I used to be a nanny. I knew many, many au pairs. The impression I got was that they were beautiful slaves.

Anonymous wrote:The families I know who have had the best luck with APs have been the firmest about their requirements (safe/confident driver, able to help with homework, whatever) and willing to re-match as many times as necessary to get a fit. I hear more complaints about the agencies than I do the APs themselves (which tend to be more along the lines of standard teenage/young adult complaints - moodiness, messiness too much time on phone).

+1 A lot of au pairs are older teenagers. Some are very responsible, others do things like not showing up to work because they partied too late on the weekend. There's a reason they're half the price of a nanny. If you're flexible and can pick up the slack if needed, it can save you a lot of money.

The families I know who have had the best luck with APs have been the firmest about their requirements (safe/confident driver, able to help with homework, whatever) and willing to re-match as many times as necessary to get a fit. I hear more complaints about the agencies than I do the APs themselves (which tend to be more along the lines of standard teenage/young adult complaints - moodiness, messiness too much time on phone).

For me, having an au pair was like having another child... in addition to the three I was trying to manage.

Mistakes I made:

1) Not holding out for someone who was older and more experienced. My au pair had never lived away from home and was immature. Other people are "pickier" with who they choose and have better luck getting someone qualified.

2) I knew in the first week that it was a bad fit and the coordinator person made it about me being intolerant and I backed down. She ended up leaving 6 months into the year because it just wasn't a fit.

3) Do you have a dedicated space in your house where she can live? We had ours in a finished basement and she was sulky about it not being as nice as other people's situations. If I were to do it again, I would make sure I had a guest room en suite to give her her own space.

4) Are you willing to shower your au pair with extra money so she will like you and feel good about being with your family? I didn't realize this was a thing and would get annoyed when she would ask me to pay for things that I figured she should use her stipend for.

I ended up with a housekeeper/family helper and that was a much better fit for me. I realized I don't like non-family members in my home around the clock.

Did you try using google OP? There are so many posts on this topic. It's definitely cheaper to have an au pair than a nanny, and some have great experiences and some not so much.

https://www.reddit.com/r/workingmoms/comments/15vr399/anyone_have_experience_with_an_au_pair_goodbad/

By cheap I mean compared to a real nanny and finding someone to be available for split hours which is almost impossible.

Ha, same OP - I had friends rave about it, so we tried it. I absolutely hated having an au pair. I learned a lot about myself during that period - I had no idea I was SUCH an introvert, I like my own space, I am very private. We paired with a lovely young woman but she was the complete opposite of me - wanted to do EVERYTHING together, nosey (but in an innocent way... like if I came home with Nordstrom bags, she'd be like, ooooh! What did ya get???), very social, very talkative. Yes, you can try to get someone with a personality similar to your own, but I also just didn't know until we tried it how much I'd dislike it. We did it 2 years (an AP can stay up to 2 years - even though I was pretty done by the end of Year 1, she did basically become like family so we did a second year too... but it was "family" like a clingy younger sister or niece who you love, but you also just want them to move out and leave you alone). We keep in touch. She's a sweetheart, the kids liked her but man I didn't like hosting someone. I had enough on my plate, then to add in someone who looks to you for social interaction, understanding our country, living in America, homesickness, hosting her birthday party and hosting her friends, including her in Christmas events and presents and stockings, including her in vacations, like getting her ski rentals when she'd never skied, surf lessons, etc. It is A LOT of time, energy and money to host someone!

Someone said above it's the cheap option - obviously they've never done it! It is "cheap" on paper but anything but in real life. Money was not our issue. We got it for the convenience piece, and to be fair, it was incredibly convenient. Top tier. Take her anywhere with you. No more snow day cancellations. No more car breakdowns, or "my dog is sick." Super consistent, plus you can change her schedule weekly - just give her a heads up. But no, not cheap - you'll need to include her in meals, going out to eat, vacations, your phone plan, and of course give her a car. And just like so many other APs, ours had an accident and our insurance went up quite a bit.

I guess it could be cheap if you lived a really frugal lifestyle, but we travel a bunch and eat out a bunch and splurge sometimes, so it wasn't any cheaper than a nanny for us.

I have friends who did the program for years and loved it, so it just comes down to personalities I guess.

Six APs over roughly 10 years, no problems at all. Minded their own business, no boy or friend drama, decent drivers, big help in handling the daily juggle.

Two false starts -- one really wanted a richer host and rematched out in McLean or somewhere, the other was super homesick and self-yeeted.

It's the cheap option. You get what you pay for.

My kids are older, but all of the ones with au pairs are almost universally poorly behaved.

I don't have an au pair but I have friends who do. I've heard about good experiences ("she was like a member of our family") but I've also heard about au pairs
-lying about their ability to drive when that was a really important part of the job
-being so expensive to insure that it was cost prohibitive to the family
-really just wanting to party and bring guys around in ways that were inappropriate (one night stand at the family home, etc)
-a group of au pairs lying that they were going to the beach, taking the car to a different state and getting arrested for a DUI (this story involved the host family of one of the au pairs who wasn't driving helping to cover it up by picking them up, getting the car back, and telling the host family of the one in jail that she was in the hospital!!!)

Both the good and the ugly.

I can’t believe how quick people are to recommend this option when to me I simply can’t imagine willingly adding another person to my household that I am required to be responsible for, feed and otherwise pretty much take care of of. But I know pretty much an equal amount of people who have loved having one and some who have had terrible experiences but won’t actually talk about the decision details (is this some kind of deal with the organization you use that you are not allowed to discuss bad experiences????)

One thing I think about is that I already have 3 kids I manage appointments for and it seems I see posts all the time asking about healthcare issues for their au pair. No thanks-I don’t need that.

So tell me, how did this actually work for you?