApp. We know that God has a plan for our lives. We don’t look too far ahead but wait to see what He has next. We know He hasn’t finished with us yet! 

To anyone considering a different kind of retirement, we’d say, don’t look at retirement as a finishing line; think of it as standing at the starting blocks, ready to run a new race. For us, housesitting freed us to respond more flexibly to God’s call to coach ministry teams around the world. For others, it might look completely different. Start by seeing retirement as an opportunity to focus on helping other people – whether they are around the corner or around the world. 

Don’t be afraid to take that risk. Adventure may follow!