How to find a babysitter in Montreal?

February 16, 2016 9:30 AM

We need occasional evening babysitting in Montreal for our two daughters aged 2 and 6. In the past, I have always found babysitters through recommendations of family and friends, but we know almost no one in the city and so don't have a good network to draw on.

There are some daycares and gyms that offer evening group babysitting and, while that seems lovely, it appears to be only on Fridays. The two options I've been able to find for midweek babysitting so far are craigslist/kijiji and using paid services like care.ca or sositter.ca which require $100+ sign up fees. Craigslist seems sketchy and the other option seems like a lot of money without a lot of extra guarantee of non-sketchiness.

We are planning to invite these people into our home and leave our children in their care. This seems like a very high bar of trust to reach in a stranger. Also, while our house is not exactly the Louvre, we do have some valuables that we would like to be secure in not having to particularly hide.

How does one find a reliable babysitter in a new city? Or, even better, any Montreal mefites want to MeMail me some babysitter recommendations?

posted by 256 to Human Relations (8 answers total)

Do you have nextdoor? It's a neighborhood-area news and classifieds group, with members vetted by zip code or personal invitation from another neighbor. Our group had lots of nannies, nanny shares, and neighborhood kids offering services.

I wasn't a fan of the group as a whole (some of the politics and neighborhood watch-type posts were too vitriolic for me) but I found it useful for services and classifieds.
posted by stillmoving at 9:52 AM on February 16, 2016

Is there a before and after care at your child's school? Those workers might be interested.
posted by k8t at 9:54 AM on February 16, 2016

I found great sitters by posting for childcare on our local university job board and specifying ECE (early childhood education). We got several "dear sir/madam" replies and a few wildly unsuited résumés but of the three or four people we interviewed, two were great and one is like a family member now. We did one or two trial sits with candidates while I was home so I could see how they interacted with the kids.
posted by lizifer at 9:59 AM on February 16, 2016

I would put up a sign at Vanier, which has a well-regarded ECE programme with students who are dedicated.
posted by jeather at 10:01 AM on February 16, 2016 [1 favorite]

Gotta get bold about asking everybody in your social networks: parents at the 6-year-old's school, the 6-year-old's teacher or classroom teaching assistant, your work colleagues, spouse's work colleagues, people who live in your building/on your street, on Facebook to connect to friends of friends.
posted by BlahLaLa at 10:02 AM on February 16, 2016

Whoever you end up with, we found that most good babysitters are 12-14 years old. By the time they hit 15/16 they end up with a more active social life + school and part-time "real" jobs. The key is to get recommendations from your current sitters for future ones.
posted by morspin at 1:44 PM on February 16, 2016

We use local teenagers. Most schools offer babysitter training programs for grade 6 kids so there are usually lots of them available. The best way to find them is to talk to other families in your neighbourhood at the school, daycare, park, skating rink, library etc.

More and more schools have informal Facebook pages for parents - you might do a search and see if you can come up with some and post queries there. Some CPE educators moonlight as sitters - if you can get someone to answer the phone at your local CPE you might have luck, but you'll pay a lot more per hour as they are professionals. You can also try your local CEGEP. Try and get in touch with someone at student services and ask about job postings. Where in Mtl are you? If it happens to be in my area I can give you some names but the sitters we use are young so they don't travel far away from the block.
posted by Cuke at 7:54 PM on February 16, 2016

I think I paid $40 for a month of care.ca but maybe it is more in Montreal than Ottawa? It was worth what I paid. I interviewed about 10 potential sitters and found four that I like.

Otherwise, you just have to ask people you come into contact with at your kid's activities.
posted by betsybetsy at 5:10 PM on February 17, 2016