Paying full-time for a flexible part-time nanny?

[Anonymous]

Hi, I'm a first time mom and baby is arriving in 5 weeks- please forgive my ignorance on this topic as I explore possible options..

I am a freelancer so lots of flexibility on how and when I want to return to work, but that also means that my schedule is rather unpredictable as I usually don't know when a request would come in. Ideally I'd start with working 4-5 days a month when I'm ready to return and spend the rest of the time at home with baby. After reading some posts on this forum though I realized that it's usually more expensive and harder to find a nanny that's willing to work only part time with an unpredictable schedule.

SO, does this sound reasonable/realistic: I'd pay around $2,000/month essentially for a "nanny on call", with advance notices (from a couple of days to a couple of weeks ahead of time), work days vary from 2 hours to 8 hours/day, no more than 5-7 days a month. The rest of the time it'd be really awesome if s/he could help me to walk my dog a few times a month? (or is this last bit too much..?) This will be a semi-long term arrangement, for 6 months-a year or more.

Will I be able to find a quality nanny with this pay+work condition? And if this is a bad idea, are there other options out there that I'm missing? Ideally I'd wanna avoid keep changing babysitters for the sake of continuity, and I don't think daycares allow this kind of flexibility?


Sorry if anything seems confusing. I appreciate any input and advice! Thanks so much!

[Anonymous]

Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

[Anonymous]

Yes, you'll likely find someone. But that's not a full time wage. Full time would be closer to $3K/month minimum. I'm saying this because if you truly want someone on call all the time, you need to pay enough that they won't take other jobs during their off time, or use that time for school or something.

If I were you, I'd plan (as you get closer) a more predictable schedule of that 1 day a week you plan to work, and find a part time person who will always cover that day plus some additional, scheduled time. Look for a nanny/housekeeper who can do household tasks, too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

Huh? Please explain...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

Huh? Please explain...

This board is dominated by nannies who think they should earn six-figure salaries for 40-hour work weeks. Just wait until the holidays roll around. The "consensus" is that bonuses should equal two weeks' pay.

[Anonymous]

Asking about wages on here is like asking a bunch of lottery gambling addicts what they deserve to win.

The only way to know for sure is to advertise and see what you get in terms of interviewees.

After being a mom for 8 years and having nannies during that whole time, I think your rate is more than reasonable. You are talking 35/hr minimum and could be as much as 300/hr. That's an insanely high rate. They cannot have another job but there are a ton of nice grandmas out there who would love the job (not professional nannies with a vendetta against their bosses which is the exact audience of these bulletin boards).

Here are the tips I can give you
1. Don't commit to anything until the baby is born. You will be so exhausted, if you are paying 2000 per month, that is a pretty penny. You WILL want someone to come just hold the baby so you can go take a moment to pee in private, and not work. You will know what I mean when the baby is born. Just don't make any commitments or set expectations before the baby is born. Don't even interview until after the baby is born.
2. There are emergency care services out there, some are smaller operations that have a group of nannies on call. Those are roughly 20-25/hr. That may be a better fit for your needs.
3. Daycare is not a bad option if you can find a good one.
4. I pay less than $3000/month for a fantastic english-speaking college-educated driving nanny for 2 weeks. She works 45 hrs/week. "$3k/month minimum"-- that's the kind of wishful thinking some nannies on this board quote you as fact. Just be very careful of the advice you get on this board.

[Anonymous]

pp here. Cross out "for two weeks" in the last paragraph above.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

Huh? Please explain...

This board is dominated by nannies who think they should earn six-figure salaries for 40-hour work weeks. Just wait until the holidays roll around. The "consensus" is that bonuses should equal two weeks' pay.

Examples?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

More like entitled mbs that think nannies should just sit at their beck and call for minimum wage positions but not have the freedom to take on other work because nannies don't have bills to pay correct? I agree with the pp that suggested daycare. Or more so a inhome daycare and enroll your child as a drop in. That way the op can do as she please within certain parameters. I am not sure how this will be viewed as a "nanny" with such limited access to the charge. You need a babysitter op

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pay full time at a daycare, and use it when you want.

You'd need to pay a nanny for every hour you'd want her to be on-call for you.

Don't listen to the many nannytrolls who lurk here. Give it a shot.

More like entitled mbs that think nannies should just sit at their beck and call for minimum wage positions but not have the freedom to take on other work because nannies don't have bills to pay correct? I agree with the pp that suggested daycare. Or more so a inhome daycare and enroll your child as a drop in. That way the op can do as she please within certain parameters. I am not sure how this will be viewed as a "nanny" with such limited access to the charge. You need a babysitter op

I think this is right, OP.

[Anonymous]

40 hrs/wk at $15/hr comes to $31,200/year, before employer taxes, worker's comp, any bonuses or other perks. For someone to be "on call" for very flexible hours, with no guarantee that you won't slowly creep up from a fabulous amount of time off to using all of those hours every week but with no set schedule ... I think (and I'm a MB), that you are going to have a hard time finding someone who thinks about this for very long at this rate, which is really the minimum.

So yes, I do think it's closer to $3K/month minimum for full time, no matter how you slice it.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thank you all for your input! I'll look into both full time daycare options and in-home cares. Hopefully it's not too late to get on a waitlist for good daycares...

[Anonymous]

I only need PT care because my kids are school aged, but I do need help on sick/snow days. The way I work it is I have a nanny/housekeeper. I pay for 30hrs a week (noon-6pm) M-F. She does laundry, grocery shops, runs errands (Costco, target, drugstore, dry cleaning), basic meal prep, makes school lunches for the next day, tidy's the house (we have a cleaning service, so no deep clean), washes fruit and veggies and gets them in a condition for snacking or cooking, ect. She then greets the kids when they get home from school, provides a healthy snack, empties backpacks, lets them play and burn off steam, and then wrangles them back to get started on homework.

Let me tell you, it is an incredibly luxury to come home to an organized house every day and have all of my closets and drawers organized and the kids sitting at the kitchen table finishing up their homework as I make the finishing touches on dinner that is already half way into the process of being prepared.

For this I pay $18/hr and it is worth every penny.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I only need PT care because my kids are school aged, but I do need help on sick/snow days. The way I work it is I have a nanny/housekeeper. I pay for 30hrs a week (noon-6pm) M-F. She does laundry, grocery shops, runs errands (Costco, target, drugstore, dry cleaning), basic meal prep, makes school lunches for the next day, tidy's the house (we have a cleaning service, so no deep clean), washes fruit and veggies and gets them in a condition for snacking or cooking, ect. She then greets the kids when they get home from school, provides a healthy snack, empties backpacks, lets them play and burn off steam, and then wrangles them back to get started on homework.

Let me tell you, it is an incredibly luxury to come home to an organized house every day and have all of my closets and drawers organized and the kids sitting at the kitchen table finishing up their homework as I make the finishing touches on dinner that is already half way into the process of being prepared.

For this I pay $18/hr and it is worth every penny.

This is what I plan to do when my kids are older. Right now we have two people with 4 kids not in school (full time nanny and part time housekeeper/babysitter). Glad to know you found someone!