Preschool childcare costs

KatieandMark06

This is kind of a nosy question (I read a magazine article about this and am now curious) Where do you live and how much do you pay for childcare for your 3-5 year old? 

I live in Kentucky and pay $120 a week for a 40 hour week, but $120 a week covers up to 50 hours of childcare per week.

brownmouse

I am in Portland, Oregon. And well, It really varies here, depending on what kind of care you are looking for. You can definitely find an in-home daycare provider for under $600 a month, but if you want a preschool that has aftercare(like M-F 8-4) you're looking at anywhere from around $800-$1500 a month. I am a university student, and also teach at the Reggio inspired preschool on my campus, so we get a subsidized student rate as well as a scholarship for B because I am in a teaching program, so we only pay $375 a month. But this is NOT the norm. Before the scholarship the rate was $500 per month, and if I didn't get the student subsidized rate it would be almost $1200 a month. And this is pretty typical for the type of school and because it's downtown. We looked at probably fifteen different schools before we enrolled her at the school she is in now (she was on the waitlist from 9 months old and just got in this last September) and not one of them was under $900 per month. I've seen schools that cost as much as $1500-$1700 a month here.

But honestly, this is really affected by the market and cost of living here. the average house price here is upwards of $300,000, and many families have been priced out of the housing market years ago. It's a pretty expensive place to live unless you live in one of the outlying cities/suburbs.

 

LoCarb

Dallas suburb $200/wk includes before and after care.

ETA: I just checked the weekly invoice and it's normally $225 wk + $25 mo for supply fees for DD1. I receive a multi-kid discount -$25 off/wk

honeybee111

OK, I'm jealous.  We are in a HCOL area, and we pay around $1100/month.  DD attends a Montessori preschool full day + 2 hours aftercare.

flyingsaucer

I am in the NYC area (not Manhattan, that would be much more expensive) and the cost for preschool that is open from 8am-6pm $250 per week and that is considers cheap!  I work within the school and get a discount so I only pay about $500 per mo

KL777

I live in the Mid-Atlantic area and for Pre-K with before and after school care it's $110 per week, so one month it may be $550 per month and a shorter week month it will be $440. Spanish is an additional cost.

VTbride05

Central VT... $250+ a week for more daycare than preschool. Might go up for private preschools.

shannm

Our old daycare/preschool was around 260/week and now his preK tuition (before aftercare) is approximately 350/week.   Full time.

bethelon

In Delaware and PreK with no aftercare (8-4pm) is $750/month for us.

segerama

In Ohio, we pay $900 a month for a NAECY daycare/preschool program.  This includes Spanish, music, physical education, sign language, and yoga.  We pay $40-50 a month extra for each extracurricular offered (e.g. ballet, soccer, piano, computer, etc.)

Amymichelle925

We pay $95/week for fulltime daycare.  He goes to preschool 4 mornings a week(within the town school system, so no additional fee).  The school bus picks him up and drops him off at daycare.  Oh, and we live in the middle of nowhere in the midwest.

jallascalla

Yikes, this thread is depressing me. We pay $550 a week for preschool, 9am-4pm 5 days a week. More if we need after care. 

SeasideBride06

We live in a suburb of Birmingham, Alabama.  In our town, the average is $130-$140 a week (5 days a week, 7am-6pm.)

I do have friends that live about 30 minutes away and they pay $1,200 a month for one child...so it can vary around here.

mgrulke

In the DC that I work at in Wisconsin it is $32.30 a full 10 hr day.   

TMWarren85

I'm north of Dallas (suburbs) and I pay $1,000/month for full time Montessori care (DD is almost 4) but it's worth every penny. When DD was an infant she went to an average chain daycare and should we have stuck around we would be looking at $180/week now. It all depends on where you go- 

Also- we lived in Chicago suburbs for a year and it was $1,450/month for a mid-level daycare. 

krusso511

In Los Angeles, I pay 500 dollars per month for M-F 8-5 care. Private preschool.

auburnbride2be

I live in a suburb of Atlanta. Full time is about $190-225 per week. Part time is about $150-200 per week. Not much savings.

jlw2505

I am in MN and my kids are no longer in daycare but we had them at a daycare center which is where their preschool was located.  They went full time (40 or so hours a week) Monday - Friday.  The cost included all food (even formula for infants) so the only thing you had to provide was diapers for those that needed.  Cost was around $900 a month (I paid around $10K a year per child).  My older DD is in a PreK program this year at the elementary school which has the same hours as the daycare center and also covers all food and field trips and we pay $904 a month.  MN is one of the most expensive states for daycare in the US though.

AmericanInOz

I live in Sydney, Australia

dd's daycare/preschool is $95 a day - but the goverment pays half - so it's $48 out of my pocket I have a friend who pays $70 a day (totaly cost $140) in a more popular area !!

 That's usually for 7:30am - 6pm, catered meals, drinks & diapers (although we don't need those anymore) all included

melody921

We're in Pennsylvania. Our rate for DS now that he turned 3 is $165 a week. But we get another $15 off of that since we have two kids at the center. That is for 50 hours a week.