Going rate for extension au pair
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Anonymous
| What is the going rate for an extension year au pair in the DMV (2 kids, 2 and 7)? We are discussing extension with our current au pair and she is assuring me that all of her friends get $409/week. That seems like a lot? |
Anonymous
|
She's taking you for a ride. 409 is a rather exact number. During the height of the pandemic when school was not in person, we paid our extension AP 300 for 2 kids (4 and 7).
What's her current rate? I'd add 50 to that. If she scoffs then I would not extend. |
Anonymous
What is 409? That's so strange. We paid $250 a week. 3 school-aged children. |
Anonymous
| ha - sorry, OP here. SHould be $400 per week. Typo. |
Anonymous
| $250 |
Anonymous
| I think she is really overplaying her hand. I hear this market is saturated with APs at the moment. |
Anonymous
|
Actually, I’ve heard a lot of host families are looking out of country and refusing to consider extension au pairs. So there is actually an excess of extension (and rematch) au pairs.
The reasoning is that the expectations from extension au pairs still is consistent from when the borders were closed and there was a shortage. So they are still expecting more benefits, more pay with less working hours and/or responsibilities. Therefore many families have decided they would rather find an out of country au pair and give bonuses for a job well done, rather than agree to more upfront and possibly be disappointed in what they get in return. Since you have worked with this au pair, you will know the quality of work she has done for you (albeit some experienced families say there is often a slide in the second year). You can determine if that quality of work is worth about $600 extra a month (since you usually save some money from the agency fee for an au pair extending with you). If you have not been completely delighted with this au pair, I would think $600 a month/ $7200 a year is far too much. I would wish her well finding a family who will pay her that amount (plus any other things she may expect- like a car or a private bathroom). |
Anonymous
| There is no way I would pay $400/week for a typical situation (split schedule, reasonable number of kids, less than 30h week). |
Anonymous
|
No way on the $400 a week. That’s nearly a second agency fee over the course of a year. You could hire 2 new aupairs instead.
Hard no. Thanks |
Anonymous
| We’re doing 250 for an extension au pair, 2 kids, less that 35 hrs per week |
Anonymous
| Good luck to all of you! I know it can feel like a bit of a crap shoot, but hiring a nanny is too. We hosted AP's for more than a decade in the early days (late 1980's and 1990's) of the legal program when they were all from Western Europe and virtually nobody paid more than the minimum stipend. From what I've read here, it seems that the girls were more mature then, and if you screened well (& they didn't misrepresent themselves too badly), you could get good drivers with substantial child care experience. By substantial, I mean some had attended a two year course in child care or had spent 4-5 years in other countries as nannies; others got newborn experience by volunteering in hospitals. That said, we did hit a few duds along the way, mostly due to their concealing things like boyfriends, smoking, or psychological issues. I'm sure we weren't the perfect HF, but we tried hard to be generous and fair. When things went south, it could be a nightmare, but mostly because we had to hire temporary nannies (who were usually awful) to bridge the gap. We always rematched with an AP out of country when this happened (3 times) in 12 years. But there was no social media or Facebook network encouraging the AP's to bid up their stipend and benefits, and it was a different generation in terms of opportunity and work ethic. Those former AP's are in their 40's and 50's now, and we still have contact with many of them including in person visits when we get to Europe and vice versa. |