The going babysitting rates in your city can help you determine the proper hourly wage for providing babysitting services. Location, skill level, the number of children and their ages are some of many other factors that influence the costs. That’s why we created a babysitting rates calculator to help you get a close idea on the average babysitting salary in your state basing on data and statistics collected from several specialized sources such as care, ziprecruiter, and payscale.
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Hourly babysitting rates by states in 2024
A babysitting rates study found an increase of 11%, outpacing inflation at 7%. That’s exactly what happened. From 2019 to 2020, rates rose 3.9%, making this year’s increase nearly triple what we’ve seen in recent years past. In the national survey of 10,000 U.S. Households across the USA, the hourly babysitting rate for one child was $20.57, and $23.25 for two children.
In the following table, we gathered the average hourly salary for babysitting services in every state
| State | Hourly Wage |
|---|---|
| Washington | $18.83 |
| Maryland | $18.39 |
| New York | $18.02 |
| Virginia | $17.88 |
| Colorado | $17.66 |
| Nebraska | $17.46 |
| Delaware | $17.43 |
| South Carolina | $17.24 |
| California | $17.09 |
| Idaho | $17.00 |
| New Hampshire | $16.94 |
| Massachusetts | $16.66 |
| Vermont | $16.54 |
| Michigan | $16.50 |
| Oklahoma | $16.50 |
| Hawaii | $16.46 |
| Nevada | $16.39 |
| Missouri | $16.07 |
| Maine | $16.05 |
| Tennessee | $15.98 |
| Connecticut | $15.81 |
| Arizona | $15.80 |
| Wyoming | $15.79 |
| Rhode Island | $15.68 |
| Alaska | $15.67 |
| Montana | $15.65 |
| Oregon | $15.56 |
| New Jersey | $15.56 |
| Minnesota | $15.52 |
| Indiana | $15.35 |
| North Dakota | $15.30 |
| Texas | $15.02 |
| Pennsylvania | $14.82 |
| Wisconsin | $14.67 |
| Ohio | $14.61 |
| South Dakota | $14.55 |
| West Virginia | $14.55 |
| North Carolina | $14.45 |
| Iowa | $14.36 |
| Utah | $14.10 |
| Arkansas | $13.96 |
| New Mexico | $13.96 |
| Alabama | $13.92 |
| Kansas | $13.77 |
| Kentucky | $13.60 |
| Mississippi | $13.59 |
| Florida | $13.55 |
| Illinois | $13.23 |
| Georgia | $12.53 |
| Louisiana | $12.42 |
Source: Ziprecruiter
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How to calculate the cost of babysitting
The babysitting rates can vary wildly depending on where you live, how much experience you have, how old the kids are, how many kids you watch at once, etc. By giving some thought to all these details, you’ll be able to price your services accordingly so that you break even after accounting for time spent watching kids and expenses like food or activities.
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Estimating babysitting expenses
Another important aspect of calculating the babysitting rates is estimating babysitting expenses. This is particularly important if you’re self-employed and setting your rates on a per-child or per-family basis. This way, you’ll be able to account for things like food, diapers, entertainment, gifts, etc.
- Food and drink: How much does it cost to feed the kids? Depending on the ages, sizes, and eating habits of your charges, this can be anywhere from around $2 to $10 per kid per day. If you’re feeding a family, you’ll need to multiply that number by the number of kids.
- Transportation: Are you responsible for taking the kids to some places? If so, how often? How much does it cost?
- Activities: Do the kids have demanding schedules or extracurricular activities? If so, you’ll have to consider the cost of these.
- Things like sports, music lessons, gymnastics, karate, and other hobbies can be pretty costly.
- Gifts: How often do you receive gifts from the parents? It’s customary to reciprocate these gifts.
- Supplies: Do you need to purchase anything special for the kids? If so, you’ll need to include that in your calculations.
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Determine how many hours you’ll watch kids each week
When talking about the babysitting rates, you’ll also want to take the number of hours you’ll watch the kids each week into account. This can vary greatly depending on the family and their child care needs. For example, do the parents want you to watch the kids from 9am to 5pm every day? Or are they looking for someone to pick the kids up from school, get them a snack, and put them to bed for a couple hours each night? This information is key to determine how to set your rates and make sure you earn enough money to make babysitting worth your time. Let’s say you charge $18 an hour, which is the average student rate. If you have a typical work week of 10 hours, you’ll earn $180 a week. This is a good amount of money for a student to make, but how do you set your babysitting rates when you don’t know how many hours you’ll be watching the kids each week?
Babysitting ad calculation
As you can see, there are lots of factors that go into calculating the cost of babysitting. Fortunately, you can use an online babysitting rates calculator to help you figure them all out. Let’s say you’re a 22-year-old female student with no babysitting experience. You’re attending a nearby university and have an average-priced degree. You’re looking to make $12 an hour babysitting and have an average amount of expenses. You’re willing to babysit 2-3 hours per day 3 days a week. How much should you charge? In this situation, we’d plug these numbers into the formula to come up with an hourly rate of $16.67. This is the rate you’ll want to advertise with if you want to increase your chances of getting hired. Why? Because if you’re advertising at $12 an hour, you’re going to get more calls from desperate parents than you can handle. If you charge $16.67 an hour, you’re going to limit the number of calls you get, but you’ll get the most desirable clients—the ones who can afford your services.
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