How much to pay 12 yr old to mow our lawn?

[Catholic90]

Does this young man have his own insurance and licensing? If not, then check with your homeowner’s insurance policy. Are you liable for any injuries that may incur if this young man has an accident on your property while mowing? And do you have worker’s comp? Finally, are you responsible for withholding any of that money for tax purposes?

Yes, I know some may think I am being silly, but I am not. In this litigious age, you need to check these things out.

Liability insurance should cover anything (everybody should have liability insurance.).

Tax? Pay cash!

For heaven’s sake, he’s an ambitious 12 year old! Encourage him! My 12 year old mows neighbors’ lawns for $20. He uses our equipment and trims. The yards are about 1/3 of an acre.

The best marketing my boys do is to take a cooler of lemonade and lawn chairs on a really hot day. They find neighbors who are mowing, set up ‘camp’, sip their lemonade and watch the neighbors. They offer the neighbor that s/he can trade places, they can sip lemonade, and my boys will mow. It’s cute!

 

[Convert_in_99]

Liability insurance should cover anything (everybody should have liability insurance.).

Tax? Pay cash!

For heaven’s sake, he’s an ambitious 12 year old! Encourage him! My 12 year old mows neighbors’ lawns for $20. He uses our equipment and trims. The yards are about 1/3 of an acre.

The best marketing my boys do is to take a cooler of lemonade and lawn chairs on a really hot day. They find neighbors who are mowing, set up ‘camp’, sip their lemonade and watch the neighbors. They offer the neighbor that s/he can trade places, they can sip lemonade, and my boys will mow. It’s cute!

Aww…that is sweet…and VERY creative. They are future salesmen, no? That’s so precious!

 

[Cat]

Thank goodness he’s twelve.

I just heard on TV this morning that the National Association of Pediatricians is saying that 12 is the absolute minimum age to be allowed to mow the lawn.

We live in the Midwest, about 65 miles west of Chicago, and for years we’ve had a high school boy do our very large lawn and paid $30. It’s cheap compared to the professionals, which charge around $40 for a small lawn. We just aren’t home enough to mow it ourselves. We should have moved into a condo.

This year his rates went up to $35 mainly because of the increase in the cost of gas (not only for his mower, but for his car to drive around town.). Everyone’s rates went up though, not just his.

 

[bear06]

Doesn’t it seem ironic that we pay kids who are not legally able to get a minimum wage job $10 an hour and they don’t even pay taxes out of that?! We pay our daughter $5 to do our lawn and she uses our mower and gas and it doesn’t even take an hour. 1/2 tops so, in reality, she’s still getting about $l0. After the lawn, any outside chores she takes on are $5 per hour. I don’t want her to suddenly wake up and realize that she’s getting the more than she could mowing lawns than if she got a real job. The same goes for babysitting. I don’t let her charge as much as the kids I used to pay. What can I say? I’m tough.

If anyone is interested, there’s a really good book called Capitalism for Kids. I highly recommend it.

 

[Jay2]

It had to happen… welcome to the 2000’s…

Does this young man have his own insurance and licensing? If not, then check with your homeowner’s insurance policy.

A kid wants to make a few bucks by cutting some grass (or shoveling some snow), and out come the lawyers!

At 12, NO, the kid cannot possess insurance and a license (?? is there a regulating commission for grass cutting?) HE’S TWELVE!

If the same kid stumbles on your front step on his way to asking “Can Jimmy come out & play”… and cracks his head, you are as liable as if the Postman or an aluminum siding guy tripped and hurt himself.

So much for “free enterprise” and a kid wanting to earn a new skateboard… enter the lawyers!

Funny you bring up babysitting… Just yesterday BOTH my kids pulled some emergency duty. Two of our neighborhood families were in a jam, and called.

Standard rate is $5hr, $1hr more for each add’l kid. BOTH of these families offered $10 hr… “Could you PLEEEEZZZZEEE help us out!”. My kids had nothing going on, and jumped at the chance to make $60 & $80 respectively!

Doesn’t it seem ironic that we pay kids who are not legally able to get a minimum wage job $10 an hour and they don’t even pay taxes out of that?!

I say let 'em earn whatever they can while they can! … they have the rest of their lives to pay taxes!

 

[Mac6yver]

I agree that the idea of a child having insurance is crazy. He is a kid trying to earn some money. How harsh can you be? We want kids to learn how to be responsible, and earning their own money is a good way. Don’t ruin it for them. Should we have health inspectors check every lemonade stand they see?

Anyways, I would say $20. $15 minimum. I couldn’t get a professional to do it for less then $40, so I think it is a fair price.

 

[mamacita]

How big is your yard?? Push mower or rider? Trimming or no?

**If small yard, no trimming, I would say $10 but if the he is trimming $15, and if the yard is big then I would say $20…my opinion **

 

[mozier]

I agree that the idea of a child having insurance is crazy. He is a kid trying to earn some money. How harsh can you be? We want kids to learn how to be responsible, and earning their own money is a good way. Don’t ruin it for them. Should we have health inspectors check every lemonade stand they see?

You just may need to do so. If your children serve a beverage to someone at a sidewalk stand, and the customer later claims to have suffered severe “pain and discomfort” from the drink, you can be sure that you the parents will be buried in litigation, not to mention the county, the city, the state, and whomever else is supposed to license the serving of beverages in your area.

Please keep in mind that I am not trying to discourage the free enterprise of a young man and ruin it for him, but neither am I going overboard here. We live in a lawsuit-crazy society, and if you hire this young man to do work on your property and something unfortunate happens, you can be sure that the lawyers will come out of the woodwork. You must keep this in mind.

And the parents of the young man, who may be “normal” people otherwise, may suddenly turn into great opportunists when they start hearing “cha-ching!”

I am sorry, and I do agree that it is stupid, but that is the way our society is now. This is yet another reason why I believe we are living in the end times.

 

[CCM08]

Does this young man have his own insurance and licensing? If not, then check with your homeowner’s insurance policy. Are you liable for any injuries that may incur if this young man has an accident on your property while mowing? And do you have worker’s comp? Finally, are you responsible for withholding any of that money for tax purposes?

Yes, I know some may think I am being silly, but I am not. In this litigious age, you need to check these things out.

12 year olds do not have insurance or bonding. As the boy is not working in a commerical capcity a general home owners policy would be in effect. However, if he is using his own equipment they wouldn’t be liable for injury as his own equipment caused the injurty, not their property. Obviously they don’t pay into worker’s comp type programs, they aren’t an employer. As the boy is an independant contractor executing a job they do not have to withhold any money. Nor can they garnish his wages in case a past client was disstatisifed with boy scout labor and sued.

 

[johntkd]

A neighborhood boy offered to mow our lawn b/c he is saving up for a Boy Scout Camp this summer.

He didn’t really know what to charge, and we have no idea either. It takes my husband and I about 1 hour to mow it with a push mower. He will be using our mower.

What do you think is a fair price?

Thanks!
LynnieLew

Ok when i was a youth i used to get 5 bucks a yard which for the most part was 50 feet wide and 200 feet deep, was usually my own mover and gas but prices were so different way back then,
I would say depending on the yard size etc 10 to 15 bucks would be fair, if he does a really good job add some to that But tell him the extra is a tip for doing quality work so he at least relizes that extra effort pays off and if he slouches the next time he wont make as much…
I guess another way to look at it is what is that extra hour of your time worth to you, I wish some kid would come and want to cut my grass for me I hate mowing lawn, and esspecially with my current work schedule where I get little time off I would gladdy pay a kid 50 bucks to cut my grass with my mower my gas But I have a larger yard also takes me about 2 hours to cut it with a push mower, depending on day he came I might offer 75 to cut the weeds i mean grass I mean oh never mind you get the idea…lol

 

[mozier]

12 year olds do not have insurance or bonding. As the boy is not working in a commerical capcity a general home owners policy would be in effect. However, if he is using his own equipment they wouldn’t be liable for injury as his own equipment caused the injurty, not their property. Obviously they don’t pay into worker’s comp type programs, they aren’t an employer. As the boy is an independant contractor executing a job they do not have to withhold any money. Nor can they garnish his wages in case a past client was disstatisifed with boy scout labor and sued.

That would cover it, then. If one is willing to take the legal risk of hiring the young man, and all of what is said above is acceptable, then by all means, hire him and encourage his free enterprise. Again,though, it is sad that such things have to be considered these days.