What services would make the most difference in the life of exhausted parents?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DP - I would also do something like this but I would want to focus on the admin portion only. My kids are 11 and 13 and I need to carpool after school and make dinners myself!!! LOL

BUT -

I could:
- do all your vacation planning
- do any scheduling and planning for example calling for appointments, customer service follow ups, anything that you don't have the energy or time to do involving the phone or email
- prob errands like Amazon returns, dry cleaning, shopping for specifics
- my background is project management so I am more than happy to help with any project requiring time and planning

Would anyone be interested in such services - I prob would charge something like $50-100/hr and maybe even a fixed fee weekly.

$50-100 seems way too high to me for the admin things but understood you’re thinking of yourself as a PM

[Anonymous]

PP - thanks for feedback. What would you pay for such? Do you think a fixed fee weekly appeals more?

What else might be helpful? I ask from the perspective of being a working mom of 2 who are MS aged. I spend way too much time planning. Whether school related (private) or otherwise I feel like laundry is the least of my chores. It's the mental stuff that's a lot.

Seriously - I would consider this cause it's similar in scope to what I do but I could make it into my own business.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP - thanks for feedback. What would you pay for such? Do you think a fixed fee weekly appeals more?

What else might be helpful? I ask from the perspective of being a working mom of 2 who are MS aged. I spend way too much time planning. Whether school related (private) or otherwise I feel like laundry is the least of my chores. It's the mental stuff that's a lot.

Seriously - I would consider this cause it's similar in scope to what I do but I could make it into my own business.

I’d be assessing the quality of your children before hiring you. Are they top of their classes and elite athletes? If not, I imagine you’d do things wrong in my opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hey there,

I am curious to find out what parents are willing to splurge on in exchange for more sanity, me-time, in their life. I am looking to offer services that would make a difference in a parent’s life and would love to hear from parents! 😍

After school or after daycare pickup by someone who might charge more when parents were late but definitely won’t call the police or family services.

Also, daycare services with 24 hour operations. Many people can’t afford live-in nannies but have nonstandard schedules. Finding a daycare center that can handle a family with an unusual schedule is hard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a developing country and we had several household helpers who came in for a few hours/ day.
One person to sweep and mop the floors, dust and do laundry.
Another to help in the kitchen with cooking and do dishes.
These two worked at other homes too, a few hours per day.
A driver, who was a full time employee who'd drive my dad to work, us to school and back, and to any classes/ after school activities. In between during the work day he'd run errands as needed - ie pick up groceries/ dry cleaning or whatever.

All this in a very middle class household. I miss it!
For life here, I'd add in a manager who could do jobs like keeping track of all the kid tasks - lessons, camps, doctor and dentist visits, school forms, etc.

I had the same! Are you from India or Africa? We had this in Zimbabwe on a middle class family salary. Such a luxury - and affordable too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a developing country and we had several household helpers who came in for a few hours/ day.
One person to sweep and mop the floors, dust and do laundry.
Another to help in the kitchen with cooking and do dishes.
These two worked at other homes too, a few hours per day.
A driver, who was a full time employee who'd drive my dad to work, us to school and back, and to any classes/ after school activities. In between during the work day he'd run errands as needed - ie pick up groceries/ dry cleaning or whatever.

All this in a very middle class household. I miss it!
For life here, I'd add in a manager who could do jobs like keeping track of all the kid tasks - lessons, camps, doctor and dentist visits, school forms, etc.

I had the same! Are you from India or Africa? We had this in Zimbabwe on a middle class family salary. Such a luxury - and affordable too.

How much did you pay these people who were essentially slaves?!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Date night sitters are a godsend. Not an original/unconventional idea, to be sure, but we love ours.

Sitters who will watch a mildly sick kid on workdays are also a wonderful resource.

Isn't watching your sick child your responsibility? Maybe as close relative would help but who else wants to be around a sick and whiny kid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, Thank you all for your replies. This is really helpful - would love to know how much you'd be willing to pay if someone for example offered the following services (10 hours per week):
1. Laundry Folding
2. Travel arrangements (maybe even a travel chaperone for your child)
3. On-call childcare, got a sick child, can't miss an important meeting? She's there to fill in.
4. Running errands, grocery shopping, scheduling doc, and service appointments, prepping meals for the week, researching customized child activities (summer camp, speech therapists), basically personal assistant
5. Fill in the blanks with other things needed.

$25 an hour.