I Wanna Be a SAHM!

Mama:

There is a difference between being a Stay at home Mom and a work from home mom...

A work from home mom is WORKING...I'm not going to pay you to take care of your child or play with your child. I would pay you to WORK and I would expect to see results, not excuses.

You and your husband need to go over your budget, tweak and find what you can afford to live on. If you want to stay home - what would need to happen in the budget to make that a reality?

If you want to be a SAHM? Then you need to put your salary in savings. Seriously learn to live off one income. And if you can't do that for at least six months? Then you aren't in a financial position to stay home. Can you do it? HECK YEAH!! But it will be hard. There will be MANY sacrifices that must be made in order to make it happen.

Maybe your husband needs to polish up his resume and see if he can get a better paying job....maybe you need to go through and see what you can cut out - improve on - couponing - meal planning - cell phone and cable services - so much...you'll find out just what you do not need..and a need is what you MUST have in order to survive...the rest is "want".

If you have a degree in something - maybe you can tutor people? Languages? Tutoring. English? Math? Science?

If you want to be with your child - and earn money - open an in-home day care...

Good luck!

I am probably repeating what someone else said but here goes. This was just asked the other day and is usually asked a few times a month.

First of all, working at home is WORK. No one will pay you to work from home and be with your children.

Most moms who do work from home either do so when the children are in school OR they have the children in daycare. Working from home requires self motivation and self discipline to do to the job at hand. No company wants a client to overhear pets and children in the background during a call.

According to your post, you need your income to remain in a pretty much debt free situation. My suggestion would be for your to bank your entire income and practice living on your husband's income alone. This way you can save for the future with your banked income plus you know what it is like with one income and what adjustments you will have to make in order to maintain it.... such as cutting out things you do not need.

How about apart time job at night or weekends when hubby can watch the children? What are your qualifications? Maybe you can do some consulting on the side.

If you truly "need" both incomes to maintain your situation, then is would not be financially feasible for you to quit your job right now. Think about down the road with college funds, retirement funds, etc.

Good luck

This question was asked just yesterday.

http://www.mamapedia.com/questions/7767272894413144065

I have been a SAHM for 11 years, and I have always worked to supplement my husbands income. I have worked in a grocery store in the evening when my husband was home (and got an employee discount on groceries), I do child care from home (free playmates for my kids) and I work in a child care at a gym (and get a free membership) where I can bring my kids with me, and I work at my kids school.

Even if you are living within your means I bet you can find plenty of ways to save money. First of all by staying at home you will be saving all of your work related expenses, including child care costs, which are usually huge. When I became a SAHM I saved money on groceries, because I had more time to cook from scratch, so I didn't need to waste money on convenience foods. I saved on car insurance because my vehicle could be insured as a pleasure vehicle. I cut out a bunch of extra's, like cable, magazine subscriptions and a cell phone. I looked for inexpensive and free activities to do with my kids. I have yard sales or sell online kids stuff and household items we no longer use. I have more time to shop second hand and sales.

You say you want to stay home but you also say that "my income is important." Do you really need the money or it is nice to have for fun things?

If you want to stay home with your child do that. Do you have a skill, a degree or a craft that you can make money with at home? Try doing that. You have to build up your reputation in order to have in coming in that is legitimate. You have to put in the hard hours to make it go and that does not mean watching baby. So where do you stand with all of this? Are you a professional career person or a mom at heart? If you are a professional, you will put in the hours or change the way things go in order to make it work. If you are a mom at heart, the extra working will not mean the same thing.

Only you know where your heart lies and what you need to do to make it work. But work is work and you have to give it 100% of your attention to make it work.

Good luck to you.

the other S.

PS I am working on a small business when not at work and it is difficult to make it go at times. It is starting to pay off but I still have the laundry and housecleaning that need to be done. I cannot survive on it yet but may in a few more years. My children are grown and on their own but I still have to do the same chores as you for my husband and myself.

Do you need FT income, or would PT suffice? If PT is good enough, how about working retail during your husband's off hours?

As long as you realize that work at home mom's put their kids in child care so they can work a job you'll do fine.

No business will hire you to work at home when children are there. You are on their clock and they expect you to be on the clock. No kids or animals or anything to interfere with your job. It's a job, not paid babysitting for your child.

I don't want to be mean or rude but if there were jobs out there like what you are asking about don't you think we'd all be lining up to apply for them?

So it sort of annoys me when this question is asked several times per week. If you work you have to "be" at work and not taking care of your child.

Stay at work and make an income. If you need the money you need to work. There is nothing wrong with that. If you can find a way for either you or hubby to earn more money then the one that makes the least money can quit work and stay home with the kiddo.

Your only other choice is to work a part time job the hours your hubby is awake at home after he gets off work. You can't work nights because then your day's become your nights and you'll be asleep all day. Again, kiddo goes to child care so you can sleep.

If hubby gets off work at 5 when he gets home you could work 6pm-10pm, 11pm, or even midnight. You can take a nap the same time as kiddo during the day. You could work weekends too. If hubby is off work that is. This way kiddo stays home with one of you or the other. Both of you share the responsibility of raising the kids.

Dad gets to cook, clean, feed the family and put everyone to bed. You gets to do the same but just at different hours.

I would suggust, as others have, taking a part time evening position to supplement. Or, try the in-home daycare option. If you watch 2 other children, you could bring in $100/wk.

I do work from home, and my job has tremendous flexibility, but often tight deadlines. I typically work during my younger baby's nap, while the older "baby" plays by himself. I step out of the office often, and he visits me in there often. I take phone calls when they come, I get up earlier than they do on some mornings to tend to business, and I put in an hour or 2 when my other children get home from school and/or when my husband gets home from work. Most of what I do can be done via email, and that helps. I can talk to the kids while I am working. But it is HARD, and I don't always feel I am doing the best job I can at EITHER job! I am considered part-time, and am expected to be about 20 hrs per week. I also have a degree in my field, so that helps.
I wouldn't trade what I do though, because I AM home. I'm here when they get up, I eat with them, we play, I an=m here when the older ones get home from school, I can attend all games, events for school/sports, etc.

I am burning the candle at both ends sometimes, for sure. But aren't we all?

A way you could experiment with the idea of staying home is continue working, but take your paycheck and put it away in savings. Make a budget on your husband's income and see what you can do away with and what you cannot. Do this for 6 months to a year. You should be able to tell right away if you really rely on your second income or not. If you can swing it, then you will also have a nice chunk of savings put away for an emergency. I use to teach elementary, but became a stay at home mom when my kids came along. My wardrobe is less expensive and luxuries I used to enjoy as a single person/married before children are less frequent, but I would not give up this time with my kids for any material item. Not to insinuate that moms that choose to work are less honorable or noble, you just have to decide which one suits you more. There are lots of part-time positions you can pick up. I know moms that sell baked goods from their homes, fill the magazine racks once a week at local grocery stores, are phone operators for Disney (work from home), medical transcription,data entry (from home), etc. Where there's a will, there's a way! Good luck!
HTH,
A.

There are a lot of ways to decrease what you spend so you can stay at home. It all depends on how bad you want to stay home. My wife and I wanted her to stay at home real bad so she could have children and be a mom to them. (Why have kids to let someone else raise them n day care?)

I know a lady that knows how to bake and decorate cakes. She does that from home on a word of mouth basis. She is a real good cook and has bread and cake recipes that she uses and her baked goods always turn out tasting great. She went to a cake decorating class (or several) and learned how to decorate cakes that also tasted real good. If you don't know how to bake, you can learn.

This lady also makes real good healthy bread. She uses all kinds of healthy ingredients in her bread and bakes them for health conscious friends. You have to learn what healthy is and be able to talk the talk, but her friends love getting her hot-from-the-oven bread. She made enough money she bought a larger than normal oven and cooks several loaves at a time.

Good luck to you and yours.

My friend does medical transcribing. She does it in the evenings after her son is in bed. Now that he is in school she can do some during the day. It is definitely a "supplemental" income, however. Not a main income source. And it does take discipline. It is so easy to do the million other tasks calling you name around the house, but she has to make a schedule and stick to it.

I looked into it and it would not be enough to replace my income (boo - hiss!), but if you can basically get by on your husband's income and just need a little for the "extras" it might be worth looking into.

I think the in home childcare might be your best bet. Or see if you can find someone that will let you babysit at their home and take your child. My cousin found a family with a special needs child right around the age of her infant. They wanted someone with another child to be a playmate and it is working out great. The boys are growing up together and are building a baby friendship (they are still under a year old). This was obviously a very specific situation, but it worked out perfect for her. Maybe look on Craigslist in your area.

maybe watch one or two kids?

Look into becoming a licensed in-home child care provider!

From what I'm hearing, it sound more like you want to be a work from hm mom. My husband hires medical billers who work from home and also medical assistants to do all their work remotely from their home offices (faxes to pharmacies and so forth). He does need them to be at his beck and call in the sense that they need to get faxes out in an hour or two, but they also have some flexibility.
I had a part time business as a fine artist that brought in about $15,000/ year working an average of 10 hours a week. But I was only able to paint while baby napped and when I had a deadline, I had to hire babysitters (shows or commissions). And that was when I had only one. I was unable to continue after the second child because I no longer had nap time. I could have done it with babysitters, but then there was the crash in the economy a while back and I just didn't have the sales to warrant the money spent on babysitters.
There are a lot of nay sayers here. But the truth is, lots of moms run part time businesses with kids. Just don't think you can do 20 or 40 hours from home and do real work without babysitter. You can swing 5-10 hours a week of real work without babysitters and from there, you will need some help.

If you're working from home you won't be spending more time with your little one you will be working and will still need to have someone come in and watch him.
Unless you are doing a home daycare.
You'd be better off taking a part time evening/weekend job. Then you'd have your days at home, you'd still be earning $ and there would be no childcare costs. Win win!

Have you thought about babysitting?

:)

There really isn't any reliable income for stay at home mom jobs. There are ways to make money..blogging etc. But those aren't reliable resources. Now if you have a job already that has a work at home option for that company then you would be a WAHM. But even then you would still have to have a baby sitter of some sort and that kind of defeats your reasoning of wanting to stay home. Being a SAHM is already a full time job....you can't work from home, get things done work wise, have your duties as the stay at home parent AND expect yourself to be able to watch and spend time with your kids. It's a pick one or the other situation. My advice is talk to your husband....he has a say too. Cancel out things you don't need or things that are of lesser value then to you to becoming a stay at home mom.

It would help to know what your field is and what your skills are. There are some decent flexible PT online jobs out there for people with education and skills, but you probably would have to do some preschool or babysitting if the kids aren't school aged (you didn't mention that either). :)

I agree with WW in that there is a difference between SAHM and WAHM. Any company that allows you to work at home still expects productivity as I'm sure you know already. We all want both, but realistically any income takes work and time.

My husband & I worked opposites for years. It really stunk sometimes but I got to stay home during most of the week ( except a few nights, if I picked up a shift), didn't have to pay for childcare, & one of us was always home with the kids.