To ask if you’re a higher earner, what do you outsource to give you more time?

[butterpears]

I have the opportunity to take on more consultancy work, which is quite lucrative as I am in a very specific field. I have done a smaller amount of this in the past. If I do it I will realistically need to outsource as much as possible to free up time. The costs of this would be more than worth it in terms of what I can earn.

My thoughts so far are to get a cleaner (we had one in the past but not recently), get my hair blowdried once a week (I have difficult hair that takes ages). My DH does most of the cooking and food shopping, I do most of the laundry and life admin. I’m struggling to think of more that I could outsource because I tend to have a fairly frugal mindset.

What do you outsource if you can use the freed up time to bring in more money?

You need a kind of part-time PA / concierge who will do whatever you want, including your life admin, either doing it themselves or outsourcing for things like cleaning, property repairs etc. I don’t know where you’d find someone like that, but I expect there are agencies offering people with references.

Definitely food preparation!!!
Personally I rather go and clean a loo than touch food to prepare and cook.
Noticed that a PP mentioned laundry, it's just husband and me here and "latest technology" for laundry.
😐

My partner had a fantastic PA when the business was busy pre-Covid. She handled all life admin for us. It wasn’t massively costly either (about £500 a month maybe). She was available to us 24/7 but was free to work as much or as little as she wanted as long as everything was organised - appointments, quotes for gifts, personal and business meeting calendar, deliveries, insurance etc. I really miss her.

How does having a VA work? Don’t you have to share emails, passwords, bank account details etc? Would they sit in a queue hitting refresh to get you concert tickets?

I'm not a high earner, but if I was I'd go for:
-cleaner once a week.
-gardener (however much needed to keep garden looking neat and tidy).
-a PA/concierge person to deal with admin stuff and errands.

I enjoy cooking, and already do grocery shopping online for home delivery so that wouldn't need to change for me.

Cleaner.
Gardener.
Get groceries delivered.

I’ve recently moved into a much bigger role. I have:

Cleaner
Window cleaner
Dog walker
Gousto meals - not good value for money but take all the brainwork out of meal planning - at some point I will stop using them but for now I am happy to spend the money in return for not having to think about what to cook through the week and then having to set up an online shop and order the ingredients.

I haven’t yet outsourced the ironing but I plan to do this as I hate it!

I'd call £500 a month massively costly and I'm a high earner.

I stopped the cleaner when my last children went to university but when we had 5 children at home and my income increased after year of full time work we ultimately had a cleaner/housekeeper 5 morning s week 9am to noon who did the cleaning, hoovered each day, put the food shopping away when it arrived, change the bedding every 2 weeks, emptied the dishwasher and washer and did ironing and put the washing away. I also had a gardener every 2 weeks for a time but happily do that myself now. We had a full time daily nanny at various stages when we had children under 5. We also had someone at weekends for a time who would drive the 3 children who were then 5 - 10 to parties all over the place - often 40 minutes' drive each way as private school children often come further than state schoolers at that age and we were both getting sick of driving them to parties; we also had child care at one point for 4 hours on Sat and Sunday morning so we could either drive our older 3 teenagers around or both work - we both just about always not only had a full time job each but did extra work for pay at some weekends indeed most weekends.

I never hired a PA because I am happy to do my own admin etc. I was in Quintessentially at one point but did not really use the service.
We also had before and after school club at the children's private school at one point we sometimes used and and the private school ran school coaches which was a kind of contracted out service to help parents.

When we were very badly off and I was 22 working full time and we each spent 50% of our net pay on full time childcare for the baby and probably most of the rest of our income on housing costs (yes it was not a bed of roses in the 80s either although everyone seems to think it was an easy life) we could not afford a cleaner but I certainly remember when my pay rose and we had 3 children under 4 and both worked full time and we had 3 children still in cloth nappies at night (disposables were not very good in those days) that we reached a point when we could afford a cleaner once or twice a week and it was a massive help.

That depends on how much money you can make in the time that you free up by having someone run your entire life admin, doesn’t it?

Painting/decorating when it needs to be done. Partly because it is not my forte.

Save yourself time by not engaging with this type of poster. Ignore. They're here for the reaction.

The person that does most of the life admin you describe here is a nanny. That's what the very wealthy have even when they only have teenagers.

Cleaners, gardener, and 50/50 co-parenting with my daughter's dad.

I use a laundry service
My meals are provided by Hello Fresh or Gousto
That's all - the rest I absolutely don't mind doing.

Kinda similar I’m a IT consultant with quite a few clients, I’d a cleaner that changes beds! I give up after soo many useless cleaners but my robot vacuums and mop is life changing also the Dyson air straight my hairdresser can’t get it as nice!

A virtual assistant or part-time PA would cover the life admin stuff, that'd be what I'd do if I could afford it. As a PP has said, the handover to make sure they know what needs doing would be quite involved, but after that you could send them a voice note with what needs doing and they'd handle it.

I work with the very wealthy and if you have the money it is possible to outsource absolutely everything.

PA for life admin.
Nanny for any childcare plus child admin (even just for teenagers).
Dog walker/pet sitter/pet service
Laundry and ironing service
Gardener
Odd job man
Cleaner/housekeeper
Cook/food delivery service/caterer if you're having a dinner party
Driver

Between them they cover everything.

I'd say you probably need a housekeeper -PA, that would cover almost everything you need. And maybe a cleaner for the heavier duty stuff.

Cleaning. Laundry/ironing. Window cleaning. The dull parts of gardening (grass cut every fortnight, annual cutting back shrubs etc) Patio pressure washing. Car valeting. Use dishpatch for meal kits when can't think what to eat when friends are coming round.
You could also hire someone to do basic financial admin, collating invoices etc once a week to keep on top of it

I'm the queen of outsourcing.

• Cleaner who does a full day once a week. Extremely thorough.
• Housekeeper who comes for a few hours a day Monday to Friday. She does laundry, ironing, top up cleaning, tidies, top up cleans, runs errands as needed and leaves dinner on the hob
• gardener - once a fortnight
• window cleaner - monthly
• car valet - monthly
• food shopping - weekly delivery. Housekeeper adds things as needed
• as much as possible done by subscription e.g. loo roll, cleaning products
• dog walker a few times a week

Yes, it's expensive, but my annual bonus covers it, and I'd not be able to do my high paying job without it so it is worth it financially. My house basically runs without me.

Oh, and all DIY, odd jobs, decorating etc outsourced too.

Some of my colleagues use virtual PAs for things like Christmas shopping, party planning, holiday planning etc.

Lloyds Direct is good for prescriptions.

I also find private healthcare and paying for a private GP as needed removes a lot of hassle.

Same as @Bemusedandconfusedagain minus the dog!

We have 2 full time high pressure jobs so we consider it to be essential.

The game changer for me is our amazing nanny housekeeper who just finds things to do, and as a result the house is tidy, the airing cupboard is organised and the ironing is done. She wraps Christmas presents, collects orders, takes things to the charity shop, sorts school uniforms....

1. Cleaner / housekeeper - someone who will keep on top of your laundry + ironing for you - get someone who can come for 2/3 hours twice a week vs one big chunk - much better for generally staying on top of things. Would suggest you use care.com or similar to find a well reviewed individual rather than a cleaning service - you’ll get a much more bespoke service as long as you pay well and ask directly - then all those little jobs like sewing school labels and walking the dog etc can be covered in one!

2. valet car clean as needed.

3. if you’ll be too busy to eat well then consider something like ‘prep kitchen’ or ‘frive’ - fresh microwaveable balanced meals

4. gardener / mowing service

This woman needs a different job title! She sounds amazing. 🤩