It can change your life to spend quality time with a host family in Australia. Not only can living abroad help you grow personally, but doing that experience with a local family can help your growth reach exponential heights. In our program, we let you interview with multiple potential host families before you make a decision. It’s helpful to get to know multiple families to figure out who would be a good match for you and where you would be a good fit as well.
During your video call(s), you can ask questions to get to know your host family. The goal of asking questions is to show your interest and ensure that you and your host family have the same expectations.
Here are 11 recommended questions to ask a potential host family:
- Why do you want your children to have a babysitter from another country
- What are your child’s interests?
- What’s the best way that your child learns?
- What is a typical day like with you and your family?
- Do you or does anyone in your family have allergies or dietary restrictions?
- Do you have pets? If so, what are they like?
- What should I expect for pocket money?
- How many au pairs have you hosted before?
- Are you an extrovert or an introvert? What about your kids?
- What are your main goals for hosting a live-in babysitter?
- What is something you’re worried or concerned about hosting someone?
After the initial meeting, you can also ask to follow the host parent on social media. Offer them to see yours as well. Be sure all posts are appropriate. This can be a great way to get to know each other!
Remember, you want your video calls to feel like a conversation, not an interrogation. So just pick a few questions for the first call. You can also ask us about some of the logistics. For example, many of the families put their pocket money rate on their profile, so you wouldn’t always need to ask this personally in a video call.
You can save some of the questions for when you text or have additional video calls to get to know each other.
Most of our host families prefer the video calls to be done over WhatsApp so that makes it easy to shoot a quick text after the call thanking them for their time. You can also use that conversation to ask any other questions you didn’t get a chance to ask during the call.
If you’re still on the fence about living in Australia, apply today to see if you’re accepted. We have flexible program dates and dozens of wonderful host families waiting for YOU!