I am a sahm of 3 with one on the way and am looking to start doing in home daycare. Problem is, I live in a Manufactured Home park and am unsure of how people will feel about that. Also how do I get word out around the area. Any advice would be great. Anyone who does in-home daycare, how do I get started??? L.
you need to call your county and see if you can become licensed first before anything can happen.
I was told by a friend of mine that has a home day care that if you take care of more than one family that you have to get licensed to do so. Like that other gal said, where you live shouldnt matter. I would try getting the word out from your friends (ask them to help pass the word out to their friends) or maybe get the word out by the phone book (yellow pages) or put flyers out in your area. Ask other home day care providers what they charge for kids and etc.... My friend charges like 150.00 (i think per wk) for an infant... Which isnt bad considering most day care centers charge about ($240.00 per week for infant). Good luck with you search....
I don't have much advice except that I don't think that you living in a Manufactured Home park should matter. What matters is how you interact with the children and whether or not your home is safe. That's what people really want. You should post an ad on Craigslist.com. That's where I found my son's baby-sitter. There are licensing guidelines in place for in-home daycares that you should look into if you plan to watch children from more than one family. Congratulations on your growing family!
Contact the county you are in...you can usually get some info online...just find the DHS site (Dept Human Services)for your county and see if they have child care licensing info on there, numbers to call, etc.
.In Henn Cty, there are large and small group meetings thru the county, Q & A sessions at those, many handouts with the rules (RULE 2 governs home daycare in Henn Cty)...then forms and background checks, a fire marshall inspection, initital licensing home inspection (mine took 3 hours..every drawer, cabinet, under beds, closets...every inch of the home!). Once all that is OK, you get licensed. Then finally you can join local providers groups and food programs and they all have referral options...lists, internet stuff, etc. I have gotten all my clients thru these and word of mouth. But you must be licensed to be a part of most of them.
Good luck!
A good start-up resource: www.asktheprovider.com
