Taking up childminding to cover the cost of a bigger flat?

[FuckOffFerret]

Dh, me and the 3 children all live in a small 2 bed flat. Do to the close age gap and my lack of earning potential it's not financially worth it for me to work out of the home for a while. I've worked with children in the past (aupairing nannying and nurseries abroad) in the past. I think my children would benefit form the socializing with other children too

an extra 300 a month would get us a 3 bedroom in our area, but that would obviously need to be profit. Would you say there was any benefit to considering this as an option?

*due to

How old are your children?

I've got three 3 and under (so busy as it is!)

Also have you actually research childminding and what it entails?

What's the space for the mindees you'd actually have?

If renting, landlord would need to approve business.

Ok so you would only be able to offer before and after school care to older children.

I don't think you're allowed to have more than 3 under 5, so you'd only be able to do before and after school care and school runs.

Ofsted gave strict square footage allowances per child. I'd check on their website first.

In my home country and in places I have lived (outside the UK) but not so much here to be honest. Childminding isn't the issue really it's the financial/bureaucracy side I don't know much about. I'm being quite lazy asking you guys but I found it all a bit confusing when I had looked in to it before.

Ok thanks, I didn't realise my kids counted toward that. No go then.

Thanks

Can you work evenings? Babysitting can be very well paid.

If you only need £300 a month then it could work. You'd only be able to have before/after school children, but if there is a demand for that in your area you could make £300 fairly easily. If you stick to older children there is far less paperwork/hassle involved as well.

You need to focus on being attractive to older children/parents of older children, which could be tricky with 3 under 3.

I can possibly ragwort, I don't think it's very well paid in my area and by the time I've driven to someone's home and lost an evening I'm not sure it would ideal. People here tend to pay for the evening. So 10 or 20 for the night not by the hour

Thanks Outraged, I don't think it would be fair on my three though (or for the older children as my house is basically a creche atm).

my cm gets the parents to drop off and pick up at her house. dont know what charge but im guessing £20ph. she has 3 under 3 and 3 she does school runs for

Could you babysit for others at weekends or after DH is home?

You can only have 3 children under 5, including your own children. And to be honest ( I had 3 under 4) you wouldn't be able to give older children the activities and attention they need. I looked into it when my eldest was 6 but decided i had enough on my plate with my 3. Plus what would happen if you had no children for a month (people leaving and you not finding another child to mind straight away) you woul still ends to cover the extra rent

Possibly but I don't think I'd make enough for a third room doing babysitting and it would just mean missing out on weekend family time

This says you don't need to be OFsted registered if

if you provide care where a child does not stay with you for more than two hours a day, even if your childcare service is open for longer than two hours.

But I'm probably not going to find enough people to need a sitter for 2 hours a day am I?

My dcs were picked up from school and went to the home of a local childminder 3 days per week. She had three under threes during the day plus her own 6 year old dd and my 2 after school. Worked well. Small house.
But, she was very organised at getting out the house with the three little ones to do the school pick up, plus she didn't always have 3 little ones at a time, the did different days plus she was generally a very organised and efficient lady e.g could give all 6 dinner at the same time no bother.
Was ofsted registered, could pay with childcare vouchers etc.

Op are things a bit chaotic at your house as if so adding more kids to the mix may not be best

Also, I didn't use her in school hols, so that is 13 weeks per ?ear when she wasn't getting paid.

That's aimed at crèches and the like? Though technically you could offer it as a cm service you would need a lot of children on roll to make it work. As a full time cm, it took me several months to be full and stay full and now I turn business away.

Plus you couldn't go anywhere as people would be picking up or dropping every hour.

Thanks for your input heels, there is always a certain amount of chaos with 3 of this age we do get out quite a bit though and that's not a problem. 13 weeks a year without pay would be an issue though

Can I just say that in 5 years of MN that this is the first time I have asked a completely uneducated PITA post and been given nothing but polite responses

Babysitters where we are charge £8 per hour so 2 nights per week could earn you £320 per month. But obviously it would fluctuate from month to month.