DSM Metro Daycare Costs

JP4CY

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Our in-home does not charge us for days she is on vacation, or sick. We also do not pay if we go on vacation, up to two weeks a year.

$20 a day per kid, except that the older is in preschool now so we only pay $10 a day for his half day.
At those rates I have some questions.
Is this State approved?
They paying taxes/or is this under the table?
CPR trained?
How many kids?
Good and healthy meals?

I mean, props to you for that rate if it is all going well.
 

AgronAlum

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Jul 12, 2014
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Daycare in ankeny is enough that my wife’s net income minus gas and daycare would have been a couple hundred a month at a 40 hour a week job. It just didn’t make any sense for her to keep working.

We’ve been looking at her doing an in home the last couple months. She had a couple people interested but they ultimately ended up at centers. The last one actually had a start date and then backed out a week later.

Side note. If anyone needs daycare in NW Ankeny, shoot me a PM. Includes transportation to and from Westwood.
 

vortec22

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At those rates I have some questions.
Is this State approved?
They paying taxes/or is this under the table?
CPR trained?
How many kids?
Good and healthy meals?

I mean, props to you for that rate if it is all going well.

Yes, state approved and inspected. She is CPR trained, there are 6 kids most of the time, and at least 2 adults all times. We provide diapers, everything else is provided. She has a state provided dietitian help with meal planning.

Also, her husband is a nurse at the VA hospital and is around most days.

It has been great for us and my kids love it. I guess that is an advantage of being in a small town.
 
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JP4CY

I'm Mike Jones
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Yes, state approved and inspected. She is CPR trained, there are 6 kids most of the time, and at least 2 adults all times. We provide diapers, everything else is provided. She has a state provided dietitian help with meal planning.

Also, her husband is a nurse at the VA hospital and is around most days.

It has been great for us and my kids love it. I guess that is an advantage of being in a small town.
Man, that's a bargain. Seriously.
 

cowgirl836

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Daycare in ankeny is enough that my wife’s net income minus gas and daycare would have been a couple hundred a month at a 40 hour a week job. It just didn’t make any sense for her to keep working.

We’ve been looking at her doing an in home the last couple months. She had a couple people interested but they ultimately ended up at centers. The last one actually had a start date and then backed out a week later.

Side note. If anyone needs daycare in NW Ankeny, shoot me a PM. Includes transportation to and from Westwood.


Don't forget to consider health insurance (if she carried it), 401k, raises, and ease of re-entry in these cases.
 

cowgirl836

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At those rates I have some questions.
Is this State approved?
They paying taxes/or is this under the table?
CPR trained?
How many kids?
Good and healthy meals?

I mean, props to you for that rate if it is all going well.


yeah what they pay for the $20 kid per month is not far off what I pay..........a week.
 

tim_redd

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The social aspect and immune system points are two that get over-looked a bunch. Friends of ours took their daughter to a home day care. They would make little comments about not having to take days off due to their daughter being sick like we did. Once they hit kindergarten, their kiddo was constantly coming home with something. It sucks to see kids sick, but they need to be subjected to some of it.

We really benefited from a center because it helped my daughter understand what was appropriate behavior when it comes to things like lining up for lunch, respecting other children's things and personal space, as well as being on a more class-room style of time schedule. My daughter also interacted with some special needs children. It did a lot of good for her to have that interaction as early as possible. It allowed a safe environment to ask questions and become more understanding of others. She also learned not to take some things for granted.

I don't want to paint with a broad brush. There are some fantastic educators running home day cares. There are also some horrible people in daycare centers (those stories piss me off).

We were limited by not having family around us to help out and not really knowing a good home day care provider near us. It was a ton of money, but I'm not sure I would have made a different decision looking back on things if I had other options.
Totally agree with all of this. My kid has been in a bad center, ok in-home, and now a good center. It's a little more money but has definitely been worth it.
 

AgronAlum

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Don't forget to consider health insurance (if she carried it), 401k, raises, and ease of re-entry in these cases.

We did the math 18 different ways. She didn’t have a retirement plan and I carry the insurance. We looked at random hours part time and full time but the math just didn’t work. Her boss would have (and still would) take her back at basically any hour amount she wanted. It just doesn’t make any sense to be away from home 160 hours a month for a couple hundred dollars. The math gets worse at fewer hours because of the increase for part time daycare.
 
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mywayorcyway

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And no one also said you had to put your kids through college. My parents helped a fair amount, but I also applied for every scholarship I could, worked on paid internships/summer jobs and had cattle as well. My wife had zero support from her parents, which she worked her butt off through college. She had her loans paid off 4-5 years out of college.

I applaud you for helping them, but I also don't feel it should be completely paid for, what does that exactly teach them?

My story was similar to yours, but I graduated 20 years ago. I worked about 20 hours/week most of my time at ISU and had student loans. I didn't know how to look for scholarships or really how it even worked. My parents paid my apartment rent, I paid for the rest.

I paid off my student loans when I was 27 and I while I remember being diligent about it, I don't remember putting that much effort into it. I believe I had $23k in loans when I graduated. I lived like a typical college student and never bought anything "nice".

That same approach wouldn't work today. My loans would have been significantly higher and it would have taken me much longer to pay them off. College costs A LOT more today than it did then.

I don't know that giving money to your children to go to college teaches them any less than having kids be stuck behind a wall of debt once they graduate. If a kid is well adjusted and understands why they're at school, are getting the grades AND understands their parents are forking out a lot of cash, it would be great to have that head start on adult life.

If I had $70k in loans when I graduated instead of $23k, my financial situation would be completely different today than it is. I'm thankful for what my parents gave me, and would be even more thankful if they had paid for most/all of it.
 

cytor

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After reading several posts (all good takes), it appears that if you can put a kid thru daycare, you can put a kid through college (in state).

$300 per week x 52 weeks = $15,600. How much is instate tuition at ISU currently?
 
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BCClone

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Not exactly sure.
After reading several posts (all good takes), it appears that if you can put a kid thru daycare, you can put a kid through college (in state).

$300 per week x 52 weeks = $15,600. How much is instate tuition at ISU currently?

Figure Yearly: 10K tuition and fees, 10k room and board, 1k books and misc. I will spend about 21k
 

SWCy13

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Daycare is ridiculous everywhere. We take our kids to a center in Decorah and it's $350 per week for 2 kids, which doesn't include food, diapers, etc. That's in a smaller town with limited employment opportunity. In home is much cheaper up here but finding somebody decent that has availability is borderline impossible.
 

JY07

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$284 / week for an infant in Ankeny (daycare center) - includes diapers + food
 

NickTheGreat

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Our center was just a hair over $300 per week per kid for infants. Goes down a bit as they get older.

Maybe I try to justify it to myself, but we have a friend paying a little more than half that at an in-home. It seems like they basically just watch TV all day and play the rest. Our kids could write their names by age 3, it seemed like.
 

coolerifyoudid

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At those rates I have some questions.
Is this State approved?
They paying taxes/or is this under the table?
CPR trained?
How many kids?
Good and healthy meals?

I mean, props to you for that rate if it is all going well.

At that rate, I'd have expected them to put about 12 kids in a 10x10 room and have them fight Hunger Games-style over a bag of goldfish.
 

BCClone

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Not exactly sure.
Mine went up yearly. Can't remember the exact amount but thinking somewhere around $300/kid/month. We had to supply everything, including milk, occasional snack type stuff. We felt bad so we would buy a new highchair when our kid needed one or a walker and just donated it. My wife's mom was pretty flexible with the payments also.

EDIT: Forgot that we had to find daycare for Thursdays, so I would get up at 4 in the morning and do some and then go back at 6 pm until whenever to finish and they kids would be with me otherwise. When the kids got older, I could take them with me on a few smaller runs and call them field trips.
 

cowgirl836

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We did the math 18 different ways. She didn’t have a retirement plan and I carry the insurance. We looked at random hours part time and full time but the math just didn’t work. Her boss would have (and still would) take her back at basically any hour amount she wanted. It just doesn’t make any sense to be away from home 160 hours a month for a couple hundred dollars. The math gets worse at fewer hours because of the increase for part time daycare.


Just tossing it out there because I see a lot of people look at the take home only and not consider the other stuff.
 
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cowgirl836

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Our center was just a hair over $300 per week per kid for infants. Goes down a bit as they get older.

Maybe I try to justify it to myself, but we have a friend paying a little more than half that at an in-home. It seems like they basically just watch TV all day and play the rest. Our kids could write their names by age 3, it seemed like.


yeah I pay out the nose but there is no tv and no baby containers in any of the rooms. Meaning stuff like bouncers, high chairs - babies are only in cribs for nap time. I don't worry that they leave them in the car seat all day like has happened to a family member recently.
 
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