Here's how finding a babysitter works right now:
You text your group chat at 4pm on a Thursday
Nobody responds for 45 minutes
Someone finally replies "ours is booked sorry 😩"
You open Care.com, remember you cancelled your $40/month subscription, and stare at the ceiling
You text your mom
The Venice Rising babysitter directory
A free, searchable list of babysitters in Venice, Santa Monica, Marina del Rey, Mar Vista, Playa Vista, and West LA where every single sitter has been recommended by at least one local parent.
That's the only rule. No parent vouch, no listing.
What you'll be able to see:
Sitter's first name and last initial
Neighborhoods they cover
Ages they're comfortable with (infant through teens)
Typical availability (weekday, weekend, evenings, overnights)
Hourly rate
Whether they have a car
CPR / First Aid certification
A short bio in their own words
How many local parents have vouched for them
What it costs:
Nothing. Free for parents. Free for sitters. No subscription, no paywall, no app to download. It lives right here on venicerising.com.
We need two things from you
This only works if the community builds it together. We need both parent recommendations AND sitters who want to be listed.
Parents: Recommend your babysitter
Yes, we're asking you to share. We know it's hard. We know you've been protecting that number like it's a family heirloom. But your sitter probably wants more work, and the parent down the street is desperate. Be the hero!
It takes 2 minutes.
Babysitters: Get listed for free
If you sit for families on the westside, this is free exposure to thousands of local parents. You just need one parent who can vouch for you. We'll reach out to them to confirm, and then your listing goes live.
It takes 3 minutes.
How it works behind the scenes
A parent recommends a sitter, or a sitter submits themselves
Every sitter submission requires at least one local parent reference
We reach out to the reference to confirm (a quick "yes, we trust them" is all we need)
Once verified, the sitter goes live on the directory
Parents browse the directory and contact sitters directly — we're the intro, not the middleman
We don't background check, employ, or certify anyone on this list. We verify that at least one parent in our community trusts them with their kids, and we make that information available to everyone. Parents are always responsible for their own vetting — interviews, trial runs, whatever makes you comfortable.
Why we're doing this
Because every parent in Venice has been in the group-chat-panic situation. Because Care.com charges $40/month and you still end up texting your neighbor anyway. Because the best sitter recommendations have always come from other parents — they've just been locked inside private group chats and whispered at school pickup.
The directory will go live once we have enough listings to make it genuinely useful. In the meantime, keep the recommendations coming. Every submission gets us closer!
Questions? Ideas? Know 12 amazing sitters and want to recommend them all? Email us at [email protected].
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