Honestly, Jackson was 5 months old when he got basic free reign of the house. He just always proved himself reliable.
I started out with a crate at 9 weeks old. We did the crate thing 'til he was maybe about 15 weeks old or so. Then I would leave him in an ex-pen when I would leave and that lasted for a little while. Then I started leaving him in my bedroom gated in. Then eventually I just left him out and all was fine... so ever since that day, he's had free roam.
He's never gotten into anything when we aren't home (now when we ARE home, that's a different story). But while nobody is home, he's never gotten into anything. My dad was the one that started it. I was over his house and he thought putting him in the crate was "mean"
so he left him out. I was terrified... we were gone for like 2 1/2 hours and I thought I'd come back home to a mess. Nope, the dogs just slept the entire time we were gone.