[wishing09]

We are scheduled for our licensing worker to come next week for our first visit for the home study, and I'm wondering what sort of things they look for? I know there is a thread on here somewhere that has talked about it, but not having any luck finding it. Any words of wisdom???

[UTbrie]

I have 2 more classes before my home studies start, but I have a friend that fosters too who has given me some ideas.
Outlet Covers on all unused outlets.
Medicines locked up
Chemicals stored away and locked
A fire Estinguisher for each floor of the house
Working Fire Alarms/Carbon monoxide Detectors
General Safety issues
Where the kids will sleep, appropriate beds/cribs. Etc.
I am sure the more experienced fosters can give you more of an idea. Good luck to you!!!

[greenrobin]

You may also need

A lock box to put those meds in before you lock them in a cabinet

A fire/safety inspection from the fire marshall in your town

CPR

Fingerprinting

Screens on all of your windows--even if you never open them

Fireplace screens

Additional locks on doors

If you have pets, vaccinations

If you have a pool or pond, a locking gate and fence

A thermometer in your fridge to attest to the right temp

A box in the fridge for storing refrigeratable medication

There are always going to be tons of things that you don't expect. Most homestudies are looking to find out if your home is safe and clean enough for kids. Most homestudy workers don't do a white glove test, but I've read on here about some who do, so you might want to wipe down your baseboards just in case. In general, the worker is nice, goes through the checklist, and asks if s/he is unsure about your home. And you're usually given time to correct things that they find, sometimes on the spot.

The goal is to get you to PASS, not to fail you.

It's more nerve-wracking before hand than during.

[Longing2bMom]

Originally Posted by UTbrie

Where the kids will sleep, appropriate beds/cribs. Etc.

I will be having my homestudy soon, too, and I have a question regarding the beds/cribs. I am going to be doing fost-adopt of a child age 0 to 3. I don't want to buy beds/cribs or other furniture for the room until I know the age of the child. Obviously, the stuff needed for an infant is quite a bit different than that needed for a 3 year old. Is it appropriate to just show the SW an empty room and explain that I will be buying the appropriate furniture once I get a placement? There's a 24 hour Walmart less than a mile away and I have lots of family nearby to help get everything setup very quickly.

[denham]

During my Home Visit, I had a queen size bed in the room that I am going to place my foster daughter in. We talked about the toddler bed that was on it's way....it was not a problem for our LS.

[yogamama]

Our Liscensing worker came for the first time on Tuesday. He took a quick look around the house and asked if we had medications and cleaning supplies up out of the reach of kids. Then looked outside and told us to get a baby gate for the top of the stairs for our deck. Then he sat down and just talked with us for two hours. He told us he was more interested in getting to know us than checking off details on a list. If we were good people, then we'd do what needs to be done to keep kids safe. I was totally worried about this whole list of requirements, but he just said, "ok, so you read those? Now I can check off that we discussed them." And that was that. Is this a normal experience, or did we just totally luck out?

[wishing09]

Yogamama--I hope ours goes that well!

Denham--I'm glad you mentioned how the room was set up that the child will use. Our's is currently set up with a queen bed. We are hoping for a baby, but said we would consider 0-3 yo.

Thanks everyone for the advice. Thankfully we know the worker that is coming to do the home study, so that puts us a little at ease, but I still want to be prepared. I was wondering about the meds and cleaning products and whether they just needed to be out of reach or actually locked up. We decided to just take all of our firearms out of the house until we can get a gunsafe or locking cabinet. Interesting the variations on what is expected. Thanks guys!

Another question--when did you start buying "supplies"--bedding, clothes, car seat, etc? I keep wanting to start getting a little here and there, but dh seems to think we should wait. I don't want to be stuck having to buy everything all at once, but I also want to be reasonable.

[mountaineermom]

For my first home study I cleaned every inch of the house, spending two whole days making sure everything was perfectly clean. She didnt even go in any of the rooms. She came in, sat down at my dinning room table, talked and went over paper work. She told me that she usually doesnt inspect anything unitl the second homestudy.
Well, then came the second home study a month later...I cleaned everything, went down the checklist and made sure I had all of the saftey stuff done. She came, sat in the living room, talked for 15 minutes, did some more paper work, and left! That was it! Im glad that she wasnt so picky, and I guess I ended up with a really clean house. But just dont worry about it too much, because in my experience, it turned out to be no big deal.

[wishing09]

So we had our homestudy on Thursday afternoon, and I seriously had NO reason to fret! It actually was pretty enjoyable. She was there for about 2 hours. We mostly talked, she asked us lots of questions about our families and our past--school, college, how we were disciplined growing up. She wanted a tour of our house--apparently everything looked pretty good, the only comment she had was that we might want to consider putting a door on our basement (or just use a baby gate) and putting a smoke detector in the basement. That was it! We talked about whether meds are required to be locked up. The law where I live does not state that it needs to be locked up, just needs to be out of reach of children. Overall, it was a great experience. She said that she will probably be the one that does the visits once we are licensed as well, so that made us feel a lot better. I told her that the appearance of my house that day was for her benefit, it may not always be that clean . Anyway, thanks everyone for the great advice to my original post, I think it made a big difference!