Hello

Just wanted opinions.

Myself and my partner are hoping to buy a house. Her mother is also moving house (we live with her).

If she moves before we do, it looks like we will need to move into her new house for a few weeks before we can go to our house.

What do we do about the cats? How long should we keep them in for?

Can we let them out whilst we wait for our move, as this might mean 4 weeks inside.

It depends on the cat tbh. Have they moved before, are they homebodies or roamers? The general advice is 4 weeks inside before letting then out. But I've had cats that go out the day we move and are never a problem, then there are others that I've been wary of letting out even after 4 weeks.

One of ours is a roamer and where my partners mother is moving too isnt too far from where we are.

We would like to keep them in for 2 weeks, but if we know we would move a week later i would keep them in.

So, if they are kept in 3 weeks at one house, when we move to our house, can we let them out after a few days?

I think the 4 weeks inside rule is when a cat comes into a new household. In your case the cats already know you and the furniture will be familiar (scent marked) too. So I'd expect them to be ok after a few days.
When letting them out a good trick is to do it before their meal time so hopefully they wont go too far.

i would think that everytime you move them you would have to keep them in for a few weeks...you dont want them wandering off and getting lost. Maybe you could buy a harness and let them outside on the lead to get them used to the new surroundings and smells.

When we moved we put mostly kept our in for a while - but we'd take her out to the garden on a harness - that way she could get used to the outside environment, and even meet the neighbour's cats but couldn't wonder off.

Once we were happy that she'd acclimatised a bit we let her out properly.

As far as the move goes - Feliway plugins are a god send to help settle the cat.
Yes they are a tad expensive - but shop around online and you can get them much more reasonably than in the pet shops.

Took a cat or on a harness once and he went crazy and managed to escape. I feel doing that just makes them want out more..

Same happened with our old family cat - luckily he came back after a spell up the neighbours' apple tree.

Ours had a bad cut on his leg, had been operated on. Took him out and he jumped onto a 6 ft fence!

There is always a spare room to lock them into if they get on our nerves
Thanks for the advice.

Yeah ours has managed to escape with a harness before now.

We were really worried - thinking she'd hang herself off a tree or something. But a couple of hours later she reappears without the harness.

So I guess if you put them on a harness, make sure you hang on tight!

I'd never use a harness on a cat that wasn't used to it, they panic (as you've found out!) as they can't escape, and usually make things worse for themselves.