Determining your Time-Space Calculation can help you account for common expenses incurred by your in-home child care services. This guide, the Time-Space Worksheet, and the video will help you calculate what percentage of your home is used for business.

Time-Space Calculation for Family Child Care Providers

As a home-based family child care provider, many of your expenses are for both your business and your personal home use. So, how do you figure out how much of those joint expenses are considered business expenses? The answer is simpler than you may think.

Using the Time-Space Calculation, family child care providers can for account for common business expenses incurred by in-home child care providers such as:

  • Rent

  • Mortgage Interest

  • Property Taxes

  • Utilities

  • Other housing expenses that are necessary for your in-home business, such as maintenance and repairs

In addition to being helpful for figuring out your spending for grant purposes, the Time-Space Calculation also determines the percentage of these expenses that you can deduct on your federal income taxes. If you already have your time-space percentage calculated from last year’s taxes, you can use that.

If you have expenses that are solely dedicated to your business and have no elements of common use (e.g., a phone line that is only for the child care, the purchase of furniture for the learning environment and supplies for the children, etc.) those expenses are 100% attributable to the business and are not subject to the time-space calculation.

How to Calculate Your Time-Space Percentage

The Time-Space Calculation takes just a few simple steps to help you calculate the percentage of your home that is used for business. It considers the amount of time your home is used for business and the space within your home that is used for business.

Using the steps below, you can easily determine how much of certain expenses can be reimbursed with grant funds or be deducted on your federal income taxes.

Step 1

Determine the square footage of the area(s) in your home that you regularly use for your child care space.

Regular use includes areas that are regularly used for the business; at least 1-2 times a week. For example, play and learning spaces that may be used all day, and areas that are regularly used for only part of the day (such as napping or mealtime areas). Any areas used regularly for business count toward your space calculation, even if children are not present (consider storage, laundry, or an office work desk). Add the square footage of each of your regularly used spaces together to determine the area of your home that you use for your child care business.

Exclusive use includes areas that are only used for child care and nothing else. These are considered exclusive use because you have no personal benefit or use of the space outside of child care. Add the square footage of each of your exclusively used spaces together to determine the area of your home that you exclusively use for your child care business.

To calculate square footage, you will first need to measure the length and width of your space.

  1. Fix a tape measure to one end of the longest wall in your space and extend it to the other end

  2. Record this measurement (in feet, not inches)

  3. Next, fix a tape measure to one end of the shortest wall in your space and extend it to the other end

  4. Record this measurement (in feet, not inches)

  5. Next, multiply the length measurement by the width measurement to find your square footage:

Length x Width = Square Footage

For example, if your space is 13 feet long and 10 feet wide, your square footage would be 130 square feet.

13 feet x 10 feet = 130 square feet

For oddly shaped spaces, such as rooms with an extra nook or filled by a closet, break your room into smaller rectangular blocks, use the square footage calculation for each block, and add the totals together.

Step 2

Divide the square footage of that space by the square footage of your home to determine a percentage.

Take the number of square feet of the child care space and divide it by the total square footage of your home.

For example, if you use 500 square feet of your home for child care space, and the home is 1,000 square feet, then the result is 0.50. Multiply that number by 100 to get the percentage: 50%.

Example Space Percentage = 50%

PRO TIP It’s important to note that the square footage for outdoor areas cannot be included in the time-space calculation. However, external spaces that are physically attached to the home that are regularly used for child care (i.e., a deck or an attached garage) can be included in your space calculation.

Step 3

Determine the amount of time your home was used for child care during the year.

Calculate how many hours your in-home child care program is open per week, including the time you spend preparing, managing paperwork, or cleaning up when the children are not present. Multiply this number by the number of weeks you were open for service and add any work hours you performed in the home while you were closed.

For example, if your business is open 10 hours per day for child care, but you spend an hour beforehand preparing and an hour after cleaning up or completing paperwork, that’s 12 hours per day, five days per week.

Let’s say you closed for two weeks due to the pandemic, but during that time, you spent 10 hours maintaining the child care space and preparing for re-opening.

Now, let’s do the math: 12 hours per day x 5 days per week x 50 weeks open + 10 hours when you were closed = 3,010 hours.

Step 4

Divide the hours your home was used for child care by the total hours in a year.

For example, let’s divide the 3,010 hours calculated above by 8,760 (the total number of hours in a year). That gets us 0.344. Multiply that by 100 to get the percentage: 34.4%.

Example Time Percentage = 34.4%

Step 5

Multiply the percentage of the space used in your home by the percentage of time your home is used for business to determine what percent of your in-home expenses are for your business.

Take your two numbers (the square footage percentage and the hours per year percentage) and multiply them together.

In our example, that’d be 50% (or 0.50) by 34.4% (or .0344).

0.50 x 0.344 = 0.172, or 17.2%

Example Time-Space Percentage = 17.2%

However, if you have spaces that you exclusively use, you’ll want to add that separately and your calculation would look like this:

Space percentage (%) of exclusive use area + (regular use space percentage (%) * time percentage (%)).

This will weigh your exclusively use areas higher in your time/space percentage.

This is the percentage that you can apply to your joint home/business expenses for your in-home child care service when filing deductions at tax time. You can also use this helpful worksheet to assist with your calculations.

When using your time-space calculation for tax purposes, providers are encouraged to review the IRS Instructions for Form 8829, Expenses for Business Use of Your Home, or consult with your professional tax preparer.

Assistance is Available

For more early care and education resources, please visit the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association (WECA) website. If you are not a member of WEESSN, click here to learn about the business training and support it offers. Ready to join WEESSN? Click here!

Disclaimer: The information contained in this presentation has been prepared by Civitas Strategies on behalf of the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association and is not intended to constitute legal advice. The parties have used reasonable efforts in collecting, preparing, and providing this information, but neither Civitas Strategies Early Start nor Wisconsin Early Childhood Association guarantees its accuracy, completeness, adequacy, or currency. The publication and distribution of this presentation are not intended to create, and receipt does not constitute, an attorney-client relationship. Reproduction of this information is expressly prohibited.