s/o What % are you? How much do you outsource cleaning, yardwork, etc.?

[Anonymous]

98% and we do not outsource anything. I stay at home with our 3 kids and handle the house cleaning. DH does yard work and home maintenance. Mostly everyone we know outsources everything. It is not in our budget, though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:98% and we do not outsource anything. I stay at home with our 3 kids and handle the house cleaning. DH does yard work and home maintenance. Mostly everyone we know outsources everything. It is not in our budget, though.

Then what the hell are you spending your money on? Pamperd Chef?

[Anonymous]

I've had a cleaning person for much longer than I have been in the 99%. I don't think one necessarily has anything to do with the other once you hit middle class. I had a cleaning person even before I hit a six figure salary. Like others have said, it's a matter of priorities and, to me, avoiding cleaning (especially because I have terrible dust allergies) was a high priority.

[Anonymous]

88% and we have someone clean the house every two weeks. It's a stretch, and to do so we gave up other spending money. It's a luxury that became more important after DC came; even though I'm at home, the house was getting out of control. It will definitely be the first thing to do if our budget becomes more tight. We don't outsource anything else except auto maintenance including as many home repairs as we can figure out how to do ourselves.

[Anonymous]

95% dual income household and outsource nothing.

[Anonymous]

97%, weekly cleaning lady, outsource some yardwork (pruning big trees, etc). Once we moved into our new house, we also hired someone to strip wallpaper, paint, etc. They could do it better than we ever could. Also get dinner in or out 1-2 nights a week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've had a cleaning person for much longer than I have been in the 99%. I don't think one necessarily has anything to do with the other once you hit middle class. I had a cleaning person even before I hit a six figure salary. Like others have said, it's a matter of priorities and, to me, avoiding cleaning (especially because I have terrible dust allergies) was a high priority.

YUP. I had a cleaning person when I made 65K/yr. I've always had someone cleaning my bathroom(s), kitchen, and floors. In many countries, you cannot afford a clothes dryer, but you sure as hell have someone who comes and cleans your house! Very common in Latin America, for even the lower middle class.

[Anonymous]

97%- Cleaning service every other week and lawn service. DH is not handy at all, so we have to outsource any type of repair.

[Anonymous]

96% and about to up the biweekly cleaning lady to weekly, and outsourced lawnmowing for the first time this year - neighborhood kid for $20/week. That is the best money we have ever spent - I work on weekends a lot and it was impossible for my husband to mow with two toddlers either running around or napping.

[Anonymous]

95% and we mainly outsource the things we can't do ourselves (Plumbing, roofing, etc). We do have a dogwalker when we are both st work. And eating out.

I grew up with a very handy (and cheap) father who did most household repairs himself, so hiring workmen feels kinda luxurious to me!

We were thinking of hiring a housecleaner, but then we got a big, uncrated dog-and don't think it would be fair for cleaners to gave to deal with him. I also just feel weird about he idea of someone else being in my house in such an intimate way. We've been debating hiring someone to do yardwork, but our yard is do tiny it seems ludicrous.

[Anonymous]

This is such a typical nosy response. We're not supposed to outsource because you can't afford to OP? C'mon. Do you want a copy of my GD pay stub? Get real, will you. That is a rhetorical question.

[Anonymous]

I have no idea what % we are and I don't care, but I SAH and we have a cleaning service and lawn service. It's worth it for DH to spend time with us on the weekend instead of on yard work and with 2 kids under 5 I can not clean as well or as often as the cleaners, they come every other week so I still have to vacuum and do laundry, straighten, and scrub bathrooms on their off weeks. We save for it, don't spend on a lot of unnecessary things, we both have 2 pair of gap jeans, etc. it was just something we wanted

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've had a cleaning person for much longer than I have been in the 99%. I don't think one necessarily has anything to do with the other once you hit middle class. I had a cleaning person even before I hit a six figure salary. Like others have said, it's a matter of priorities and, to me, avoiding cleaning (especially because I have terrible dust allergies) was a high priority.

Same here. We've had a cleaning person for more than 20 years. Used to be biweekly, but it's been weekly since the kids were small.

[Anonymous]

96% and we have a cleaner every week, done in three hours. Outsourced nanny in our home.
Lawn care each week 29 bucks
Meals out regularly
I'm lazy about home "work" and work hard enough at my job. I don't want to spend any time away from my kids or doing things as a family. I am the wife and DH is a miserable homekeeper and I simply refuse to do it for him so we spend money to have it done.

[Anonymous]

PP here -- funny error I meant I don't want to have to do things that take away my time with kids or anything that takes away time to do stuff as a family. You can't really clean a house with two small babies running around but when they are older we could do a lot of home stuff together.