photo by d&e

Many animal rights activists are protesting this new rent-a-dog business called FlexPetz that allows busy people to rent pets to take care of without maintaining the long-term responsibility of keeping a companion animal full time. I can see problems right off the bat: it can be an emotional roller coaster for animals to be shipped from one home to the next, never being able to form a steady bond with one person or family. However, there are also many many neglected animals out there whose owners just don’t have the time to be full-time pet owners. Is this a good compromise for otherwise neglected animals? Animals that would ultimately be returned to the shelter due to lack of care?

The owner of FlexPetz, Shari Gonzales, prefers the term “shared ownership” versus rent-a-pet. If the dogs are able to be cared for by multiple families versus spending a great deal of time at home or in kennels, wouldn’t that be better? And the time dogs spend at FlexPetz apparently is in cage-free kennels. When they are “rented” out, the owners are given care-kits with food, leashes, beds, etc to ensure that the dog has what he needs.

I know plenty of people, including myself, who would love to have a dog but, for one reason or another (like living in an apartment or never being home), cannot. Some important things I think must be required for such a service to work:
1. The “owner” has a decent amount of knowledge when it comes to animal care.
2. Making sure the owner will not be cruel to the animal. That the renter is very responsible and caring.
3. The living situation at FlexPetz as well as in their adopted homes is a happy and positive one for the animals.
4. The animals are never treated like a product.
5. Constant monitoring of the animal’s stress levels. If the dog seems very unhappy with the switching of families, he probably isn’t an ideal candidate for this lifestyle.

Gonzales claims that the pets are only shared with two or three families, which seems like an ideal situation. I would certainly be more concerned if it was a free-for-all where you could pick out a new pet each week and the dogs never had a steady family to return to. Gonzales also says that the owner spends hour-long sessions with the dog to make sure they get along well. The dogs featured on the FlexPetz website are dogs that would otherwise be in animal shelters because they were abandoned by the owner or were given up. And the dogs are monitored very closely for any health problems they may have had when they arrived.

But I can also understand the nay-sayers’ claim that “you wouldn’t rent out a child.” And if a dog is having a really great time with his family and then gets sent back, is he getting a message that he is being punished? It may be very hard to cope with.

I guess what it boils down to in my mind is, as long as the situation is treated with a great deal of care and sensitivity and isn’t some money-making animal exploitation situation, it’s better to have a few families to go home to that pepper you with love, versus ending up in a shelter or living with one family that’s never around. Read CBS article.