Long Island parents are paying $20 to $30 per hour for a babysitter as rates climb

When Regine Charles and her husband, Barton Doricent, of Port Jefferson Station, go out for a three-hour date night, they know they’ll drop $100 for the babysitter before they even spend a penny on their outing.

The couple has 1-year-old twins, and their sitter charges $23 an hour. "As soon as you’re coming in with twins, $23 is really the cheapest," says Charles, 40, a medical biller. On top of that, she usually also offers the sitter dinner, which is another $25 for delivery.

Parents looking for date-night babysitters on Long Island would be lucky to pay per hour rates that start with a 1, parents say. The going rate is at least $20 an hour; more if the sitter is watching more than one child. It’s not unheard of to pay $25 or more, they say.

According to the website UrbanSitter, which tracks and analyzes babysitting costs in metropolitan areas nationwide, costs vary widely, ranging from $19 to $29 depending on location, with bigger cities such as New York City, for instance, clocking in at an average of $26.03 per hour for one child and $28.77 for two children as of January.

Of the 30 cities surveyed, only three had averages lower than $20 to watch one child, according to Urban Sitter. Rates rose by 4.9% in the past year, outstripping inflation, UrbanSitter reports.

The cost of sitters on Long Island makes it a challenge to fund date nights or break nights, parents say, lamenting that it's tough to even find a high school student who might babysit for less than a college student or adult. Some libraries on Long Island offer babysitter training classes for teenagers, and even they expect to be paid at least $15 an hour, says Colleen Navins, teen services coordinator for the Smithtown Library.

‘NEVER HAD A FAMILY DO LESS’

Kayla Rooney, 23, of Sound Beach, babysits to earn money as she’s working on her master’s in adolescent education at SUNY Old Westbury. "I would say the standard of most families is $20 an hour," Rooney says. "I’ve never had a family do less."

She says sometimes sitters will charge more for families with more than one child, for children who are particularly difficult behaviorally or to sit for children who have different abilities or needs. Sometimes hourly rates also rise in the summer, when there is even more demand, especially in the Hamptons, she says.

When we got out to dinner, we have to factor that cost in. It you want a nice, relaxing dinner, it’s easily $100 in child care.

- Kami Walker, 48, of Port Jefferson

Kami Walker, 48, of Port Jefferson, who co-founded a company that helps parents prepare for au pairs, says she pays $25 an hour for a sitter who is a woman about 50 years old to watch her two children, who are now 12 and 14. College students can be less expensive, she says, but not by much. "When we got out to dinner, we have to factor that cost in," she says. "It you want a nice, relaxing dinner, it’s easily $100 in childcare."

That’s if families can find a sitter, parents say.

"I wish I could find a high school kid. That’s how I started," Charles says. Maybe then she could pay a little less, she says.

‘PARENTS ARE TIRED’

"It’s a nightmare," says Zoila Darton, 41, an entrepreneur from Laurel on the North Fork, who often relies on her mother-in-law to babysit. She has two children, Dakota, 8, and Stazie, 3.

"There are no more kid babysitters anymore," Darton says. "I’m not sure why that is. I was babysitting when I was 15, 16 years old. I really believe getting more high school kids into the babysitting workplace will help." Darton is trying to launch an app called Titi — Spanish slang for "aunt" — to help parents on Long Island find sitters. "It’s kind of like a dating app for parents and caregivers."

She says she finds that parents go out — but separately, so that the other parent can watch the children. Couples need to be able to go out together to recharge their relationships without having to spend an untenable amount on babysitting on top of all the other costs of raising children on Long Island, she says. "Parents are tired. They are so tired. Every single day we’re hit with something new," she says.

‘DON’T HAVE THE VILLAGE’

Thais Gaspard, 38, of Roosevelt, a high school dean in Brooklyn, says she agrees with the importance of having date nights with her husband, Randall, 41, a claims adjuster. "If we’re not healthy, it’s going to affect the kids," Gaspard says of their relationship.

They have a 5-year-old, a 4-year-old, and a baby on the way. That’s in addition to their 18-year-old son. She says that things were easier for her when her 18-year-old was young and she could rely more on family members to babysit for him.

"As you get older, your family gets older. We don’t have the village we had with my oldest," Gaspard says. She says she can’t expect her 18-year-old to babysit all the time. "I don’t believe in parentizing my child," she said. Even when they do rely on him, they pay him, she said.

She hires babysitters that charge $22 an hour to watch the youngest two if she and her husband, a claims adjuster, go out. Her regular sitters have included a 19 year old and a 60 year old, depending on which is available on the nights she needs help.

"Between the younger one and the older one, they provided different things for my boys," Gaspard says of her two regular sitters. The younger one provides more structure, she says. "The older one gives them that Grandma love."

But the younger sitter recently raised her rate — to $25 an hour, Gaspard says.