A staffed New York home is its own logistics problem: a townhouse or large co-op apartment, a housekeeper five days a week, perhaps a house manager holding the vendor list, and a Hamptons place that needs coverage from Memorial Day to Labor Day. When families hand that hiring to an agency, the cost is concrete: household staffing placement fees in New York run 15–25% of first-year salary, and the one major tri-state firm that publishes its rates charges 15% for standard roles and 20% for senior ones like house and estate managers.
New York has the deepest private-service market in the country, which means more good firms — and more mediocre ones charging the same fees. This guide profiles the household staffing agencies NYC families actually use, what staff earn here, and how to evaluate a firm before signing its fee agreement. For the national picture, fee structures in full, and the seven evaluation questions, see our guide to the best household staffing agencies.
Expect NYC household staffing fees of 15–25% of first-year salary: roughly $12,600 on a $70,000 housekeeper, $28,000 on a $140,000 senior house manager. Full-time private housekeepers in New York earn $25–$35/hr, executive housekeepers reach $160,000+, and senior house managers run $140,000–$180,000. Employment agencies in New York City must be licensed — ask for the license number — and no single firm's roster covers the market, so strong searches run more than one channel.
How the New York Household Staffing Market Works
Three things shape hiring household staff in New York. The first is cost of living: at an index of 187 — 87% above the national average — NYC pays the highest private-service salaries in the country, and agency fees calculated as a percentage of salary scale up with them.
The second is the buildings. A housekeeper or house manager here works inside co-op house rules: service elevators, move-in and contractor windows, certificates of insurance for every vendor, doormen who see everything. Candidates with long tenures in staffed Manhattan or Brooklyn homes carry that fluency; candidates from suburban single-family homes often do not, however strong their references. Good NYC firms screen for it explicitly.
The typical staffed NYC household is smaller than the word "staff" suggests: a full-time housekeeper first, then a house manager once vendor traffic and two residences outgrow the family calendar, with chefs and laundresses appearing mostly in fully staffed townhouses. Sequencing those hires — and deciding which can be one hybrid role — is half the budget conversation, and it is worth settling before you brief any agency.
The third is regulation. Employment agencies operating in New York City must hold a license from the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. Asking for the license number takes ten seconds and filters out the informal operators at the bottom of the market.
A pattern we see constantly in New York searches: families interview beautifully credentialed candidates and never ask about the building. The hire that lasts is almost always the one who has already worked under a co-op board's rules — the second question in any NYC household interview should be about the last building, not the last employer.
The Best Household Staffing Agencies in NYC
These are the firms that come up over and over in New York searches, with what each is genuinely known for. Most also place nannies; this guide evaluates them on household staffing only — for childcare placement, see our separate guide to NYC nanny agencies, because screening a child-facing hire is a different exercise.
Pavillion Agency
The scale player. Placing staff since 1962 from East 40th Street, Pavillion bills itself as the largest household staffing agency in the U.S., with a roster spanning housekeepers, chefs, butlers, estate managers, laundresses, and baby nurses, and coverage that includes Greenwich and the Hamptons. Scale cuts both ways: the bench is deep, and the experience is more institutional than boutique.
British American Household Staffing
The formal-service specialist. BAHS places British-trained and estate-caliber staff — butlers, house managers, executive housekeepers — from its New York base, with offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, London, and Dubai, plus yacht and aviation crew for households that need them. Its process starts with a fee agreement and an application fee, then batches of pre-screened resumes and trial periods before an offer.
Society Staffing
A New York boutique that works the seam between the household and the principal's office, recruiting for private residences and corporate roles under one roof. A fit when the role blurs — a house manager who also supports a family office, an executive assistant who runs the home calendar.
Hire Society
Founded in 2012, with offices in NYC, the Hamptons, and Palm Beach — a geographic footprint that mirrors how its client families actually live. The firm reports its clientele comes entirely through word-of-mouth referral, and it staffs private events alongside permanent household roles, which is useful if your household entertains seriously.
Household Staffing International
The transparency benchmark. HSI publishes what nearly every competitor keeps quiet: 15% of gross annual salary for standard roles in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut after a 30-day free trial, and 20% for senior roles — house and estate managers, personal and executive assistants — with a 60-day trial. Even if you hire elsewhere, its schedule is your negotiating anchor with every other firm in this list.
Mahler Private Staffing
Founded in 1989 and headquartered in Milwaukee, Mahler counts New York among its core markets and specializes in family-office-adjacent households. Its differentiator is consulting around the hire — staff planning, household manuals, compensation reviews — which matters when you are building out a staff of three rather than replacing one housekeeper.
What Household Staff Earn in New York
Salaries drive fees, so start with the salary market. These are 2026 benchmarks for full-time private-service roles in the New York metro:
| Role | NYC range (2026) |
|---|---|
| Housekeeper (full-time, private home) | $25–$35/hr; senior roles $75,000–$115,000 |
| Executive housekeeper | $96,000–$128,000; $160,000+ with 7+ years in NYC homes |
| House manager | $86,159 national average; $140,000–$180,000 for senior NYC roles |
| Estate manager | $85,000–$250,000; ~$185,000 median |
| Private chef | ~$150,000 median; $300,000+ at the top of the market |
| Nanny | $22–$28/hr market base; $30–$45/hr experienced full-time |
Then load the number. Employer FICA at 7.65%, state unemployment insurance, a payroll service, guaranteed hours, and benefits push the true cost of any household employee to roughly 25% above headline salary — a $140,000 house manager costs about $175,000 all-in. The tax mechanics are identical whether the employee is a nanny or a house manager; our household employer tax guide covers them, and our NYC nanny cost guide maps the childcare side of the market in detail.
Live-in arrangements shift the math rather than shrinking it. Published national averages put live-in household employees at $1,200–$1,600 per week for a five-day schedule, against $30–$40/hr live-out — and in New York, live-in staff still earn overtime, at 44 hours a week instead of 40 under the state's Domestic Workers' Bill of Rights. Private quarters are part of the compensation conversation, not a substitute for it.
See what a coordinated search looks like. The research is the easy part. In two minutes, watch how a Beverly coordinator runs the rest — agencies, screening, and contracts — so you don't have to.
Watch: Meet Beverly · 2 min →How to Evaluate a NYC Household Staffing Agency
The national evaluation questions — exact fee trigger, replacement terms, rejection rate, verification methods — all apply here; our national agency guide walks through all seven. New York adds four of its own:
- License first: Confirm the DCWP employment agency license before anything else. Legitimate firms volunteer it.
- Building fluency: Ask how the firm screens for co-op and condo experience — house rules, service-elevator logistics, vendor COIs. A candidate who has run a staffed townhouse is not automatically ready for a white-glove co-op, and vice versa.
- Hamptons and second-home coverage: If your household moves seasonally, ask whether the firm places for summer coverage and whether candidates will travel. Firms with real Hamptons desks (Hire Society, Pavillion's Hamptons market) handle this routinely; Manhattan-only firms improvise.
- References from comparable households: Two client families, placed in the last six months, in buildings or homes like yours. In a market this deep, "we can't share references" is a choice, not a constraint.
Beverly vs. a NYC Household Staffing Agency
Beverly is not a staffing agency — it is the family's hiring coordinator, running one search across multiple agencies, job channels, and your own network at once, with the same screening standard applied to every candidate regardless of source. In New York that matters because the firms above draw from overlapping but incomplete rosters; coordinating two or three channels is how difficult roles actually get filled, and doing that coordination is a part-time job Beverly takes off your plate.
The fit is strongest for childcare-centric roles — nannies, nanny-housekeepers, family assistants — where the search spans both the household staffing firms in this guide and NYC's dedicated nanny agencies. For a purely non-childcare estate role, a specialist firm above is the right call.
The Bottom Line for New York Families
If the role is formal or senior — estate manager, trained butler, executive housekeeper for a staffed townhouse — start with Pavillion, BAHS, or Mahler and budget a 20–25% fee on a six-figure salary. If it is a first housekeeper or house manager hire, get HSI's published 15–20% terms as your anchor, then compare one boutique against it. If the hire will spend real hours with your children, evaluate childcare screening separately — that is a different market with different standards, and it is the search Beverly coordinates for families every week.
In fee terms, the three paths look like this:
- Budget: Direct-source a $25–$30/hr housekeeper through referrals and job boards — no placement fee, your hours as the cost, payroll done properly from day one.
- Mid-range: A published-fee firm on a standard role: $70,000 housekeeper at 15% = $10,500, with a 30-day free trial absorbing the early risk.
- Premium: An estate firm on a senior search: $160,000 house manager at 20% = $32,000, justified when discretion and a passive candidate pool are the point.
And whatever firm you choose: the license, the guarantee terms, and the void conditions will matter more than the brand. New York's best households run on paperwork done right — start as you mean to go on.
See how Beverly actually works
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Even though we work to keep the information, stats, and details in this article accurate and up to date, please do your own financial and legal due diligence before acting on anything you read here, and reach out directly to the private companies and government agencies referenced for the most current details.