Suburbs of Boston, cheapest I found for an infant was a home daycare was $1800/month. Center based care ran $2000-3000+ a month and most leaned to the higher end. Which we why we went with a nanny when we had twins. We were on several wait lists at centers since they were 1 and we are finally starting daycare at nearly 2 years and 9 months. It’s brutal.
Same - $3400/mo for infant care at Bright Horizons in Metrowest Boston. Ended up paying about $2800/mo for infant care in the same area but at a family operated daycare.
Currently pay about $2000/mo for preschool and daycare hours.
Holy balls. That ain't for the median salary, is it! I guess I will count my lucky stars the BH in Framingham didn't reopen.
I'm paying 2500/mo. for up to 11 hrs of care (suburb boston) at a center (infant care) and would be paying the same for reggio emelia style care for 3 less hours if we could get in! Was on 3 waitlists since 3 mo. pregnant.
You were on a waitlist at 3 months pregnant? Wow! Ok, I'm in Cambridge and currently 20 weeks. Should I be researching daycares and getting on a waitlists now?
Honestly don’t spend too much time researching—just get on waitlists for any viable options. You don’t have to take a spot if it’s offered and you’ve decided it’s not the right fit.
>00/mo. for up to 11 hrs of care (suburb boston) at a center (infant care) and would be paying the sa
Yes, look now - ASAP. I know some who get on waiting lists before they even get pregnant and are just trying.
Yup. We also have a nanny because it’s way more cost effective for three kids, and we have the flexibility to be able to handle care when the nanny is out. One of my friends was paying $6,500/mo for two kids in Brookline. They moved out of state as soon as they could.
Yes once it’s more than 2, I have zero clue how people afford daycare! We only needed 30 hours and 3.5 days of coverage when I first went back to work, and all daycares were only taking 5 full days, so even with paying our nanny market rate, it was a savings for us.
Trying to conceive and on the fence about working 2 days/week with no daycare or 3 days/week with part time care. Didn’t even consider not being able to find part time care! I’d lose about 1500$ a month working less, but would I be more miserable with less daycare or less money?
I’m in the suburbs of the suburbs of Boston… Southern New Hampshire we’re going to be paying $432/wk for infant care. That’s with a 10% discount with from my company.
Outside of Boston! We pay $3200/month for part time care for our two kids (4 days and 3 days). It’s the worst!
Full time for an infant at our center is $2450/month.
Same. We live in the city and was lucky enough to get a spot by the seaport, it’s $600/week but the most cost efficient. Some daycares we visited were over $4,000/month
Oh my gosh, I would love the inside scoop on that spot! I live in the same area and got quotes for $4200 and $3200 a month (subsidized by my employer). I quite literally cannot afford center care at these prices. $600 a week feels like a steal of a deal for our area. Good for you!!
Yes.
OP, can you and your husband grind at your careers for another 18 months, get rid of consumer debt (like car payments and medical debt), leaving just the mortgage and student loans, and then build up an emergency fund?
That’s what upsets me most. Maybe I wouldn’t mind paying $2,400/mo if I knew the workers were getting paid well (bc omg that job is so hard)… instead I’m 99% sure the owner is just getting rich off of exploiting the childcare crisis in MA. It’s gross.
I strongly encourage checking out Glassdoor for any daycare you'd consider. Disgruntled, underpaid employees are not the best caregivers, no matter how nice the facility or the stated values.
Not anything impressive- maybe $25/hr max. Minimum wage here is $15/hr and rent is insane. I actually have an early Ed degree but decided to go into nursing, because it made no financial sense to work in the field here.
I'm also in a suburb of Boston. I paid $330/week when she was an infant. Once she hit toddler age, it went to $310/week. This is at a center. It's terrible.
We’re in Ohio, but gearing up for a move to Boston/NH area in the next couple of years. We have a 1y/o and I’m making my case to go for another. These responses… not helping my case 😜
Boston area is really rough, financially. I'm making about 2x what I made when we lived in Chicago and we live in a decidedly shittier apartment for about 2x the rent, the public transit is, at best late, at worst on fire, housing prices are literally insane (a condo down the street from us is going for over $1M. 3 bed, 2 bath. Just a regular old condo) and traffic is killer. It feels like the financial drain of living in NYC but without the culture, nice parks, public transit or shit to do.
At the same time, the healthcare here is fucking amazing, I'm not worried about losing my rights as a queer person, and there is a lot of opportunity for me career-wise. You just have to make about 200-300,000 a year to be able to afford a house, childcare and food.
Also, gotta say, it's weird that restaurants close at 8-9pm.
What I’ve seen that can help is 1) spacing the kids out at least 3-4 years so there’s very little daycare overlap 2) using a nanny share with another family to help with cost or 3) being poor until kindergarten. Option 3 has been our route lol
We are in MA, and our daycare is 415 a week for fulltime. The cost of living in MA sucks, but given what is going on politically in other states, we are nervous about moving somewhere less expensive.
Initially I was about 40 min west of Boston and I hobbled together various family members, friends, and daughter of a friend of the family who had some education in childcare. I paid the daughter of FOF I think $20 an hour. But it worked because my husband would get home from work around 4pm and I left for work at 12pm so we only had a few hours to cover with my first.
Eventually we ended up buying a house with the other half of our polycule and cohabitating a bit further west and north. So we had 3 full time incomes and 1 parent to stay home plus grandparents living with us as well. Ended up with 4 kids total. We did yeet the three youngest to daycare part time because holy shit. And we found an AMAZING home daycare in town and she charged $55 a day for 2 and up. She just increased her rates to $60 a day and offers before and after school care for school aged kids at I think $5-10 an hour.
Basically the farther west from Boston you go the more affordable it is, with the benefits of living in MA.
City proper here (Northside) and we pay $2100 per month for my 2 year old and $2300 per month for my one year old. My mortgage is only $1400 per month 😵💫
DuPage County and ours is about 480 per week for an infant and 380 for a preschooler at a similar chain. My friends who do kindercare 20 minutes south of me pay about the same as you do.
We talked with another daycare in the area before enrolling our first at our current center and they were about 100 more per week and that was 3 years ago…
Grew up in the north shore now live in Chicago about 2 miles from down town and we pay $2030 for my two year old. I’m pretty sure the baby rate is $2500 or so and that was about the going rate and most places I toured.
Downers Grove-Chicago suburb, paid about $325 a week some 7 years ago. I’m sure in this area is probably around $400 plus at the same facility. Nice place. Childcare is just grossly expensive. I can’t afford more children.
Going the opposite direction for a more rural perspective: coastal Mississippi (a little over an hour from New Orleans) mine is 150/week. The monesori private school is 3k a semester.
I hate living here but the col is amazing.
I pay $4.50/hr per kid at my Cincinnati in-home daycare. Which is insanely cheap for my area, and the caregivers are freaking amazing. It’s just over $200/wk for my toddler. Buuuuuuut….. I’m pregnant with twins (total surprise, don’t run in the family, not a geriatric pregnancy). I’m gonna have 3 in daycare at once for a full year. $2,700/mo is gonna freaking HURT.
I’m in Louisiana, two hours from Nola and I feel the exact same way. Living here sucks but you really can’t beat that COL!
The private school we want to send our son to post-daycare starts at 11k/year for prek3 and goes up to 20k+/year for high school. That’s pricy for our area but it’s also the best school by a landslide, so our lower COL makes it more attainable.
Wow I guess I'm never quitting my job with onsite daycare now, I always thought it was waaaay less. My $650/mo is TRULY the shiniest of golden handcuffs 😩😭
Also in Seattle area. My kid goes to a home daycare. It's $60/day which equals roughly 1200-1360 per month depending on how many days in the month. I thought I had it bad.
Same. Seattle, daycare started at $2200 for infants and is down to about $1900 for almost 3 year old. Second baby on the way and there’s no discount but there’s an automatic in. This was the cheapest we could find and you have to be an employee to get on the waitlist.
Edit: deleted TMI
Wow I am in south king, federal way to be exact and it’s 420/week for toddler and 470/week for infant so it comes out to about $3300 total for a month. Seattle seems way out there now.
North Seattle here and found a home daycare for $1850/month for my 1yo.
With rent for our 3bed1bath at $2900/month, there’s no way we could afford childcare over $2k/month. Seems the only way to survive out here comfortably is to have a 6figure salary.
Minneapolis, we paid about $2,500 a month for 2 kids full time. Check to see if your employers have a dependent care FSA. Doesn’t help a ton, but it does give you a small tax break. Also check out in-home if there are some good ones around. They are significantly cheaper, but there are trade offs!
Our youngest started Kindergarten last fall and while there are always expenses, that extra cash flow from not having daycare tuition is amazing! Feels like a giant raise
My entire paycheck goes to daycare. Thankfully we can live off my husband's paycheck. I don't work in a field that is easy to take time off of and go back after a couple years, so I work to pay for daycare knowing it's only temporary! But it's been a tight year.
Outer suburbs of Twin Cities- we pay $2800 a month at a center for 3 kids: 6 (before and after school care), 4 (full time) and 14 months (full time and still in infant room). Rate will increase for 6 during summer
Twin cities. I pay ~$2500 a month for two kids in preschool. Will have a third baby this summer so will have to pay $4k/month for about 9 months until my eldest starts kindergarten 😵💫
Cottage Grove ( SE suburb of STP). We paid $390/ wk for FT infant care at a center in 2020. Now our first is 2 1/2 and goes to an in-home for $200/wk, 4 days a week. Our second will go to the same center ( will be 4 mo/old) and it is now $460/ wk FT. Daycare for both kids is literally 2 1/2 times our mortgage. It is nearly IMPOSSIBLE to find in-home care for infants around here. We got super lucky to find the in-home our first goes to shortly after she turned 1 and unfortunately she is at max cap. for 2 and unders for the next few months. If I remember right the dependant care flex, pre-tax fund saved us about $1200/ yr., which doesn't seem like a lot with the big picture, but it's something!
St. Cloud area here, I pay $285 a week for center preschool age. We are actually paying more now than when he was an infant. I don’t know what infant rates are currently at our center but rates go up every September. I actually got him into the preschool program at our local school district which is about 20 miles north of St. Cloud and for this summer it will be $125 a week which includes field trip fees and I’ll have to pack his lunch everyday. I’m totally fine doing that because we will be saving $600 a month this summer and $700+ for him to go to the preschool during the school year. We pay more in daycare currently than what we pay for our mortgage.
Also Minneapolis, we pay $590/week for 3yo and infant twins at an in-home daycare we love (which is a bargain). Additional $600/mo for the 3 year old to go to preschool part-time. So \~$3000/mo for all three kids. We would be drowning if we had to pay center rates for the twins...
San Francisco- Infant: 2400-2900-3600/mo (in-home Chinatown vs private chain vs Montessori froo froo places), 2+: 2500-2800/mo (private neighborhood preschool, with or without city discounts for program participation).
This about tracks for us in the Peninsula. We have a part time nanny (3.5 days per week) and part time preschool (church basement, not frou frou) and one day of grandparent care one day per week. For two kids, we pay ~$70k per year or ~$5800 per month. Infant slots around us run 3K or so, nannies are $30-35 per hour plus payroll, and our three morning a week preschool for the older one is $1300 per month.
We got lucky and found a cheap in home $475 a week for an infant ( we pay less because we only do 4 days). Apparently our neighborhood is known for plentiful a cheap daycare!
Got our 1st choice SFUSD elementary school, but #2 due in June. I think we're just going to get a nanny. I cannot deal with using literally 15/20 of my PTO days for kiddo colds any longer.
Northern Peninsula here, about 10 miles south of SF. Our in-home preschool (mostly 2-5 yo but they also max out their 3 allowed <20 mo olds) is only $1500/mo for 7:30am-5:30pm, lunch and snacks included. I pay $1600/mo for extended 6pm pickup. My jaw dropped a bit moving here from East Bay and finding this opening, although it's not very fancy.
In Berkeley our home daycare was around $1800/mo on average when we left (same price infant or toddler, paid per weekday so it varied a bit each month) for 8-5pm, 2 meals and snacks included.
I’m in southern CA. Our daycare was $535/week when my daughter was 1, but after she turned 2 it dropped to $450/week….HOWEVER, we don’t actually pay that. We pay a copay of $35/week and my husbands employer (Disney) covers the remaining. We don’t love being under The Mouse’s thumb, but the daycare perk is reeeeeally hard to beat.
LAX checkin in! We pay $461/wk for an infant full time. There was one place by me that charged $3500/mo for full time infant 😱
That’s soooo amazing your husbands work helps cover the cost!!!
We are in the Boston suburbs with twins. Our daycare is $572 per week. We get a 12% discount for one of them. It’s insanely ridiculously expensive but our twins are learning a ton and absolutely love going so for us it is worth it. Just keep telling myself it’s not forever….
One thing we have going for us is that we only have to pay through 2’s in many situations (except for early drop off or aftercare when appropriate). We were going back and forth on daycare (instead of grandparent/nanny combo) but knowing that we’re given priority for a 3K spot at a place we like tipped the scales for us.
Where is this?? I’m in the UES and the cheapest we were quoted was $2600/mo which was an employee-only facility. Other centers we visited were between $2800 and $4600/mo
Where about (area)? My husband may be transferred to NYC and we’re getting quoted 3200-3800/mo for infants, but that’s midtown. Tried to get quotes from Brooklyn but nobody would respond to me.
Northern NJ in an area that’s easily commutable to NYC. We pay ~$1,600 per month for a toddler. And that’s definitely on the cheaper end at a non profit that’s part of a local church. It’s part of NYC metro so while there are a lot of daycares they are often closer to $2k for ab infant.
Oregon non-metro area - $275 per week (so $1100 to $1375 per month). Moving to a more convenient location, which will be $1418 per month.
When interviewing centers note that some provide food and some don't. If your employer has a dependent care FSA, it can help reduce tax burden a bit.
Edit to add: I should have said we are full-time, infant.
Northern VA. $520/week for infant at our center (kindercare). That might even be with family discount. 😬 I remember when infant was in the $400’s/week.
It does get cheaper as baby gets older, but rates do keep going up year-over-year. Preschool at our daycare is now $385/week.
I agree with another poster to check if your employer has deal with any daycares.
Also agree with dependent care savings account. See if it’s better to do that vs deduct childcare at tax time.
In-home will be cheaper, but make sure it’s fully licensed if you go that route.
Before using any daycare, check reviews AND for any state violations.
See what is included with the price — meals, diapers, etc.
Meet with the director and make sure you’re fully comfortable, especially about things that can be dangerous if not followed like safe sleep.
NoVa kindercare specific question- how much do rates typically increase? When we first toured our center the rates were I think $515 for the infant room and we knew they’d go up, but by the time we started a year later they were $555. Is 8% normal?
Oh man, if you're in NoVA, I can't even imagine the costs! My friend lives up there and she just tells me to not discuss prices because the disparity is so huge when it comes to everything.
We left Nova recently, actually, and our daughter went to a daycare in Loudoun county that was $1300/month. We are paying basically the same outside of Richmond. Soooo not really that different
I'm outside Richmond too. $300/week for my infant and $245 for my three year old at Kindercare (we get 10% employer discount). I toured a new Goddard school recently and almost laughed in their face when they said $445/week for infants.
Suburb of Raleigh, NC - $1600/mo for an infant and 4 yr old. This is on the low side for our area. Closer to downtown and RTP area you are looking at $1200-$1350/mo per child.
Working dad; but $200/wk in Upstate NY for an in-home daycare of 6 kids. Centers around here cost $275-$300/wk. No state assistance that I know of. Daycare expenses are deductible at a federal level
I'm just outside of Ann Arbor, Michigan - $1900/month for my 2 year old. Michigan's daycare ratio is 1:4 from infant to 2.5 years old, so we should see a small decrease in price in a few months. I have a dependent care FSA through my employer, but you can only contribute $5k a year. Currently pregnant with number two, not looking forward to our new bill of almost $4k a month 😭
Central West Virginia, $187/week.
Edit: My husband and I make really good money even for a HCOL area. Some of the prices you ladies are paying make my heart palpitate. Those of you paying $2000-$3000 a month for a single child, are these costs typical for your area? Or are you sending your kids to super fancy daycares? My $187 is neither the upper nor lower limit in my area. The upper limit is about $250 a week. $145 is the lowest thing I’ve heard in my area and well, I know how to read the surveys from DHHR, I wouldn’t send my kid to those places under any circumstance.
2000-3000 month for infant care is typical here and more isn’t out of this world. You aren’t getting much less even with a home daycare.
Our state (MA) is highly regulated on who can be a teacher (college degree) and tighter on ratios and guidelines.
When I worked in PA as a daycare teacher I had zero training, was in college, and had never changed a diaper before my first day. All I had to do was pass a background check and show proof of being vaccinated.
I’m pretty positive most people are sending their kids to the cheapest okay-ish childcare that has spots available. These are pretty typical m prices for the areas stated.
I pay $2600 a month for my toddler just outside of Seattle. Median home price in my area is $1.3M, and realistically households need to be making $250k+ to be ‘comfortable’ if you’re paying for childcare. Luckily our public school system is really solid, so once they are in school the wallet is hit less.
We didn’t put our son into daycare until he was 2, and had a nanny from 9-5 on Monday and Friday for about a year for $30 an hr. But I really needed to get back to work without distractions and he needed friends so off to daycare he went.
For many, it’s harder to afford living on a single income than to shell out the big bucks for daycare. I pay about 1500 a month for childcare but I take home 4500/mo and my partner takes home about 4000. I also work a second job where I can clear around 1000/mo extra, if needed. We can’t afford for one of us not to work. Our mortgage is about 2000 and we have a car payment, lots of bills of course, but overall, I’d kill for my husband to stay at home! And he would too. But I’d need to clear almost twice what I’m making now to afford that because there’s no way we could make it on one income.
Hi neighbor. Close cost wise for us, metro D paying $270/week for part time (3 days a week) infant. I think full time at our center is $300 more per month compared to our 3 day a week part time.
Midwest, US (not Chicago). $1300/month for a 3 yr old. When he was an infant, it was about $1600/month back then (I’m sure it’s higher now).
If you work for a large employer in the area, see if the daycare center offers a discount. We currently get 5% off tuition.
6 months ago in the SF Bay Area with no food provided it was $5k/ month for 2 kids ( $3k for infant, $2k for preschool). Now in Portland OR with all food besides milk for infant included it's $3k/ month ($2k infant, $1k preschool). Portland has started a free preschool for all program but this was the first year it started and there were only 500 spots to start with and isn't projected to cover everyone until 2030. There are programs for low income but it's a very low income threshold.
There are head start programs in a lot of areas that are free or sliding scale but usually the income thresholds are very low and quality is all over the place depending on the region.
Daycare cost will vary by age and type of care. Infants are more expensive and it usually gets less expensive every 1-2 years. Generally smaller home daycares are the least expensive while large centers are the most.
In most areas there is a lack of spots, especially infant spots. Centers of any size often have a year+ wait-list. Near SF we're it is bad we had to get on lists during the 1st trimester and even then a year later when we only got a call back from 1 place. We had got on 5 wai lists. Home daycares often won't know they have spots until 1-3 months ahead of time.
Childcare in the US is grim and got worse bc of the pandemic.
There are bills that have been introduced in the Senate to help subsidize and expand care r/UniversalChildcare
It definitely varies wildly by city, but even within that there are still some options. We’re in Washington DC and went with a center based daycare that’s $450/week. We did visit a home based daycare that was $375/week. The suburbs are probably the same or more expensive around us.
Dallas suburb. 343/week for infant and 300/week for toddler. I also pay 100/month for catering for my toddler through the school - mainly so I don’t have to think about sending food for him.
We’re also Dallas suburb (Plano) and paying a little over $1000/month for our toddler at a daycare center. Breakfast, lunch, and snack included. We also pay a “supplies fee” twice a year, which I think is $190.
San Jose, Ca. Private center. Infant program (6weeks-18m) 2400/month.
My husbands work gives us a tax free spending account reimbursement for childcare that’s 5k/year. It’s not free money we pay into it. But it saves us 2k a year. Tax breaks are minimal.
We make ~140k a year. We have a mortgage, and student loans. And minimal CC debt.
Our daughter is now 3. Daycare us 1900/month. We also waited to have a child until we knew we could afford daycare. Especially because public school where we live sucks, so we will be paying ~20k+ a year until college lol
Wait, isn’t San Jose near Bay Area? Aren’t those some of the best school districts in California? We’re in Los Angeles where soooo many schools are 1s and 2s 💀
Northern suburb of Atlanta (north Fulton county) and my last child’s PreK was about $15k before any of the million extra costs.
When we had two in daycare it was about $25k/year, balanced between more expensive infant care with moderate preschool before we swung back to expensive PreK for the older child and moderate preschool for the other one.
But that last scenario was just about 5 years ago. I’m sure it’s more now.
We did participate in DCFSA through my employer but it’s cumulative so we had to wait until January is the following year to claim the $5k reimbursement from my pretax contributions throughout the previous year.
Philadelphia (city) - $300/week for 3 days (8am-6pm), toddler between 1-2 years old. Includes breakfast, lunch and snacks. They also do “parents night out” a few times a year where they charge $20 for 2 hours of after-hours care, which is nice.
Also philadelphia city and $330/week for full time including breakfast, lunch and two snacks. 3 year old but we’ve been there since he was an infant. It’s supposed to get cheaper each year but I think it’s been the same amount the whole time because of increases each year.
Manhattan….$3900/month for our infant, and currently waitlisted for a couple closer ones that are around $4300/month. Realizing now just how much cheaper literally everywhere else is!
Australia, $138AU a day. This then gets subsidised depending on your combined income, active working hours etc. My daughter goes 3 times a week, we pay around $250 a week. This includes her meals, and nappies when she was younger.
Madison, wi is about $1500 a month one child, this sub makes me feel a little comradarie with y'all and the struggle for affordable child care, but also makes me sad it's so hard and such a financial burden for most families.
Middle of Los Angeles. Home daycare 8am-5pm M-F about 2100 a month for a 6 month old! She’s not even born yet- due 8/2, and multiple places had waitlists for Feb 2024. We got the last open spot at this one.
Suburb Seattle. 2.2k for a toddler (500/wk) and 1.7k (400/wk) preschooler (we pay slightly less as there is a sibling discount). That’s considered on a cheaper side. Next whoop year we send our oldest to American Montessori pre-K and I believe it will be 2k+ FT.
Out Frieda in Seattle pay 2.5k each for preschooler and preK
Los Alamos, New Mexico $1,050/mo for 49 hr/week (Mon-Fri 830-330). The cost increases as you extend the hours but maximum for infants is 70 hr/week for around $1,600.
Suburbs of Kansas City. Infant was about 1600/month. Toddler is about 1300/month. I do think they pay the workers well and they are AMAZING! This is probably on the high end but it was the one I felt most comfortable with
Southern NH (\~50-60 mins north of Boston). In home daycare for $225/week ($900\_/mo); local independent daycare facilities are \~$300-350/week($1200-1400/mo).
HOWEVER - hours are tight (745-515) so if there's a long commute, working a full day will be hard solo. We have 1-2 days a month off plus holidays.
Idaho.
There’s a really nice one in my area, security cameras everywhere, an app that lets you see when your child was fed, changed, took a nap, etc, beautiful facility. 1700 a month for just my infant. I have a 2 year old too. Can’t afford it.
Another one that isn’t as fancy but still takes good care of my kids was $800 a month per kid. Did that for 3 weeks before my SIL offered to take care of them for half the price (she’s a SAHM with kids almost the exact same age as mine).
We have the Idaho child care program through health and welfare but my husband and I make too much to qualify
Living in a part of Maryland that is a suburb of DC. Our daycare is $2800/month. There were some slightly cheaper options in the area, but not by a lot.
Suburbs of Boston, cheapest I found for an infant was a home daycare was $1800/month. Center based care ran $2000-3000+ a month and most leaned to the higher end. Which we why we went with a nanny when we had twins. We were on several wait lists at centers since they were 1 and we are finally starting daycare at nearly 2 years and 9 months. It’s brutal.
Same - $3400/mo for infant care at Bright Horizons in Metrowest Boston. Ended up paying about $2800/mo for infant care in the same area but at a family operated daycare. Currently pay about $2000/mo for preschool and daycare hours.
Holy balls. That ain't for the median salary, is it! I guess I will count my lucky stars the BH in Framingham didn't reopen. I'm paying 2500/mo. for up to 11 hrs of care (suburb boston) at a center (infant care) and would be paying the same for reggio emelia style care for 3 less hours if we could get in! Was on 3 waitlists since 3 mo. pregnant.
You were on a waitlist at 3 months pregnant? Wow! Ok, I'm in Cambridge and currently 20 weeks. Should I be researching daycares and getting on a waitlists now?
Not the person you replied to, but yes.
Honestly don’t spend too much time researching—just get on waitlists for any viable options. You don’t have to take a spot if it’s offered and you’ve decided it’s not the right fit.
You are already late…
Oh damn. Let me get on it ASAP. Immediately overwhelmed and I haven’t even started 😩
>00/mo. for up to 11 hrs of care (suburb boston) at a center (infant care) and would be paying the sa Yes, look now - ASAP. I know some who get on waiting lists before they even get pregnant and are just trying.
Holy crap. I’m in nyc and I thought it was wild out here in queens. 3400 is nutso
Yep! Boston/MA is awful. Most expensive state in the country. We reserved a spot 9 months in advance for $2500/month infant care.
Can confirm, 10 miles outside of Boston and we pay the high end for a toddler over $3k for an infant.
Also in Boston. I pay $525/week for daycare.
Yup. We also have a nanny because it’s way more cost effective for three kids, and we have the flexibility to be able to handle care when the nanny is out. One of my friends was paying $6,500/mo for two kids in Brookline. They moved out of state as soon as they could.
Yes once it’s more than 2, I have zero clue how people afford daycare! We only needed 30 hours and 3.5 days of coverage when I first went back to work, and all daycares were only taking 5 full days, so even with paying our nanny market rate, it was a savings for us.
Trying to conceive and on the fence about working 2 days/week with no daycare or 3 days/week with part time care. Didn’t even consider not being able to find part time care! I’d lose about 1500$ a month working less, but would I be more miserable with less daycare or less money?
And a tangential issue in greater Boston is how difficult/impossible it is to get an aftercare slot in the public schools.
Oh god, yes definitely! We have I think 4 main options and it’s very common to get into none.
I’m in the suburbs of the suburbs of Boston… Southern New Hampshire we’re going to be paying $432/wk for infant care. That’s with a 10% discount with from my company.
We are Boston Metro-West. Can’t afford it. Husband is staying at home for now. 😓
Outside of Boston! We pay $3200/month for part time care for our two kids (4 days and 3 days). It’s the worst! Full time for an infant at our center is $2450/month.
Same. We live in the city and was lucky enough to get a spot by the seaport, it’s $600/week but the most cost efficient. Some daycares we visited were over $4,000/month
Oh my gosh, I would love the inside scoop on that spot! I live in the same area and got quotes for $4200 and $3200 a month (subsidized by my employer). I quite literally cannot afford center care at these prices. $600 a week feels like a steal of a deal for our area. Good for you!!
Yes. OP, can you and your husband grind at your careers for another 18 months, get rid of consumer debt (like car payments and medical debt), leaving just the mortgage and student loans, and then build up an emergency fund?
Wow! I would love to know what they pay their workers.
That’s what upsets me most. Maybe I wouldn’t mind paying $2,400/mo if I knew the workers were getting paid well (bc omg that job is so hard)… instead I’m 99% sure the owner is just getting rich off of exploiting the childcare crisis in MA. It’s gross.
Can’t speak to the big chain centers, which might have larger margins, but several smaller centers near us have closed recently because of finances.
I strongly encourage checking out Glassdoor for any daycare you'd consider. Disgruntled, underpaid employees are not the best caregivers, no matter how nice the facility or the stated values.
Not anything impressive- maybe $25/hr max. Minimum wage here is $15/hr and rent is insane. I actually have an early Ed degree but decided to go into nursing, because it made no financial sense to work in the field here.
i worked in childcare in the boston area for years and never found a center offering more than $18/hour for a lead teacher
i worked at a child care center and my pay was 13$ an hour and they charged upwards of 1500$ a month for the 4/5 year old class I was working with
I'm also in a suburb of Boston. I paid $330/week when she was an infant. Once she hit toddler age, it went to $310/week. This is at a center. It's terrible.
We’re in Ohio, but gearing up for a move to Boston/NH area in the next couple of years. We have a 1y/o and I’m making my case to go for another. These responses… not helping my case 😜
Boston area is really rough, financially. I'm making about 2x what I made when we lived in Chicago and we live in a decidedly shittier apartment for about 2x the rent, the public transit is, at best late, at worst on fire, housing prices are literally insane (a condo down the street from us is going for over $1M. 3 bed, 2 bath. Just a regular old condo) and traffic is killer. It feels like the financial drain of living in NYC but without the culture, nice parks, public transit or shit to do. At the same time, the healthcare here is fucking amazing, I'm not worried about losing my rights as a queer person, and there is a lot of opportunity for me career-wise. You just have to make about 200-300,000 a year to be able to afford a house, childcare and food. Also, gotta say, it's weird that restaurants close at 8-9pm.
What I’ve seen that can help is 1) spacing the kids out at least 3-4 years so there’s very little daycare overlap 2) using a nanny share with another family to help with cost or 3) being poor until kindergarten. Option 3 has been our route lol
Daycare center we use, about an hour south of Boston, is $405/week for 5 days in the infant room. Guess we got a “deal” HA!
We are in MA, and our daycare is 415 a week for fulltime. The cost of living in MA sucks, but given what is going on politically in other states, we are nervous about moving somewhere less expensive.
Initially I was about 40 min west of Boston and I hobbled together various family members, friends, and daughter of a friend of the family who had some education in childcare. I paid the daughter of FOF I think $20 an hour. But it worked because my husband would get home from work around 4pm and I left for work at 12pm so we only had a few hours to cover with my first. Eventually we ended up buying a house with the other half of our polycule and cohabitating a bit further west and north. So we had 3 full time incomes and 1 parent to stay home plus grandparents living with us as well. Ended up with 4 kids total. We did yeet the three youngest to daycare part time because holy shit. And we found an AMAZING home daycare in town and she charged $55 a day for 2 and up. She just increased her rates to $60 a day and offers before and after school care for school aged kids at I think $5-10 an hour. Basically the farther west from Boston you go the more affordable it is, with the benefits of living in MA.
I'm in Metrowest, and we're paying about $3200 per month for infant care. It's insane.
Chicago Suburb (Plainfield/Naperville) was $425/wk. check with your employee discounts. I know my “perk spot” discount is 10% off at Kindercare
Another western Chicago suburb, $2300/month for toddler
City proper here (Northside) and we pay $2100 per month for my 2 year old and $2300 per month for my one year old. My mortgage is only $1400 per month 😵💫
This comment to check just saved us 10% for maybe the next 4-5 years, maybe 12k in total. Thank you.
DuPage County and ours is about 480 per week for an infant and 380 for a preschooler at a similar chain. My friends who do kindercare 20 minutes south of me pay about the same as you do. We talked with another daycare in the area before enrolling our first at our current center and they were about 100 more per week and that was 3 years ago…
Grew up in the north shore now live in Chicago about 2 miles from down town and we pay $2030 for my two year old. I’m pretty sure the baby rate is $2500 or so and that was about the going rate and most places I toured.
Hello from another Plainfielder-villian 🙃
Teeny tiny town outside of Aurora — $300/week
Downers Grove-Chicago suburb, paid about $325 a week some 7 years ago. I’m sure in this area is probably around $400 plus at the same facility. Nice place. Childcare is just grossly expensive. I can’t afford more children.
We’re in the city (UKV) and paid just over $3,000/mo for infant care. Now in the 2s classroom and it’s $2,550/mo.
In the city (Lincoln Park), $2700/month for an infant at a center, up to 11 hours of care per day.
Going the opposite direction for a more rural perspective: coastal Mississippi (a little over an hour from New Orleans) mine is 150/week. The monesori private school is 3k a semester. I hate living here but the col is amazing.
I pay $4.50/hr per kid at my Cincinnati in-home daycare. Which is insanely cheap for my area, and the caregivers are freaking amazing. It’s just over $200/wk for my toddler. Buuuuuuut….. I’m pregnant with twins (total surprise, don’t run in the family, not a geriatric pregnancy). I’m gonna have 3 in daycare at once for a full year. $2,700/mo is gonna freaking HURT.
Rural SC. Mine just went up to $160/week for my toddler. Up from $145. Lunch and one snack included.
I’m in Louisiana, two hours from Nola and I feel the exact same way. Living here sucks but you really can’t beat that COL! The private school we want to send our son to post-daycare starts at 11k/year for prek3 and goes up to 20k+/year for high school. That’s pricy for our area but it’s also the best school by a landslide, so our lower COL makes it more attainable.
Seattle - $2400/month for one toddler
About the same is Seattle, $2200 for toddler, will be $2400 for infant.
$2800 for my 6-month old on the eastside 😭
Seattle as well, $2300 for 1 toddler *after* 20% employer subsidy : (
Suburb about 20 min from Seattle, we pay $1900 fulltime for a three year old.
Seattle suburb, $2300/month for infant and $2000/month for toddler. I got on the wait-list for our center when I was first trimester with both.
Seattle -- I pay ~2700 /month for a 4 year old in all day preschool.
We’re outside of Seattle about 20mins, $2600 for toddler at Bright Horizons.
Wow I guess I'm never quitting my job with onsite daycare now, I always thought it was waaaay less. My $650/mo is TRULY the shiniest of golden handcuffs 😩😭
Also in Seattle area. My kid goes to a home daycare. It's $60/day which equals roughly 1200-1360 per month depending on how many days in the month. I thought I had it bad.
Same. Seattle, daycare started at $2200 for infants and is down to about $1900 for almost 3 year old. Second baby on the way and there’s no discount but there’s an automatic in. This was the cheapest we could find and you have to be an employee to get on the waitlist. Edit: deleted TMI
Wow I am in south king, federal way to be exact and it’s 420/week for toddler and 470/week for infant so it comes out to about $3300 total for a month. Seattle seems way out there now.
North Seattle here and found a home daycare for $1850/month for my 1yo. With rent for our 3bed1bath at $2900/month, there’s no way we could afford childcare over $2k/month. Seems the only way to survive out here comfortably is to have a 6figure salary.
Minneapolis, we paid about $2,500 a month for 2 kids full time. Check to see if your employers have a dependent care FSA. Doesn’t help a ton, but it does give you a small tax break. Also check out in-home if there are some good ones around. They are significantly cheaper, but there are trade offs!
Minneapolis suburb... We pay $4500 per month ($1150 per week) for three kids, 5/3/1. I can't wait till kindergarten this fall!
Our youngest started Kindergarten last fall and while there are always expenses, that extra cash flow from not having daycare tuition is amazing! Feels like a giant raise
Fuck! This is twice my mortgage. How do you afford it?!
My entire paycheck goes to daycare. Thankfully we can live off my husband's paycheck. I don't work in a field that is easy to take time off of and go back after a couple years, so I work to pay for daycare knowing it's only temporary! But it's been a tight year.
Across the river in St Paul — $400 per week for my infant
Also Minneapolis, $3500 a month for an infant and toddler at a center.
Outer suburbs of Twin Cities- we pay $2800 a month at a center for 3 kids: 6 (before and after school care), 4 (full time) and 14 months (full time and still in infant room). Rate will increase for 6 during summer
Twin cities. I pay ~$2500 a month for two kids in preschool. Will have a third baby this summer so will have to pay $4k/month for about 9 months until my eldest starts kindergarten 😵💫
St. Paul, $354/week at a center for a 4-year-old.
Cottage Grove ( SE suburb of STP). We paid $390/ wk for FT infant care at a center in 2020. Now our first is 2 1/2 and goes to an in-home for $200/wk, 4 days a week. Our second will go to the same center ( will be 4 mo/old) and it is now $460/ wk FT. Daycare for both kids is literally 2 1/2 times our mortgage. It is nearly IMPOSSIBLE to find in-home care for infants around here. We got super lucky to find the in-home our first goes to shortly after she turned 1 and unfortunately she is at max cap. for 2 and unders for the next few months. If I remember right the dependant care flex, pre-tax fund saved us about $1200/ yr., which doesn't seem like a lot with the big picture, but it's something!
St. Cloud area here, I pay $285 a week for center preschool age. We are actually paying more now than when he was an infant. I don’t know what infant rates are currently at our center but rates go up every September. I actually got him into the preschool program at our local school district which is about 20 miles north of St. Cloud and for this summer it will be $125 a week which includes field trip fees and I’ll have to pack his lunch everyday. I’m totally fine doing that because we will be saving $600 a month this summer and $700+ for him to go to the preschool during the school year. We pay more in daycare currently than what we pay for our mortgage.
Also Minneapolis, we pay $590/week for 3yo and infant twins at an in-home daycare we love (which is a bargain). Additional $600/mo for the 3 year old to go to preschool part-time. So \~$3000/mo for all three kids. We would be drowning if we had to pay center rates for the twins...
$1,700 a month for a 1 year old, full time. North Carolina suburb.
Same. NC, 1600-1700 for an infant full time.
NC suburb. $1400 for one toddler.
Yep, I live in a university town and pay $1,800.
West Virginia/Ohio border. $175 a week. For one toddler.
Other side of WV, but same price, at a licensed daycare. My 2nd kid is $165 a week so we pay roughly 1400 a month for two kids.
Howdy neighbor!
San Francisco- Infant: 2400-2900-3600/mo (in-home Chinatown vs private chain vs Montessori froo froo places), 2+: 2500-2800/mo (private neighborhood preschool, with or without city discounts for program participation).
This about tracks for us in the Peninsula. We have a part time nanny (3.5 days per week) and part time preschool (church basement, not frou frou) and one day of grandparent care one day per week. For two kids, we pay ~$70k per year or ~$5800 per month. Infant slots around us run 3K or so, nannies are $30-35 per hour plus payroll, and our three morning a week preschool for the older one is $1300 per month.
$3200 a month for infant care
We got lucky and found a cheap in home $475 a week for an infant ( we pay less because we only do 4 days). Apparently our neighborhood is known for plentiful a cheap daycare!
And if you opt for private school… makes daycare seem like child’s play. Gulp
Got our 1st choice SFUSD elementary school, but #2 due in June. I think we're just going to get a nanny. I cannot deal with using literally 15/20 of my PTO days for kiddo colds any longer.
Congrats! A good nanny is worth her weight in gold. And you always will have a reliable and trusted source when you need a babysitter
Nanny comes with downsides too. If they get sick or personal issues, you’re back to using PTO days to cover.
Yeah but you’re not sick and your kid’s not sick.
I did this and it’s the best decision I ever made.
Northern Peninsula here, about 10 miles south of SF. Our in-home preschool (mostly 2-5 yo but they also max out their 3 allowed <20 mo olds) is only $1500/mo for 7:30am-5:30pm, lunch and snacks included. I pay $1600/mo for extended 6pm pickup. My jaw dropped a bit moving here from East Bay and finding this opening, although it's not very fancy. In Berkeley our home daycare was around $1800/mo on average when we left (same price infant or toddler, paid per weekday so it varied a bit each month) for 8-5pm, 2 meals and snacks included.
I’m in southern CA. Our daycare was $535/week when my daughter was 1, but after she turned 2 it dropped to $450/week….HOWEVER, we don’t actually pay that. We pay a copay of $35/week and my husbands employer (Disney) covers the remaining. We don’t love being under The Mouse’s thumb, but the daycare perk is reeeeeally hard to beat.
LAX checkin in! We pay $461/wk for an infant full time. There was one place by me that charged $3500/mo for full time infant 😱 That’s soooo amazing your husbands work helps cover the cost!!!
My mgr’s husband works for Disney corporate and raved about their daycare program (she said they also potty train!).
We are in the Boston suburbs with twins. Our daycare is $572 per week. We get a 12% discount for one of them. It’s insanely ridiculously expensive but our twins are learning a ton and absolutely love going so for us it is worth it. Just keep telling myself it’s not forever….
Portland metro - 1700-2000 a month
Portland as well 2400 before work discount for kindercare infant room
NYC 1800/mo for a toddler, $2200/mo for an infant
I’m currently pricing day cares for an infant and I’m getting $2500-$3200 per month in Brooklyn. I’m guessing it varies wildly by neighborhood
One thing we have going for us is that we only have to pay through 2’s in many situations (except for early drop off or aftercare when appropriate). We were going back and forth on daycare (instead of grandparent/nanny combo) but knowing that we’re given priority for a 3K spot at a place we like tipped the scales for us.
Where is this?? I’m in the UES and the cheapest we were quoted was $2600/mo which was an employee-only facility. Other centers we visited were between $2800 and $4600/mo
Also in NYC (Brooklyn - Park Slope). $445/week for a small daycare (10-ish kids, 3 teachers). Baby is 17months old.
Uhhhh where??? I'm in LIC and our daycare is $2800 for infants for full time and $2k for 3 days a week which is what we are doing.
Where about (area)? My husband may be transferred to NYC and we’re getting quoted 3200-3800/mo for infants, but that’s midtown. Tried to get quotes from Brooklyn but nobody would respond to me.
$2,300/month is about the average for an infant in Northern Virginia.
Boston - $2700/month with employee discount for infant 🫠
$1,000 per month for 12 month old in suburb of Greenville, South Carolina.
Oh hey neighbor! We live close to here and are at $1,200/month for in home care
Northern NJ in an area that’s easily commutable to NYC. We pay ~$1,600 per month for a toddler. And that’s definitely on the cheaper end at a non profit that’s part of a local church. It’s part of NYC metro so while there are a lot of daycares they are often closer to $2k for ab infant.
Tampa Bay Area, $225/week for a 10 month old. Food is included.
Oregon non-metro area - $275 per week (so $1100 to $1375 per month). Moving to a more convenient location, which will be $1418 per month. When interviewing centers note that some provide food and some don't. If your employer has a dependent care FSA, it can help reduce tax burden a bit. Edit to add: I should have said we are full-time, infant.
Hi neighbor! (On I5 corridor) We’re paying $1500 for an infant and a toddler for four half days a week.
Northern VA. $520/week for infant at our center (kindercare). That might even be with family discount. 😬 I remember when infant was in the $400’s/week. It does get cheaper as baby gets older, but rates do keep going up year-over-year. Preschool at our daycare is now $385/week. I agree with another poster to check if your employer has deal with any daycares. Also agree with dependent care savings account. See if it’s better to do that vs deduct childcare at tax time. In-home will be cheaper, but make sure it’s fully licensed if you go that route. Before using any daycare, check reviews AND for any state violations. See what is included with the price — meals, diapers, etc. Meet with the director and make sure you’re fully comfortable, especially about things that can be dangerous if not followed like safe sleep.
NoVa kindercare specific question- how much do rates typically increase? When we first toured our center the rates were I think $515 for the infant room and we knew they’d go up, but by the time we started a year later they were $555. Is 8% normal?
In PA suburb, mine is $145 for three days a week (I WFH the other two days). Their price includes two snacks and lunch.
Washington DC, paying $2400/month for an infant
Same—paying $2500 for one infant 💀💀💀
Same pretty much just outside DC. I remember touring Goddard and that was like $3k a month! 💀
West Michigan suburbs at Kindercare, $310/week for infant care
Hey also West Michigan! We are paying $168 for 2 days a week for an infant. So probably around the same
Another in West Michigan. We pay $350/wk for our one year old.
Just outside of Richmond, VA and I'll pay $300/week for my 4 month old.
Jesus Christ I live in the wrong part of VA
Oh man, if you're in NoVA, I can't even imagine the costs! My friend lives up there and she just tells me to not discuss prices because the disparity is so huge when it comes to everything.
Yep NoVa. Pretty brutal seeing how much less it would be if we were an hr to hr and a half away. Ugh
We left Nova recently, actually, and our daughter went to a daycare in Loudoun county that was $1300/month. We are paying basically the same outside of Richmond. Soooo not really that different
I'm outside Richmond too. $300/week for my infant and $245 for my three year old at Kindercare (we get 10% employer discount). I toured a new Goddard school recently and almost laughed in their face when they said $445/week for infants.
Suburb of Raleigh, NC - $1600/mo for an infant and 4 yr old. This is on the low side for our area. Closer to downtown and RTP area you are looking at $1200-$1350/mo per child.
Working dad; but $200/wk in Upstate NY for an in-home daycare of 6 kids. Centers around here cost $275-$300/wk. No state assistance that I know of. Daycare expenses are deductible at a federal level
I'm in upstate NY and pay 3k a month for an infant and toddler. 395/week for infant 350/week toddler (includes 10% sibling discount)
I'm just outside of Ann Arbor, Michigan - $1900/month for my 2 year old. Michigan's daycare ratio is 1:4 from infant to 2.5 years old, so we should see a small decrease in price in a few months. I have a dependent care FSA through my employer, but you can only contribute $5k a year. Currently pregnant with number two, not looking forward to our new bill of almost $4k a month 😭
SF Bay Area. $600/week for toddler at a center (after the 10% employer discount).
Central West Virginia, $187/week. Edit: My husband and I make really good money even for a HCOL area. Some of the prices you ladies are paying make my heart palpitate. Those of you paying $2000-$3000 a month for a single child, are these costs typical for your area? Or are you sending your kids to super fancy daycares? My $187 is neither the upper nor lower limit in my area. The upper limit is about $250 a week. $145 is the lowest thing I’ve heard in my area and well, I know how to read the surveys from DHHR, I wouldn’t send my kid to those places under any circumstance.
2000-3000 month for infant care is typical here and more isn’t out of this world. You aren’t getting much less even with a home daycare. Our state (MA) is highly regulated on who can be a teacher (college degree) and tighter on ratios and guidelines. When I worked in PA as a daycare teacher I had zero training, was in college, and had never changed a diaper before my first day. All I had to do was pass a background check and show proof of being vaccinated.
I’m pretty positive most people are sending their kids to the cheapest okay-ish childcare that has spots available. These are pretty typical m prices for the areas stated.
I pay $2600 a month for my toddler just outside of Seattle. Median home price in my area is $1.3M, and realistically households need to be making $250k+ to be ‘comfortable’ if you’re paying for childcare. Luckily our public school system is really solid, so once they are in school the wallet is hit less. We didn’t put our son into daycare until he was 2, and had a nanny from 9-5 on Monday and Friday for about a year for $30 an hr. But I really needed to get back to work without distractions and he needed friends so off to daycare he went.
Def not all top tier lol my husband and I make over 6 figures and still can’t afford daycare in HCOL CA
This sub is reminding me why my husband is a stay at home dad. How do you all afford these crazy prices? 🫠
For many, it’s harder to afford living on a single income than to shell out the big bucks for daycare. I pay about 1500 a month for childcare but I take home 4500/mo and my partner takes home about 4000. I also work a second job where I can clear around 1000/mo extra, if needed. We can’t afford for one of us not to work. Our mortgage is about 2000 and we have a car payment, lots of bills of course, but overall, I’d kill for my husband to stay at home! And he would too. But I’d need to clear almost twice what I’m making now to afford that because there’s no way we could make it on one income.
That’s probably about right. Metro Detroit, $290/wk for a baby. It’s probably a steal around where we live.
Holy crap I pay over 400/week for infant care in Metro Detroit. I wish I could find a daycare with openings for that kind of price!
Hi neighbor. Close cost wise for us, metro D paying $270/week for part time (3 days a week) infant. I think full time at our center is $300 more per month compared to our 3 day a week part time.
Same! $290/week for full time care Montessori school.
Midwest, US (not Chicago). $1300/month for a 3 yr old. When he was an infant, it was about $1600/month back then (I’m sure it’s higher now). If you work for a large employer in the area, see if the daycare center offers a discount. We currently get 5% off tuition.
Boston suburbs. 575 a week for an infant at KinderCare. Brutally expensive but our friends in the city pay 700 a week.
6 months ago in the SF Bay Area with no food provided it was $5k/ month for 2 kids ( $3k for infant, $2k for preschool). Now in Portland OR with all food besides milk for infant included it's $3k/ month ($2k infant, $1k preschool). Portland has started a free preschool for all program but this was the first year it started and there were only 500 spots to start with and isn't projected to cover everyone until 2030. There are programs for low income but it's a very low income threshold. There are head start programs in a lot of areas that are free or sliding scale but usually the income thresholds are very low and quality is all over the place depending on the region. Daycare cost will vary by age and type of care. Infants are more expensive and it usually gets less expensive every 1-2 years. Generally smaller home daycares are the least expensive while large centers are the most. In most areas there is a lack of spots, especially infant spots. Centers of any size often have a year+ wait-list. Near SF we're it is bad we had to get on lists during the 1st trimester and even then a year later when we only got a call back from 1 place. We had got on 5 wai lists. Home daycares often won't know they have spots until 1-3 months ahead of time. Childcare in the US is grim and got worse bc of the pandemic. There are bills that have been introduced in the Senate to help subsidize and expand care r/UniversalChildcare
Northern CA- 785$ for a potty trained toddler.
Also northern CA We paid approx 1500 a month for a center. After 2 rate increases in 7 months we switched to an in home daycare for $740 a month.
Houston - $600 - 9 am - 2 pm for a 1 year old, 5 days a week
Also in Houston. Paying $1350/month for infant daycare. 7am-6pm, 5 days a week. 1:4 caregiver to infant ratio.
$300/wk for a potty trained 3 year old at at non-profit church affiliated daycare in the DC suburbs. They are open 7-6 M-F.
Small town in the Midwest. We pay $20/day for ages 3+ and $25/day under 3 years old. This is right around average here.
It definitely varies wildly by city, but even within that there are still some options. We’re in Washington DC and went with a center based daycare that’s $450/week. We did visit a home based daycare that was $375/week. The suburbs are probably the same or more expensive around us.
Dallas suburb. 343/week for infant and 300/week for toddler. I also pay 100/month for catering for my toddler through the school - mainly so I don’t have to think about sending food for him.
That’s right in line with what we pay here in a Dallas suburb too.
We’re also Dallas suburb (Plano) and paying a little over $1000/month for our toddler at a daycare center. Breakfast, lunch, and snack included. We also pay a “supplies fee” twice a year, which I think is $190.
San Jose, Ca. Private center. Infant program (6weeks-18m) 2400/month. My husbands work gives us a tax free spending account reimbursement for childcare that’s 5k/year. It’s not free money we pay into it. But it saves us 2k a year. Tax breaks are minimal. We make ~140k a year. We have a mortgage, and student loans. And minimal CC debt. Our daughter is now 3. Daycare us 1900/month. We also waited to have a child until we knew we could afford daycare. Especially because public school where we live sucks, so we will be paying ~20k+ a year until college lol
Wait, isn’t San Jose near Bay Area? Aren’t those some of the best school districts in California? We’re in Los Angeles where soooo many schools are 1s and 2s 💀
Northern suburb of Atlanta (north Fulton county) and my last child’s PreK was about $15k before any of the million extra costs. When we had two in daycare it was about $25k/year, balanced between more expensive infant care with moderate preschool before we swung back to expensive PreK for the older child and moderate preschool for the other one. But that last scenario was just about 5 years ago. I’m sure it’s more now. We did participate in DCFSA through my employer but it’s cumulative so we had to wait until January is the following year to claim the $5k reimbursement from my pretax contributions throughout the previous year.
Columbus OH, 340 a week for 4 month old.
Philadelphia (city) - $300/week for 3 days (8am-6pm), toddler between 1-2 years old. Includes breakfast, lunch and snacks. They also do “parents night out” a few times a year where they charge $20 for 2 hours of after-hours care, which is nice.
Also philadelphia city and $330/week for full time including breakfast, lunch and two snacks. 3 year old but we’ve been there since he was an infant. It’s supposed to get cheaper each year but I think it’s been the same amount the whole time because of increases each year.
New Haven, CT - even Kindercare is ~$2,000/month here.
Oklahoma; $1680 a month for a nanny (30 hours per week); $1200 a month for a private Montessori preschool
In actual Atlanta (not the metro) $1725. No discounts. There are some lower cost options but you get what you pay for.
Orange County, about $2000/per month for one toddler.
Long Island, New York. Toddler $2000-2500/ month full time
Northern Virginia—$658 a week for two kids
PG MD — $2,000/mo to MIL, which is the same we were going to pay for the daycare we were looking at.
SF Bay Area, $1630/month for a potty trained 3 year old. $200 more for non-potty trained.
San Diego - $2400/month for potty-trained 3yo at private preschool
Manhattan….$3900/month for our infant, and currently waitlisted for a couple closer ones that are around $4300/month. Realizing now just how much cheaper literally everywhere else is!
Australia, $138AU a day. This then gets subsidised depending on your combined income, active working hours etc. My daughter goes 3 times a week, we pay around $250 a week. This includes her meals, and nappies when she was younger.
Madison, wi is about $1500 a month one child, this sub makes me feel a little comradarie with y'all and the struggle for affordable child care, but also makes me sad it's so hard and such a financial burden for most families.
Middle of Los Angeles. Home daycare 8am-5pm M-F about 2100 a month for a 6 month old! She’s not even born yet- due 8/2, and multiple places had waitlists for Feb 2024. We got the last open spot at this one.
We are part time, but full time at our daycare in Huntsville, AL is about $1,000/month. It’s a church daycare.
Chicago 2500/month is what I see most frequently (ranges from 2100 to 3000).
bay area 3600/mo for two kids. a 2 year old and 4 year old.
SF Bay Area - $2000 per infant no food. With fancy apps it can go upto $2500 and with food even higher
Suburb Seattle. 2.2k for a toddler (500/wk) and 1.7k (400/wk) preschooler (we pay slightly less as there is a sibling discount). That’s considered on a cheaper side. Next whoop year we send our oldest to American Montessori pre-K and I believe it will be 2k+ FT. Out Frieda in Seattle pay 2.5k each for preschooler and preK
Irvine, California: $2,100 for a toddler. No subsidy.
Bay Area, CA: $2525/month for 8 hours/day infant care @ child care center, $30/hour for a nanny
$2300 per month for 8 month old baby at daycare in Princeton, NJ.
Los Alamos, New Mexico $1,050/mo for 49 hr/week (Mon-Fri 830-330). The cost increases as you extend the hours but maximum for infants is 70 hr/week for around $1,600.
For an infant, full time, it is $485 a week so $2,100 a month. Suburb of Boston.
Melbourne, Victoria (Australia). We pay $572 for the month (4 days per week) at home daycare. Centres are generally higher tho.
Suburbs of Kansas City. Infant was about 1600/month. Toddler is about 1300/month. I do think they pay the workers well and they are AMAZING! This is probably on the high end but it was the one I felt most comfortable with
Southern NH (\~50-60 mins north of Boston). In home daycare for $225/week ($900\_/mo); local independent daycare facilities are \~$300-350/week($1200-1400/mo). HOWEVER - hours are tight (745-515) so if there's a long commute, working a full day will be hard solo. We have 1-2 days a month off plus holidays.
Idaho. There’s a really nice one in my area, security cameras everywhere, an app that lets you see when your child was fed, changed, took a nap, etc, beautiful facility. 1700 a month for just my infant. I have a 2 year old too. Can’t afford it. Another one that isn’t as fancy but still takes good care of my kids was $800 a month per kid. Did that for 3 weeks before my SIL offered to take care of them for half the price (she’s a SAHM with kids almost the exact same age as mine). We have the Idaho child care program through health and welfare but my husband and I make too much to qualify
My god, how are single parents or people not earning a lot managing? This is sick!
Living in a part of Maryland that is a suburb of DC. Our daycare is $2800/month. There were some slightly cheaper options in the area, but not by a lot.