Nanny Experiences-- How Would You Go About Finding a Nanny?

It depends cost wise on what exactly your looking for. I am a nanny but am not expected to do any housekeeping of anykind. Not opposed to it just not part of my contract. If you are looking for a nanny/housekeeper you should make that clear up front. It is nice to have someone at your home so the children can come straight home. I do a split shift for the family I nanny for. I am there in the mornings to get the children fed/dressed and off to school. then again in the afternoon to feed them snack and make sure homework is done. I take them to sports / clubs and we go to the library. I will occasionally start something for dinner. but it is not expected of me to do any housework. Just pointing out that they are 2 different jobs. I charge the family I care for $10 an hour (more if it is a weekend day) we figured out the hours and I make a weekly amount. If I take off I dn't get paid for the hours. But if they take off for whatever reason I still make my weekly amount. I get paid holidays (the basic 8 days christmas, new years, good friday, memorial day, july 4th, labor day and thanksgiving and the day after). My boss appreciates what I do and tells me and shows me in any number of little ways as I make his life a whole lot easier.

LOVE LOVE LOVE our nanny. She's part of the family and my kids adore her.
We found her by a referral from friends. Other friends of mine have found theirs on www.sittercity.com.

If you'd like, I'm happy to forward the interview questions and nanny contract that we used. They were drawn up by friends of ours that are lawyers, so they're ridiculously thorough. :)

We pay ours $650/week for 2 kids ($550 when it was just 1). She works 7-5 daily, and does their laundry, as well as some very light cleaning for us.
We've had her for 3 years and will keep her as long as she wants to stay!

This might sound odd, but both of the nannies whom we have employed (and LOVED) have been referrals from our cleaning ladies. In both cases, I asked our current cleaning lady if she knew anyone who would be a good nanny, and both times the cleaning lady came back with a referral from her church. If you already have someone you trust to be in your home and who has proven to be trustworthy, ask them who they know - you may be surprised at the great leads you can get that way! We paid our first nanny $10/hr under the table (for one child), plus we paid for her bus/metro fare to and from our house. In both cases, these ladies also did light cleaning (laundry, dishes, sweep/dust), which I know isn't typical of some nannies.

Do you have a website for your subdivision? You may be able to place a want ad on there. And I know this is crazy to say, but you could check CraigsList.

We hired a nanny once which had just finished her Senior year of High School, so she was a little on the young side, but she had a lot of experience with kids. Later found out she was LAZY. I would advise that you make your expectations VERY clear from the start. And if something gets missed by the nanny that she should be doing, bring it up RIGHT away, do not let it go on. Make a daily check list of activities for the kids. This will allow the nanny to check off the things she did with the kids...like play outside, ride bikes, take a walk, reading time, tv time, snack time, nap time and so on. Other wise, you may get someone who lets your kids sit in front of the tv all day.

Also, discuss sick days...if she calls in, YOU have to miss work too. Talk about her possible upcoming vacations, school schedules and so on. What kind of car does she have? Is it reliable, or do you have to worry about it not starting in the Winter?

Good luck! I REALLY thought having my kids at home with a nanny would be the best thing for us. Turned out to be more headaches than it was worth even after leaving a center we hated. Finding a better daycare center ended up being MUCH better than our nanny situation.

We had a fantastic nanny for two years who we found on Craigslist. We checked her references extensively and actually found friends who knew one of her references - so it wasn't quite so strange hiring her. We paid $14/hour. I loved having a nanny. It was so much easier than getting our kids ready and out of the house every morning for daycare/preschool.

I found my nanny on care.com. It was 30$ for the month and a half it took to find my nanny. I had a lot of applicants and it was hard narrowing down the search. Looking back, I defintely recommend writing down EXACTLY what you are and are not looking for, and what you expect to happen as far as paying for sick days or not, holidays off, etc. I jumped into and have a great nanny now, but now that my oldest is starting preschool, I realize she isnt going to have transportation to drop him off and pick him up and have my other one tag along, so I am trying to find the right way to let her go... because Im going to miss her!!!! So if I could go back i would make sure the person could fit all of my needs and ones I may have down the road. good luck!

I have been a nanny for years and love it. I highly suggest care.com. They have nannys in your area. Or let you post a want ad and they will email your ad to the nannys in your area. Make sure you check references. If you are looking for someone to do housework as well you'll probably be in the range of $10-15/hr.

Good luck! If you have any questions feel free to PM me!

If you know anyone who uses a nanny, ask them. What about asking your local parish or temple?

You could also do a search in your area for nanny and household help agencies. We used an agency for both our nannies and while it's certainly not the cheaper route, it was worthwhile bc they only deal with career nannies, do all the background work etc.