To buy a nursery?

[raininginspringtime]

There's one for sale. I could (just) afford it.

Here are the problems:

I have an educational background although not in early years.
I haven't ever owned a business before.
It would take ALL my money!

Here are some solutions such as they are:

I own my apartment outright (lucky I know)
Do I need to be physically present at all times? I was wondering about possibly doing a day or two of supply teaching while things get set up.

I can't think of any other relevant info but I'm sure there is some.

Yes, I know - that's why I'd need to employ a nursery manager (which I think would be best anyway) and hopefully buy an existing business with someone already in post.

Right I was not wanting to crush your dreams but this sounds all wrong. Definitely no to buying the nursery you were thinking of. It's not a nursery, it's a building that would otherwise need a lot of adaptation to make it back into a home. The facilities are there but in what condition? The fact that it's not been sold as a going concern says they couldn't make it work.

I'm an accountant so I say with experience here. Before you do anything do your research and crunch the numbers. If you can't do that you have no business running a business.

You also need to start with an ethos about what you want to do for the children. It needs to be about more than ' I need a new job, oh, how about I do this?!' Lots of planning needed.

I'm not saying no, exactly, as I think you might be being flippant and guarded in your posting but that might belie how serious competent and dedicated you'd be IRL.

So get out there and work out what demand there is for nursery places in the area. Find out what nurseries charge. Budget for all costs as suggested here. You are going to need a working capital loan to get started. I still think it sounds crazy and must be constantly hard to replace the children each year. But only this week I was fizzing about our new nursery owners profiteering from something that should be a public service. So it's not that I think nurseries are inherently bad business you just have to really know what you're doing.

I am in Cheshire and I am an outstanding Childminder with six years experience I am also (about to be) a graduate with a relevant degree.

If you need me give me a shout - I am looking to get out of Childminding very soon ... I won't be able to answer any PMs tonight as I am already on the sauce and I have my iPad only. ( It's been a hard day.....)

best job application ever!

You need to look at demand... and what is profitable. There may be lots of demand for care of babies but is it profitable. A friend of mine has recently stopped taking babies at her nursery as it was not making financial sense. Does a great trade now in before/after school care and in funded pre-school sessions.

Location is hugely important. Links with schools, especially those who do not want to provide their own wrap-around care.

Friend texted back to say their horrid nursery is still open so it's not that. She thinks it on the market for 750k. If the one you're looking st is a similar price then I'd say think of investing it in something better. Overheads and paperwork are bad enough but profit must be dwindling due to living wage/pensions/the 30hours a Week initiative. If you're still keen id look to see why it closed and whether there are lots of others for sale within say, 25miles. Is there an early years person at your local council who can talk you through what paperwork you'd need?

Raining I'll try and send you a private message and see if that works!

Nannynick is right. Often a minibus is an excellent investment for a day nursery especially if before and after school club provision is patchy in your area.

Also, look at taking 4-8yr olds in some sort of summer club if you have space. There is a massive shortage for this type of provision. In fact there's a shortage from 8-11 to but it's a more difficult age to cater for.

Foreverliving - you have to fake it to make it - waves to my fellow Parslaii adherent...

The rules for running minibuses as part of a business are nightmareish though, we looked in to it and it was a massive headache

YABU.

The nursery sector is fucked.

There has never been a worse time to have a nursery. Money going out has increased due to minimum wage going up. There is a chronic shortage of decent staff so you'll be paying over the odds for temps. Money coming in is capped so most nurseries make a loss on children for 15 hours per week, soon to be 30. The body that gives grades is shit.

It would be like feeling an earthquake and deciding to hold a card house building competition.

But if you do it anyway, hire a good manager and let them get on with it without looking over their shoulder constantly. You need some separation between owner and manager.

The rules for running minibuses as part of a business are nightmareish though, we looked in to it and it was a massive headache

Oh really? I didn't know that. I have used 2 nurseries that did it and both said it was a major source of income. But this was 6 or 7 yrs ago and in some areas schools were still not really offering wraparound care so it was a major issue for parents.

It's a total PITA to run a minibus, it would have been ideal for us but it's just too difficult. Fine if it's a community group but as soon as it's part of a business it's heinous.

You need to get a PCV licence to drive the thing (because it's classed as hire or reward so you can't do it on a standard licence), then you need a public service vehicle operating licence (restricted one) which includes being able to demonstrate sufficient financial resources to run it which when I looked in to it meant have thousands available per bus. And you have to have a service schedule in place, and have adequate offroad parking...

My understanding is that there are quite a lot of nurseries/after school clubs who run minibuses without following the rules, thinking that if they don't explicitly charge a bus fare they're ok. There's been a few stories of them getting caught and fined heavily for it.

That's right Statistically - I had to bring it to NCMA's attention several years ago as a friend worked for dvla & just said "No"

Tiggy, you just say it like it is don't you? I agree btw

Thanks Newlife - it's been hell

I'm just going to say I am overwhelmed with your kindness, advice, help and support.

I am terrified but excited.

I saw some of your threads Katymac, sorry you had to close. Things aren't quite as bad here in some ways (yet) although I think the current SNP government would quite like to see all childcare being state provided. But short of nationalising nurseries they couldn't do it as they don't have the facilities.

Nurseries here are able to charge top-ups above the council funding, which helps. But on the flip side most regions don't allow childminders to claim the pre-school funding. Thankfully we don't need to as we're busy without it but it make it hard for smaller businesses. We also don't have the lunacy of EYFS, although the Care Inspectorate still manage to come up with some crazy shit!

So sorry Katymac. It must have been awful.

I'd still open a nursery if I had the money though.

Me too I think, as long as I didn't need to live off the profits or depend on EYE funding

Not much practical help, sorry.

But I am a Cheshire nursery user.

My nursery changes £50 a day. £33 for half a day. Maybe slight differences for the different age groups.

They have had a lot of the same staff there for over 10 years. Both ds and dd have been happy there. Dd still is.

Not golden triangle, but nearer chester.

They have a waiting list...

I'm in the area you mentioned up thread. I haven't read the whole thread (so apologies if I'm repeating what has ordinarily been said).

Nursery fees locally are high - I was paying £830 a month for a 3 day place 3 years ago, a full time place was around £1200. They've obviously gone up since then.

There is a massive demand for after school care. The provision attached to my DCs school has a waiting list. I think thats also expensive - £14 per child per day - but people don't have a choice. We don't use breakfast club but I think that is £9 per child per day. Holiday clubs are about £30 per child per day.

I don't know if those numbers will impact on your plans. Good luck whatever you decide.

I'm going to apologise in advance because I haven't RTFT, but my children's outstanding, small nursery has just announced it is closing - they provide a fantastic 'kindergarten' type nursery experience and only ever had about 12 children - but she has had to close because she cannot give the children what OFSTED want within the confines of what she thinks is best for the children, and what parents actually want - this is an extract from what she wrote to parents:

"I have been running my little nursery for 15 years now, and during that time I have experienced a gradual erosion by exterior powers, of all the small things that have made it special. In the last four years or so, there have been so many changes forced on nurseries, many of which I have not agreed with, but which we have had to comply with in order to receive the government funding, which is in itself insufficient to cover the costs of providing the standard of equipment and resources which you, as parents, have a right to expect. I have continued to charge fees, although this is discouraged, so that we are not forced to join the majority of nurseries that have to accept more and more children, thus reducing the time we can spend with each individual child, or spend increasing amounts of time fund raising, just to make ends meet."

So, although I have often thought of doing something similar myself, I personally think it's too much of a risk to enter this sector at the moment.....

Good luck with whatever you decide!