How Much Do You Pay the Teenage Babysitter!?

Wow, I'm glad you posted this. We've been paying $5/hr for one child, $6/hr for both, then we always rounded up. Looks like we need to step it up! Thank you!

I agree with Jamie F. Lisenced daycare workers are not paid as well as some of you pay for a teenage babysitter. I have multiple babysitters that love watching my two children and I pay them $5 an hour for both children. I agree you have to have multiple, since teenagers lives are very busy. Some of these teenagers that you have hired to watch your children are not even old enough to have a regular job and they get paid better then I did before I went to college two years ago. That's sad.
I do agree that I pay the sitter a min of 4 hours if she kept her night open for me and I didn't end of using her, unless it was a previous determined scheduled one or two hours.
The reason these girls keep there nights open and call you regularly is because you pay them better then anyone else they know and just cause they are teenagers doesn't mean they are fools. They know where the money is so of course they are going to call you. Fat & Easy money

I pay our neighbor $10/hour. She is in high school, and very good with my son. I find that babysitters are usually more motivated to provide good quality care when you are as generous as you can be. And, with young children, I think any childcare provider truly earns their money! :) Best wishes.

If you want a good sitter and want to keep her.........be generous. CASH

We guaranteed $40 because she saved her night for us. That meant if we cancelled, she still got $40. Then we paid $10/hr. Most date nights and we do them weekly were $60-$80 for the sitter.

I had girls calling me offering to babysit. We had some great high school girls through the years.

EDIT: I agree that is depends on the area where you live. We are in a northern burb of Dallas. I am sure smaller towns and rural areas might pay less.

We do not regret having date night. It was always a priority and we feel it has helped us maintain our secure stable relationship. We'll celebrate 22 yrs this year!

This is nuts! Does anyone realize that CHILD CARE CENTER EMPLOYEES (at least in my area) only make $8 per hour AND they are required to have AT LEAST a 2 year degree??? I'm sorry, but there is no way I would pay a TEENAGER $10 per hour to babysit. I'd never get to go anywhere because I wouldn't be able to afford the night out plus the sitter. I've got 4 kids (9, 6, 2 & 5 months) and I have a few different sitters that I use...all of whom I trust 100%. I keep more than one "handy" because they're all involved in different activities and sports so they're not always available....and I would never expect them to put their teenage lives on hold for the chance that I may call. My oldest sitter is 21 and has been with me for 9 years. I pay her the most...mainly because I usually will leave all 4 kids with her (the baby is still nursing, so I don't often go out without him) since I know she can handle all of them...she's basically grown up with them. I pay her the most...$30 flat for an evening out. I'm usually gone for about 5 hours or so when I go out so I guess that pans out to about $6 per hour. The younger ones usually get $20 for the same time frame, but usually only have the 3 older kids. I've never had anyone complain about the rate I pay, and actually have one sitter (the youngest @ 14 years old) who callse me weekly to see if I need her.

I have found the answers here to be very insightful. I also now understand why my husband and I don't ever go out...can't afford $10+ an hour just for a fun evening...kind of pushes a date night to $200 easily.

My friend and I use the same sitter for summer care and spring break care. She is only 14 but extremely mature. Also, my daughter and my friend's daughter are 8 and 9 respectively. Anyway, we each pay $25 a week so the teen makes $50 a week for watching both girls. I also add more to the weekly pay if she does any type of housework for me. I do not ask for housework to be done because I want the attention to be on the kids not on the house so anything additional I reward for.

When I was in highschool (90s) I made $10/hr for 2 kids when they were between 3-7 years old (aka not babies). This was really good money at the time and kept me motivated to make sure my weekends were free to watch their kids should they need me. I think if you LOVE your babysitter and want to make sure she's available when you need her you should pay the upper end of what you think is fair.

I ran a referral hourly job sort of nanny agency. Standard pay to the caregiver was between $7 and $14 an hour depending on circumstances, expectations, etc. Sometimes more if it required something really taxing or weird.

I have been doing some of my own polling. I have a babysitter who is new, attended an 8 hour babysitter training where she learned CPR etc. and her teacher suggested $5 per hour for one kid. I pay her $7 per hour for one kid. I also use some college educated daycare people from my daughter's daycare and their rate is $10 per hour for one kid. I think most people are paying in my area what I am paying. I would pay high to keep the kid. Babysitters are hard to find. If you want to rely on her to be available and not go somewhere else instead when you need her, that you should pay on the med to high side.

Just my advice.

Here it is High schooler $8.00 for 1 child per hour. $2.00 more per child per hour.

College kids $10.00 per hour 1 child $2.00 per extra child.

Anything $10 or under is a steal! Especially for 3 or 4 kids! For that many around here it's 12 -15 an hour or more!

My daughter gets paid well from a neighbor with 3 kids, I think about $10 an hour. I agree with the other posts that if you have a good one that you trust and the kids love, the upper end would be appropriate.
As far as your question about when you add #4, maybe just talk to her and offer a movie pass or some kind of "tip" especially if your husband is going to round up anyway.
My DH and I always looked at this a little differently. Of course we only had 2 kids who are now 19 and 15 so I realize it doesn't answer your question. But we were always accused of over-paying babysitters and making the rest of our friends and neighbors look bad. But we felt we were trusting them with the lives of our children. And we always had honest, reliable kids ready and willing to babysit when needed

Good Luck

Wow! I wanna babysit for you! lol Just 10 years ago I was paid $1/hr per child. Some families gave a little bit more-just to round to whatever they hand in their wallets but that's about it. I personally don't use a teenage babysitter--Thank god for close family!

That does not sound bad too me, and it should go up for more kids, so they should probably get a set 3 per hour per kid, that way, once you have children who will cut out for sleepovers, or sports it is easy to figure out. I have read to that having the right snacks is also important to keeping a babysitter happy. Open them up so that they don't worry that you are monitoring what they eat.

Ah, the days of cheap babysitting! Yeah, I made around $2/hour - didn't matter if it was 1 or 4 kids... No wonder I stopped as soon as I was able to get another job. :)

I enjoyed reading the varied responses. I honestly think pay is a regional thing. My sister lived in Ann Arbor for many years, and couldn't get a babysitter to accept a job for less than $10/hour. I lived in Kenosha, WI, and our babysitter was blown away when we paid her $8/hour. We now live in Fort Wayne, IN. When we hired a babysitter to work in our home a few hours every day here we paid $7/hour and there were 2 kids (age 3 and 1). But it was during the day and guaranteed for several hours every week. Now we have a family with 4 kids of babysitting age who we call when we need a babysitter. We always pay around $8-10/hr for our two kids, and there is always one or two willing to babysit.

I am 34. When I was a teenager, I made about $2 per hour. I now have my own daughter (only 1 child). I pay our teen babysitter $7.50 - $8 per hour for our 1 baby. I dont think its beign too generous.If I had another baby, i would still pay her the same rate. I personally think with 4 kids, $10-$12 per hour would be fair. 4 kids is alot for a person to take care of and you will need to make it worth her time to come over...especailly with a little one on the way they are very demanding.
Also if you look at it in the long run, what is an extra $2 or $3 per hour? If you are gone for 4 hours, are you going to go broke over $12?? I guess it depends on how often you will need the sitter. In our case, we only go out once a month (if that). But even if you go out twice a month, its only an extra $24.00(on the high end)
Good luck and congrats on the new little one

I have 2 kids and pay our sitters anywhere from $8-10 per hour for both kids (usually closer to $10 because we love our sitters so much and want to keep them happy and available!). I would just talk to your sitter and ask her what she thinks about #4. Maybe you could keep it at $10/hr even when the new one comes along or just make it $11. It's tough because I have asked mine before and they always say to just pay them whatever....they are trying to be diplomatic, but I was clueless too! I realize it seems like a fortune compared to what we used to make, but times have changed....they all have iPhones now! Ugh! :-)

I pay $5.00 hour for two kids (and then round up). My kids are 8 and 10 and fairly self-sufficient. The sitter basically plays games with them, colors, or watches a movie. When you think about a 13 or 14 year-old making $25-$30 dollars in an evening, when they aren't even old enough to get a job, that is excellent money. I've never had trouble, even at that rate. They also may only have to play for an hour or two before putting the kids to bed. Then they are getting paid $5/hour to hangout on the couch, watch tv and text! I do know someone that used to pay one rate for the hours that the kids were awake, and then another rate after bedtime.

We usually pay about $8 per hour. I only have one kid so far. Our first babysitter was a younger lady from our daycare who we loved and she loved our littel girl. Now she is not as available and I am trying to build up my list of possible high school girls. We still pay them $8/hr. I don't expect any teenager to sit around waiting for my call, but I think you have to pay around $8/hr at least to get them to want to set aside a night in their busy schedules. When I babysat in the late 80's early 90's I didn't get extra for more kids, but most of the time unless there was a baby involved the more kids the more they would play together so sometimes it was easier that way.

Can you give me your phone number please so call you . Here my ###-###-####.

We live in a small town and have two daughters, now age ten. We started at $5 an hour when the girls were young (beyond infants), and we've moved up to $6-$7 per hour. If we had more children, it would be higher, and frankly, if they were extremely energetic boys, I think I would pay more also. This is in small-town Indiana, so I know the "asking price" isn't nearly what it is in larger venues.

First of all you are so lucky. I live in an area deviod of kids other than my own and the only teenagers in my area I would never consider letting them watch my children as it would interfer with their drug use. If I have to take both my boys to a drop in child carw place I pay $14/hour for two. I would talk to the young person and see what they feel is fair. I used to watch several kids when I was a teen. One of the couples I usually sat for had a friend who's sitter had an emergancy and they asked if I could watch the other couple's child too. I said okay and they just assumed I would do so without any increase in pay. Once was okay but it did not they tried to turn it into a weekly deal. The additional child was a lot more work then the first two I was orginally taking care of. An infant ontop of 3 active boys is alot for most people.

Wow! I am flabbergasted at all the responses I have seen. We haven't used a teenage babysitter much lately. The ones we have used have gone to college. We have 3 children and paid $2/hr/per child. I also usually fed the babysitter (and children, of course) with dinner ready when they get there. I actually one night needed her for 6 hours and her mother called me the next day and told me that I should not have paid her daughter that much for watching my kids......she actually threatened to tear up the check. She explained to me that Aimee had only watched them for 3 hours before they went to bed and then, she just watched tv and read books while I paid her the same rate. I am not sure I agreed with that part, what if they wake up or something.

Of course, we live in a small town, so that might make a difference. I babysit during the day and have checked around town for other daytime prices and they are around $2-3/hr/child.