15 Great Jobs for Stay-at-Home Moms and Dads

Stay-at-home parenting is like a full-time job—except you’re paid in cuddles (and tantrums) instead of cash. Unfortunately snuggles don’t pay the bills. Fortunately however, there are plenty of fantastic jobs for stay-at-home moms and dads.

These 15 jobs offer legitimate work options for caregivers looking to work from home with kids around. They’re flexible, remote, and helpful for parents hoping to make some extra money without sacrificing quality time with the kiddos.

1. Online tutor

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From teaching English to helping students ace high school chemistry, plenty of job options are available in the world of online tutoring. Freelance tutors may be hired by parents, students, schools, and third-party organizations charged with assisting student academic performance. Whether you have subject-specific expertise or have first-hand experience helping your own kids prepare for important tests, any love of teaching makes this a great remote job choice.

Online tutor rates typically range from $20 to $40 per hour.

Find tutoring jobs on Upwork

2. Freelance writer

Freelance writers offer their expertise in storytelling, writing, and editing to deliver content such as blogs, articles, press releases, and white papers. If you have a way with words, can articulate a message with impact for a variety of audiences, and can communicate well with potential clients, you may have what it takes to become a freelance writer. You may also want to consider related jobs such as proofreading or editing.

Freelance writer rates often range from $30 to $60 per hour.

Find freelance writing jobs on Upwork

3. Virtual assistant

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Virtual assistants are administrative professionals who help business owners and teams with administrative tasks. Depending on your area of expertise, virtual assistant tasks may include maintaining calendars, data entry, email marketing, social media management, event planning, managing meetings, and more. 

Virtual assistant rates may range from $10 to $20 per hour. 

Find virtual assistant jobs on Upwork

4. Social media manager

A freelance social media manager is responsible for the marketing components of a company's presence on social media platforms. This includes content creation, placement, and promotion of social media posts, and audience engagement.

If you have a knack for leveraging content and driving engagement, and you live and breathe social media, this may be the right work-from-home job option for you. 

Freelance social media manager rates can range from $14 to $35 per hour.

Find social media management jobs on Upwork

5. Customer service representative

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Whether via phone, email, or live chat, customer support representatives must be able to respond to questions and complaints in a friendly and professional manner. These problem solvers can address customer concerns in real time, helping people around the world with everything from billing and shipping errors to clothing returns or technical issues.

If you have great communication skills and like helping people solve problems, then a remote job as a customer service rep may be ideal for you.

Remote customer service representative rates typically range from $10 to $20 per hour.

Find remote customer services jobs on Upwork

6. Online coach or consultant

Many stay-at-home parents develop various skills along their parenting journey. This may include skills involved in setting up a successful business or, perhaps, fitness skills from your own health journey. As a coach, you can offer others your expertise and insights to help them through their own journey—whether it’s business or life.

One of the easiest ways to get started in your coaching and consulting journey is to offer paid consultations on Upwork.

The amount you can earn as a coach or consultant varies based on your area of expertise. For example, a life coach can earn between $50 and $250 per hour. Business coach rates may range from $75 to $150 per hour. 

Find consultant jobs on Upwork

7. Pet sitter

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If you love pets, you may want to consider starting a pet sitting business in your home! Apps like Rover allow you to connect with pet owners in your area who need someone to watch their dog or cat for anywhere from a few hours to several weeks. And if you aren’t able to host a pet in your home, you can also offer drop-in pet visits or daily walking services. 

The amount you earn as a pet sitter will depend on the kind of service you offer, the pet’s needs, and the time of year (many pet sitters charge extra during peak times like New Year’s Eve). Pet sitters on Rover keep 80% of their hourly fee.

8. Prompt engineer

Freelance prompt engineers are in-demand professionals who help clients get better results from generative AI tools. You may work with a small business owner who needs help building a custom chatbot to create social media content, or a large company interested in leveraging an AI API as part of their internal tech stack. You don’t need to know how to code in order to be a prompt engineer, but you do need to be familiar with how generative AI platforms work! 

A number of free online courses are available to help you learn AI as a beginner. You can also hone your skills with the help of our AI glossary and guide to writing ChatGPT prompts.

According to ZipRecruiter, prompt engineers make an average salary of $71 per hour.

Find freelance prompt engineering jobs on Upwork 

9. SEO specialist

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An SEO specialist helps small and large businesses get more traffic via search engines like Google. Some SEO specialists focus on how a website is set up and the content on every page, making sure it aligns with specific keywords and best practices. Other SEO freelancers work to get websites to link to their client’s site, or focus on the back-end side of things—often involving code like JavaScript. This creates lots of opportunities for both creative and technical professionals to build a career in SEO. 

Many SEO freelancers' rates range from $15 to $35 per hour.

Find SEO jobs on Upwork

10. Data annotator

Data annotators are an important part of machine learning and artificial intelligence projects. They may label text, audio, video, and image files with keywords and labels about what the file contains. This labeled information is then used as part of a supervised machine learning process, where AI professionals train an algorithm to recognize similarities in new data sets. Without the work of data annotators, we wouldn’t have as many useful AI applications as we do today! 

According to Salary.com, many data annotators’ rates are between $16 and $33 per hour.

Find data annotation jobs on Upwork

11. Recipe writer

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A recipe writer (also known as a recipe developer) comes up with new recipes for restaurants, food bloggers, culinary magazines, and more. In this role, you could find yourself creating a new recipe every week for an ongoing client or preparing an entire cookbook’s worth of recipes. You don’t need to be a professional chef, either—as long as you have good cooking skills, you can find work developing recipes across a variety of cuisines. You may find you have some eager taste-testers at home, too! 

Salary.com reports that food writers earn an average of $23 per hour.

Find freelance recipe writer jobs on Upwork

12. Notary Public

A notary public is someone who acts as a neutral witness during the signing of sensitive documents like house deeds, car titles, wills, business agreements, and more. Many notaries operate out of a home office, remotely via Zoom calls or on the go as a mobile notary. The ways in which you can provide your notary services (and how you can become licensed as a notary) vary based on your location.

For example, in the United States and Australia, anyone can go through the process to become a notary, and they cannot offer legal advice. But notaries in China can offer legal consultations—and in Mexico, only a licensed attorney can become a notary! 

Notary work is very flexible, though the amount you can charge may be dictated by your local government. The National Notary Association reports that in the U.S., nearly 30% of all part-time mobile notaries earn at least $1,000 per month.

‍Find remote notary public jobs on Upwork

13. Graphic designer

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Graphic designers are talented artists who may work in a variety of formats, designing everything from print magazine covers to social media graphics or soda can labels. If you’ve always enjoyed drawing or have had an interest in digital art, you may find that a career in graphic design is the perfect way to use your talents while working from home. 

And if you find there’s a particular type of design that you like best, you can focus on just that—there are plenty of logo designers, packaging designers, and even t-shirt designers working on Upwork right now.

Many freelance graphic designers’ rates range from $15 to $35 per hour.

Find graphic design jobs on Upwork or create a Project Catalog™ listing now

14. Bookkeeper

Bookkeepers help their clients stay on top of business finances by organizing expense deductions, reconciling accounts, creating balance sheets, running payroll, monitoring accounts payable and receivable, and more. You don’t need to be a professional accountant to be a bookkeeper, either. If you’ve been managing your family’s budget successfully for years (and enjoying the process), then you may enjoy helping other freelancers and business owners get their books in order as well. 

To hit the ground running as a freelance bookkeeper, though, you’ll want to be familiar with accounting software like Quickbooks, as well as key financial terms like normal balance of accounts.  

Many bookkeepers’ rates range from $11 to $25 per hour.

Find freelance bookkeeping jobs on Upwork

15. Online seller

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Creating an online storefront is another way to bring in income on a part-time basis. Consider a few different avenues to becoming a successful online seller, including:

• Reselling your own items on sites like Poshmark
• Turning your passion for art and design into an Etsy business
• Selling digital products in a store that you create with a website builder
• Dropshipping items for your own Shopify boutique
• Refurbishing electronics to resell on Ebay

The income you generate from your work as an online seller will depend on what kinds of items you sell, and at what volume. If you’re successful, though, you could build an additional revenue stream as an e-commerce consultant. According to Salary.com, the average E-commerce consultant earns $30 per hour. 

Find E-commerce consultant jobs on Upwork

How to find your ideal job as a stay-at-home parent

All of these opportunities are exciting. But how exactly do you find the right work-at-home job that allows you to balance your parenting responsibilities with your work?

1. Identify your skills and interests

The first step to finding any job is identifying where your skills and interests lie. Define what you know, what you don't know, and what you're best at doing. Knowing your strengths and weaknesses can help you choose work you’re likely to complete quickly and well. 

These don’t have to be skill sets you’ve used in paid work, either. As a parent, you’ve gained experience in things like calendar management, budgeting, teaching, communications, and being detail-oriented. And if you’ve ever volunteered—whether at the local food bank or your kids’ schools—you may realize you have additional experience as a people manager, project manager, public relations specialist, consultant, customer service representative, seller, spokesperson, web designer, copywriter, and more! 

Next, think about the industry you work in (or want to work in), whether it's finance, videography, or nearly anything else, and the type of work you enjoy most; this could be your specialty.

Pro tip: Check out the top in-demand skills in every industry that clients on Upwork are looking for right now.

2. Research job platforms

Once you’ve identified your skills and interests, you’ll need to do some research. Check out platforms like LinkedIn and Upwork to get an idea of the types of flexible, work-from-home jobs available to parents like yourself. Be sure to also check out salaries or hourly rates so you know what you can expect to get paid by clients. (Sites like Salary.com, Payscale, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics are all great places to find this information.)

You may also find these resources helpful for more insights: 

• How Much Can Freelancers Make?
• The Highest-Paying Freelance Jobs
• Is Upwork Worth It? Pros, Cons, and Top Tips from Freelancers
• Freelance Rate Calculator

3. Build a strong resume or portfolio

As you get ready to start looking for work, you’ll need to start putting together your job search tools such as your resume, a cover letter and even a portfolio if your field requires one.

Not sure where to start or how to create a resume? Check out our advice for stay-at-home mom resumes, including templates you can use to create your own. You can also use a resume builder to help you get started, or hire a freelance resume writer for more personalized guidance.

4. Network with other professionals

Not all jobs are advertised, though. Sometimes, finding great work-at-home opportunities may not come from spending hours on job boards. Instead, finding work can be about who you know. Start networking with people in your immediate and extended circle as you begin to look for suitable work.

Networking is a crucial aspect of the job search puzzle. This step can also be important and very useful if you’re attempting a career change and looking for work in a new field or industry. Your personal or professional contacts may give you a job referral that could help you break into a brand-new career.

5. Figure out your preferred work schedule

For most stay-at-home moms and dads, being able to work on a flexible schedule is the biggest benefit of working from home. You can work around your child’s nap schedules, sicknesses, or even work late nights if that’s what suits your family best.

Margareth Claire Espero is a great example of someone who created the ideal schedule for her family. She decided to work with clients in time zones other than the one she lives in, as this allows her to focus on being a mom during the day—then transition to her work as a freelance business consultant at night, once her kids are asleep. She creates a clear separation between her professional and personal life, and makes sure to focus on her and her family’s well-being above all else. 

I myself have worked from home for almost 10 years. However, since coming back to work after my maternity leave, I’ve become more grateful for remote work. I’ve learned there are so many wonderful benefits of being able to work from home with a baby to care for! 

Remote work allows my husband and me to tag team on child care while the other works. We both work from home full time and this has allowed us so much time in these early days with our son. It’s a lot of juggling and the days often feel chaotic. But the flexibility of our work-from-home jobs has allowed us to be so present with our baby. 

Find great freelance jobs for stay-at-home moms and dads

A remote job that allows you to work from home while also staying present as a parent is the ultimate win-win for stay-at-home moms and dads. You can work on your own schedule (or your kids’), make extra income, and spend quality time with your children. Online jobs are wonderful for work-life balance, whether you’re looking for a full-time job or a side hustle.

Whether you’re interested in virtual assistance, bookkeeping, or freelance writing, the world of flexible jobs is your oyster. Excited to get started? Upwork is the world’s human and AI-powered work marketplace where stay-at-home parents can find a variety of remote jobs. You can use the search engine to look for part-time jobs or freelance projects that suit your needs. Or, if you prefer, plenty of full-time jobs are offered as well. Sign up for a freelancer account on Upwork and kick off your search for a new job today.

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