Start Your Own Home Daycare Business

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If you are the parent of small children anyway or perhaps a grandparent with extra time on your hands, then you might want to consider opening your own home daycare business. It is not unusual at all for a home daycare business to begin in the home as a natural result of babysitting duties and then expand into something much larger. While not everyone will want to take on the responsibility of caring for more children, the fact is that a home daycare business has the potential to blossom into a real opportunity.

Essential Equipment and Requirements

State law will most likely require you to get a license in order to take your babysitting to the home daycare business level. This is to ensure that you are qualified to care for small children. You will also be required in most states to have insurance before officially opening a home daycare business and make certain that your house is suited for the new purposes you intend. Other than these basic requirements which will vary depending upon the state in which you live, having age-appropriate games and activities will be the only other essential necessary to begin your home daycare business. Unless you need to make improvements to your home in order for it to meet the requirements of your state, you can start a home daycare business for $1,000 or less with most of this money going towards insurance and licensing fees.

Skills and Training

Patience and a love of children is all you will really need in order to start your own daycare business. Now it will look better if you have some sort of background in Developmental Psychology or teaching, but these are not requirements that are necessary in most states.

Charges and Earnings

If you have ever paid for daycare then you already have a pretty good idea as to the charges and earnings to expect from running such a business. It is not uncommon, depending on the area and demand for quality daycare services, to receive $150-$250 per week for children under the age of 5 and less for older children if you are contracted to watch them after school. Your home, state law, and the number of people caring for the children will ultimately determine your earnings. The more children you can legally take care of, the more money your home daycare business will earn.

Marketing

Quality daycare does not need much more than word-of-mouth advertising and maybe a classified ad in order to effectively market services. As your business grows and should you decide to make education part of the services offered (and remember that teaching will definitely require certification and qualified teachers), then advertising in the Yellow Pages will become part of your marketing strategy.

Most people do not plan to start a home daycare business but sometimes necessity and opportunity combine and offer people the chance to go into business for themselves. There are licensing and insurance concerns, but the start-up costs for this type of business are pretty low, as are the expenses. So if you love children and want to take babysitting to an entirely new and exciting level, then consider opening a home daycare business and thus take control of your financial destiny while helping children and parents in the process!

Doug Dillard has started and run many home-based businesses over the past 25 years. He has created a great site for those of you looking to start your own home-based business, but don't know how to get started. Visit his website: HomeIncomeOpportunities.com for more information.

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As I write this, I am sitting alone in my house for the first time in eighteen months. I am totally and completely alone, bar the cat. It is quiet, just the sound of birds outside, even the usual drone and thud of construction work in neighbouring fields has halted in honour of the occasion. I can do whatever I want: drink tea which is still hot, read a book and fall asleep with it on my face, leave the house with just my keys and mobile. And what do I actually want to do? Well, other than compulsively tidy the kitchen and my sock draw, I want to bite my nails and fidget and maybe, just maybe, make one tiny call to the childminder, just to make sure that her phone is working and that Squidget isn’t too distraught without me.

Yes, dear reader, I have finally done it. Little Squidget has gone off to her childminders, alias Wonderwoman and Superman, for the morning, for the first time, and I am feeling bereft, like I have sent her away to borstal. Wonderwoman and Superman are the most capable, wonderful people I know, having looked after Goldilocks when I returned to my former life of Career Woman following her birth, some three years ago, so my feelings of dread, guilt and sheer loss are at once rendered ridiculous. But I still feel loss, like part of my body has weirdly evolved and fallen off.

It has been a long road to today, a road pitted with emotional minefields and practical nightmarishness. Who would have imagined that organising enough time to sit and stare gormlessly out of the window could be so complicated? When I gave birth to the Tweenager, I was in my second year at university. I was 22, had just moved to the UK, got married and moved house. My life fell apart when she was born and daycare was the best option. Even as a tiny baby, she was very stoic about the whole thing, bravely heading off to nursery and then school with a rucksack the same size as her on her back, blinking back the tears as she bravely waved goodbye. I never got over the guilt that crippled me every time I left her and went to my lectures. Staying at home was never an option I considered – I was grateful to get through the day without having a tantrum of my own. By the time Goldilocks was born, I was in Cyprus, running a successful business, stronger, healthier, happier, but I had gained that enemy of kids the world over: a Career. I swore I would do better by my second daughter and delegated frantically. Unfortunately, my maternity cover proved to be barking mad and so I returned to work (not altogether unwillingly), baby on hip and often on breast (much to the combined curiosity/shock of anyone within burping distance). A year later, Wonderwoman and Superman entered our lives and Goldilocks found her happy ever after with them for the next two years. The fact that she was and is never fazed by anything, giving any poor soul looking after her a real run for their money, helped assuage any feelings of guilt I might have been harbouring.

Fast forward to today. Before gathering the resolve to ask Wonderwoman and Superman to help out with Squidget (it took me two months to make the call), I read every darn article discussing the pros and cons of early childcare, about separation anxiety and how to handle it. There is a massive amount of information out there on how and why to leave your child but precious little discussion of the emotional impact separation has on the frazzled parent left holding an empty packet of wet wipes. I have always been oddly clingy with all my kids. I’m known for it: well-meaning friends and not-so-friendly others have often joked that I am too attached to them. I couldn’t bear the thought of letting them go, a genuine problem not helped by the fact that it seems to be a medical condition peculiar to Turkish Cypriots to squeeze, stroke and physically grab your baby out of your arms at any given opportunity. If I let them go, what would I do with myself? Knit? Become an estate agent? So I became a Stay At Home Mum extraordinaire. With no life. Enter Wonderwoman and Superman, who I can hear coming up the driveway now. Squidget is smiling in the back seat and all is good with the world. I think I might be able to get used to this.

Nikki is a freelance writer whose work is regularly commissioned by and published in a variety of international magazines and newspapers. As a mother of three young daughters, her writing often focuses on parenting and lifestyle issues but, secretly, Nikki also has a 'proper' job, as an expert writer on overseas real estate investment. She acts as a consultant to agents and developers, identifying and marketing key emerging markets. She is currently collaborating with Property Club International. See more at http://propertyclubinternational.net

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Opening a Home Daycare Business

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Opening your own home daycare center can be a wonderful way to spend more time with your family and enjoy a career working with children. Before setting off on this adventure, however, you need to determine what your motives are. If you are looking for a way to get rich it isn't going to happen. If you are looking for an easy job and a day lounging around the house you are in for a shocking surprise. Running a daycare is not an easy job and there is no place in this field for those who do not love children and have the patience and endurance that is needed to work with them on a daily basis. Taking care of other people's children is an entirely different job than caring for your own. You need the ability to love unconditionally and to accept the children in your care into your home and family. If, after thinking long and hard about this career choice, you decide that daycare is right for you than there are several steps you must take.

First, you must find out what your state regulations regarding home daycares are. Most states require a food handler's permit, first aid, C.P.R., and a business license. These are easily obtained with some time and small fees. There are organizations out there that will provide grant money as a reimbursement for your start up costs after you have remained licensed for a set period of time. After you have done that you need to find out what your city regulations are. The state and local regulations are not always the same. In order to do business in the city that you live in you must follow their ordinances. They will generally want to do a fire inspection of your home and will take a written plan for the amount of traffic you will receive during business hours. None of these things are hard. They simply require time to process.

Once you have fulfilled all of the legal requirements of running your home business you need to determine what your business model will be. Hours of operation will have to be decided, keeping in mind that you will need to work longer hours than the parents you serve in order to give them time to travel to and from work. A daily schedule will make your day go much smoother and give the children a routine to count on. This will relieve many of the behavior issues you may run into. A contract and parent handbook is necessary to maintain good relationships with the parents and to assure that your own needs are met. The contract should cover weekly fees, when payment is due, consequences for late payment, and the type of notice on monetary compensation that must be given when the contract is terminated. The parent handbook should cover the rules of your business at home. This is the place to tell parents what you expect of them. Some things you may want to include here are your sick policy, whether or not you allow children to bring things from home, what your stand is regarding vacations and sick days etc. There are many home daycares that have posted their contracts and parent handbooks online that you can look at for ideas. Be sure to be as thorough as possible because these are the things that will primarily determine your satisfaction with your business. It allows you to be in control and avoid many of the typical complains of daycare providers. Once you have a contract be sure that you follow it. This sounds simple but it is easy to become lax in rules trying to please the parents. You need to remember that they have not employed you. You are running your own business and you set the rules. They are a client and agreed to the terms that you set for them. Start strict so the parents know where you stand. It is easier to be more lenient over time as you develop relationships with the parents than it is to go the other direction. The last thing you want is to hate your job because parents are constantly late picking up or paying their fees.

Many daycares choose to provide full preschool programs. If you are not comfortable developing your own curriculum there are many companies such as Mother Goose Time and Funshine Express that will send you boxes of materials every month with each day planned for you. This is not a requirement for running a home daycare. Children can learn quite a lot through play as long as they are actively engaged in activities and interactions throughout the day.

Advertising can be fairly easy. Signs can be printed for under $20 at vinyl shops with your business name and phone number. These can be placed in your yard if your neighborhood allows it or on streets nearby. Flyers can be posted on bulletin boards at many local businesses, including grocery stores. Word of mouth is the best advertising. Talk to everyone you know and let them know what you are doing. Parents are desperate to find quality daycare and once you build your reputation you will never need to advertise. Local Resource and Referral agencies offer fantastic childcare placement services. They link parents searching for daycare with a list of daycare providers in each city. Be sure and sign up with them once you have received your license. It can take up to 6 months to fill all the openings you have but once you develop a name for yourself your business should be pretty steady.

Daycare can be a wonderful profession with the right attitude and passion. It requires patience and love and a lot of work but the time it gives you with your own children and the freedom to control your employment is well worth the work.

Rachel Lister is a 26 year old mother of two young children. She teaches preschool and runs a home daycare. Rachel is the teen editor for Bellaonline.com (http://www.teen.bellaonline.com/) and writes for various other online markets.

http://www.rachelptg.blogspot.com/

http://www.kaleidoscope-childhood.blogspot.com/

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