Should/do you pay family members for childcare?

[e&d]

My mom is planning to retire this spring and will watch our son part time; we are thinking about 20 hours a week or so. She totally wants to do this and is even moving from several states away to do it.

I know she is not expecting to be paid for it...but I'm wondering what those of you do who have parents/in-laws/etc. watching your kids. She and my dad are working through their finances to figure out how much income they'll need per year and I'm feeling a little guilty about this. (They do not expect us to pay her, and I'm not even sure they would want us to.)

Just looking for some input from some more experienced moms out there!

[Sophia]

I wouldn't pay my mother to babysit my kids.

My mother frequently batsat my kids when they were younger and still does on occasion. In fact, after she retired and before I quit my job, she would come to my house every morning to take my kids to school and then pick them up from school afterwards. If I go back to work after the new baby is born, she'd be taking care of the baby every day. She'd be highly insulted if I tried to pay her. It could be a cultural thing, though. Although she's not Hispanic, she's spent most of her life here and has taken on a lot of the customs. My paternal grandmother took care of me and my brother before we were school age so both my parents could work, and she was never paid. It just wouldn't be done in my family.

[kiki61872]

augh - this is a constant battle with my mom who babysits for us. she gives us a hard time when we pay her. so i sneak instead :)
i get things that she likes/needs and leave them at her house without her noticing.
ie - gift certificates to favorite restaurants, gas cards etc etc.
that way its stuff for her - that she cant turn around to try to give back to us or to spend on DD.

[Asha]

i think it is a better idea to pay with gifts. if you pay her a salary or hourly rate, you are technicaly responsible for paying her social security and taxes. i plan on having my mil watch my children and we will be providing them housing in addition to paying for vacations for them.

[sophiapb]

Hey Elizabeth. My mom moved out from several states away to care for DD and she didn't expect any payment either. However, given that she left her friends and three jobs (she's a retired science teacher but has so much freakin' energy that she would babysit, work at a park and help a friend with elderly parents :eek: ) I didn't feel right not giving her anything. Because she moved in with us and is caring for DD fulltime, I basically tried to make it so that she has no expenses. She came with her car so we pay for the insurance, upkeep and gas for the car. I give her $400 a month cash which is really more like spending money. I gave her a credit card so that she can put gas, groceries, whatever, on it and we'll pay the bill. When we go out to dinner, to an event or on vacation, she comes too and we pay the entire bill. I also plan to send her to visit my other siblings in other states at least twice a year and will pay for her plane tickets.
My mom has been with us over 6 months now and things are working out really well. You totally can't beat having grandma as a nanny but at the same time, I feel like we are taking care of things for her as well so it's a two way street.
I hope things go as well for you and your mom.

[EJH]

My ILs watch DD one day a week. We don't pay them, they wouldn't take it if we tried. Instead we'll go the route others have mentioned. MIL loves to go out to eat, so we'll do gift certificates to restaurants etc every once in awhile.

[Chelsea524]

I think it totally depends on the situation. I have my mom and my brother watch my children, my brother in the am while moms at work, for the first 6-9 months I didn't pay her, I did give them gifts like gift cards for dinner and things like that, but then my shift changed at work and my mom quit her second job to make up the hours for me and I did start paying her at that point, just covering what she lost in wages, I have always paid my brother, but way below what normal child care is in this area

[sophiapb]

Concerning wages and Social Security, I do not consider what I give my mom to be a wage. She is living with us and I am giving her spending money. I consider this to be covered under the IRS definition of a gift.

From the IRS website:
Generally, you do not need to file a gift tax return unless you give someone, other than your spouse, money or property worth more than the annual exclusion ($11,000 in 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005; $12,000 beginning in 2006) for that year.

[tray622]

My in-laws wont watch dd unless they are paid... but it is a whole other story ;)

I like the idea of going out of your way to do some nice things for her, like gift certificate here and there, etc.

[chandy]

My parents wouldn't want to be paid, but I do try to help out anyway I can. It's been more fun to surprise them with unexpected gifts here and there, rather than feeling like I'm their employer. I know that would make them uncomfortable too. My mom was thrilled when I showed up with a new set of pots and pans that she needed, but she would have felt awkward taking a check for $200.

[Sophia]

To expand on my previous post, I do give my mom little gifts and things (even then I get a "you shouldn't be spending your money on me" lecture from her) and also leave spending money so she can take them out to eat, to a movie, etc. Other than that, she won't take anything from me. She's ridiculously stubborn about it.

[marchfamily]

We give my MIL (who watches DD once a week) gas money. She lives 45-60 minutes from us.

[jay&erinn]

I'm in the same boat as most the others. My Mom watches DD about 6-8 hours a week. She would never accept money. Instead, I spend about twice as much on them at holidays, birthdays and anniversaries then other family members (I sign DD's name to the extra gifts). We also try to pay for their meal when we go to dinner with them (once or twice a month). I'm sure it doesn't make up for everything, but it's the best we can do.
They also had to live with us for about 2 months, and we refused any money they tried to give us.

If it was a younger family member (neice or cousin), I'd pay them.

[LeslieR]

I don't know about 'should'. If I were in your situation, I would definitely offer to pay, but I know neither my mother nor my MIL would ever take our money. On the flipside, I would never let anyone in my family pay me either.

[octoberkate]

Well, I pay my cousins (15 or 17 depending on who I get) when they babysit, but that's different from your point I think (at least it seems like you're talking about a constant daycare kind of thing, not infrequent babysitting).

[Ohana]

Yes, absolutely. We have a family member who watches DD from time to time, and we always pay the market rate for a babysitter. This way, DH and I can stay out as late as we want without worrying about taking advantage, ya know? In our case, though, it is only for occasional babysitting on the weekends, not a regular thing.

[BooeyJ2]

My sister watches DD twice a week and my FIL watches her once a week. Both of them offered to watch her, we never asked and when we offered to pay them they looked at us like we were crazy. Neither of them would take money from us for watching DD.

Although we don't pay them, we have given them gifts and gift cards or gift certificates to show our appreciation. My sister is *addicted* to Starbucks, so we had given her a $100 gift card to Starbucks. She also loves wearing the clothing of the company we work for, so we got her a complete new wardrobe and she was stoked. FIL looooves watching movies, so we gave him a bunch of gift certificates to the movies and to Blockbuster to rent some. We have also taken them out to dinner, etc. Of course they don't expect it (and we always get the "you shouldn't have done that" speech) and we don't *have* to do it, but we enjoy doing it because we sincerely appreciate their help and although we say "thank you" over and over and over....it's always nice to do something nice for them since they are helping us SOOO much by watching her those days so that she doesn't have to go to daycare :)

[Pink_Converse]

If my family was watching my child everyday, like while I was at work I would try to pay them and would not be offended if they said yes. If they watched them while I went out one night on the weekend or something I probably would not offer. I'd just leave $ for them to take him to do something.

[heather 8^)]

My MIL is moving down with us this summer to take care of our baby probably about 30 hours a week or so, and I voted other. She won't receive a salary because none of us wants to pay the taxes. However, she will be living with us, so we will pay almost all of her living expenses: all room and board including mortgage, all food (even when we go out), gas, cell phone, etc. She will pay for her own insurance and long distance (because she calls internationally a lot and we don't want to pay for that). Incidentally, she has also retired and has pension income, so she doesn't need a salary from us to pay for insurance or incidentals.

For us, it's an issue of making sure she feels that her work and efforts are valued and appreciated. I know a lot of grandparents who feel put upon or taken advantage of because they take care of the grandkids so much, even if they love the children and love to help out; and since we will be living together as one big happy family, we really, really want to make sure she knows that we're not just using her so that we can avoid paying daycare. It sounds like other people are doing that via gifts of appreciation, but considering that MIL would be really the primary caregiver for most of the work week, that just doesn't seem sufficient to us.

She has protested to a certain extent, but she also realizes that this is something *we* want to do in part to make *us* constantly aware of how important her efforts are to our family. :)

[ManteoChik]

I voted yes, but in reality most grandparents won't take payment for babysitting their grandkids.

My best friend has a 6 month old DD, she's a SAHM so it's not too often that she uses sitters but when she does she normally hires a sitter because she knows what its like to be taken advantage of by family memebers. Her mom and MIL won't take payment for babysitting so she normally gets them gift cards to restaurants and such.

Her SIL has three kids (ages 9, 6, 3) and she ALWAYS calls my friend to watch her kids...in edition to her own child....at least 2-3 times a week. She NEVER offers to pay her and usually sends to kids over without having already eaten lunch and never offers to pay for the cost of feeding and picking her two oldest up from school. In the 9 years that her SIL has been a mother she has never once paid for a sitter.

[mia's mama]

No - My mom watches DD every monday and occasionally in the evenings and my parents would never, ever take money from us. We (like many of the previous posters) take them out for dinner once/month or so and I often treat my mom to luch and a movie etc.

I would totally pay the going rate to a cousin/niece etc. if we had one around and used them for babysitting.

[jki]

I think it depends on who is better off financially. I would definitely pay my parents for their time if they needed the money or quit their job to watch my kids.

When MIL found out how much we pay out babysitter ($16/hour), she said, "I'll be your nanny and you can pay ME instead!" She was not joking.

[MrsT]

My mom retired to take care of my sister's first child and moved up here to where we live to do so. She would totally do it for free, but since my sister was working full-time (has since changed jobs, but still works 3 days a week) she paid my mom. I don't know how much, but I know it was less than a nanny would make yet more than enough to supplement mom's retirement income. I think if you are asking a family member to WORK in your house (be there at a certain time, can't take vacations without checking, etc) they should be paid. In essence, my mom is on call for my sister all the time. My mom was also the maid and cook. She probably spent (and still does) 12-14 hours a day over there.

Now, when using mom as a babysitter (we use her 1-2 times per month), we don't pay her (she won't accept it) but buy her dinners or give her gift certificates every few months as a thank you.

[westamp]

My mother watches DS about 40 hours/week (about the same amount of time I am away at work). She is retired and her and my dad are on a limited income. I do pay her (not what the going rate is for a babysitter) and treat her to meals when she goes out with us.

She cooks and cleans after DS (laundry!), we think she deserves a small amount of money for having her weekdays overtaken by DS.

I don't think it is a matter of should or not. It really depends if your mom is willing to take the money. If she is, then offer her something.

[IrishMeg]

I would offer but I know my parents would never accept money for watching DC.

Now my MIL, let's just say you'd have to pay me to let her babysit my kid. ;)

[UTChick]

I just had this conversation with my mom because she will be taking care of our baby once I go back to work. She will be watching him/her approx. 30-40hours a week. I brought up paying her and she told me absolutely not. So I will probably have to sneak her money or buy her gifts instead. I wish she would accept some payment from us. It's going to be a lot of work! But she is really stubborn, so I will have to get creative and sneaky.

[Pookie]

I think it depends on if they've quit their job, how many hours, etc. My mom use to watch DS 1 or 2 days a week and we didn't pay her. She works at my dad's office and makes her own schedule, so it wasn't like she was taking time out of her paycheck. If she quit her job to watch DS, we'd pay her, though.

[camberne]

I think it depends on the situation. There is a difference between "babysitting" and "providing daycare". I consider babysitting a few hours every once in a while, not a set daily schedule. I think to not pay for that is taking advantage, whether it's a grandparent or not. I also would never expect my neices to babysit my son without paying them. Now, I do have friends who would say "please let me keep him when you go out next time." I wouldn't pay them, but they eventually got paid in other ways.

[maybebaby]

Agree that occasional free babysitting is one thing but I would offer payment if it is full time childcare (so that you don't have to pay a daycare provider/nanny/etc).

[bamboo]

My parents watch DD 10 hours a week while I work. There's no way on earth they'd let me pay them- they feel that this is just what families do for each other. Similarly they won't pay me when they are elderly and I care for them- that's not the way our family works*. I think a lot depends on your family expectations and the amount of time/type of arrangement.

*They would pay for any medical care they needed, and similarly I would pay for any class or place they wanted to take DD, like the zoo or aquarium- anything above and beyond just playing with her in our home.

[cgmom313]

My MIL has taken care of my DD since I have been back to work from Maternity leave. It was suppose to be until the end of 05 and then we were going to put her in daycare. However she enjoyed doing it so much she has continued. She is going to do it until we relocate sometime this summer and then I will put DD is Daycare which she will be at a good age for it 15 mths.

I have paid my MIL since she started watching her. She watches her 4 days a week from about 8:30a till 4pm and I pay her $100.00 a week as well I let her do her laundry at my house. Her and my FIL live in a Motor home and have a very tine washer.

If they watch her on a weekend so my and DH go out we do not pay her.

I agree with everyone else it depends on the situation. I know it is hard work and I feel it is necessary for me to pay her. If not her than it would be daycare.

[BusyBee]

My parents would never take $ from me. In fact, my mom insists on paying me back for everything I buy her. :rolleyes:
My mom got an early schedule, so she could take care of the baby for a half day every day. If she stopped working to do it full time, we'd have to work it out differently.

Found this little story online:

AFTER a month of staying at home with our newborn son, my wife and I felt the need for a night out. Reluctantly, I asked my parents to baby-sit while we went to a movie, assuring them that we would be gone no longer than two hours.
When we returned I jokingly said to my father, "Let's see, now -- baby-sitting rates are about a dollar seventy-five an hour."
"For each of us?" he asked.
"That's right."
My father took out his wallet and gave me seven dollars. I never worried again about asking my parents to baby-sit.

[Brady]

Found this little story online:

AFTER a month of staying at home with our newborn son, my wife and I felt the need for a night out. Reluctantly, I asked my parents to baby-sit while we went to a movie, assuring them that we would be gone no longer than two hours.
When we returned I jokingly said to my father, "Let's see, now -- baby-sitting rates are about a dollar seventy-five an hour."
"For each of us?" he asked.
"That's right."
My father took out his wallet and gave me seven dollars. I never worried again about asking my parents to baby-sit.

I love that story! That is totally my parents as well.. they would pay ME before they would let me ever pay them...;) When I was working full-time, my father watched my son one day a week, he looked at it as a chance to spend an entire day with his grandson and was so excited every Weds. to see/play with him. So, no... he would have never let us pay him. Like others, we would give small gifts here and there as a "thank you". This past weekend we went away overnight and my son stayed with them. We brought them a restaurant GC as a thank you. Little things like that. But again, he only watched him one day a week..

[Kanga]

We don't have family watch her on a regular basis, but when they do watch her we offer to pay (except for parents, like someone else said, it would just make them feel awkward) but they always refuse. Instead we pay them in gifts, gc to restuarnts usually or go out to dinner with them and pay for their meal.