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When your child gets old enough to start their academic career but is still too young for kindergarten, you'll probably want to start considering daycare, which is a great way for your child to learn, grow, and meet other children their age. If, for whatever reason, you don't (or can't) invest in a local daycare, why not make your own?

There are pitfalls and problems that can come with this plan, but if you do your research, you should be able to give your child — not to mention other children — a great daycare experience that you can curate yourself.

You Won't Need A Campus

While some daycares have their own buildings, this step is not actually necessary to having your own daycare — you can run it out of your own home, and you won't have to worry about the upkeep of another building. As long as you live in an area where you can run a business out of your home (more on that requirement below), you should be free to operate out of your own home.

You Will Need Some Preparation

The first thing you'll need is to check on the licensing requirements of your state. These requirements might include (but are not limited to) a business license, a daycare license, and insurance for your daycare business. These requirements — including whether or not you have to have them at all — vary from state-to-state, so check to see exactly what your state demands.

In addition, most states at least require that you are a legal adult without any felonies on your record.

The other preparation you'll need to do is medical; because you're dealing with children, who have weaker immune systems, you'll want to get regular checkups to ensure that you're free of any disease that could be passed on to the children in your care.

You Might Need Help

Running a daycare is a full-time job, and can be incredibly exhausting to do by yourself. Depending on the number of children in your care, it can be near impossible to keep track of them all. Knowing this, you may want to consider starting your daycare with another parent in your neighborhood.

Not only would this provide care for their child (or children) as well, but they could help keep track of the other children, help manage business expenses, and provide insight into subjects that you might not know as much about. In order for the children to have a caring and well-rounded daycare experience, you may want to bring another parent on board and share the work.