With the economy struggling and most families feeling the pinch, doing something as simple as home care and maintenance can be a challenge. If both parents are working and are feeling stressed about their finances, household chores are likely to get neglected and funds are scarce for outside help for lawn care, home repairs, or even maid service.

One alternative is to become a host family. You could provide a person with free room and board in exchange for providing some of the help you need around the home.

Here are some ways this could be useful:

• Affordable lawn maintenance - The live-in person could mow your lawn, trim the bushes, even tend to your garden if he or she has a green thumb and no pesky allergies.
• Help with laundry and other chores - If you have a large family, doing the laundry, cooking meals, even loading the dishwasher can be a time-consuming struggle. Having another pair of hands to help could be a huge asset.
• Home maintenance help - If your home is like most, there are some minor repairs that need to be made. Maybe the front door is sticking or the screen door in back is ripped. Maybe you need to replace the tiles in the kitchen or the carpet in the living room. Bringing someone in to help with these problems can save a lot of time and money.
• Maid service alternative - Instead of paying someone a lot of money to clean your home, you could be offering someone a place to stay and warm food for their services. They could be a college student, a retired person, a traveler, or a recently unemployed worker.

Additionally, you could bring them into your home to be both companions and homemakers. If both parents are working, the children may like having someone available when they come home so they don't have to go to a babysitter. Stay-at-home parents might appreciate the grown-up company and the extra hands as they struggle to keep the house running smoothly. Overall, this arrangement could be a win-win situation for everyone involved.