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Morgan & Mallet, a luxury household staffing agency, recruits proven and experienced domestic couples for private properties across the US.
Hiring a domestic couple for a high-net-worth home isn’t like any other private service hire you’ll make.
You’re hiring a partnership that will live in your home, run the property when you’re not there, and split a workload. They need real experience as a couple and they have to be proven to be able to work together.
They need to fit alongside your other staff if you have them, and be naturally discreet when you’re there.
Morgan & Mallet was founded in 2015 by Laurine Mallet, a former private nanny for high-net-worth families, and Morgan Richez, a former butler and chauffeur for high-net-worth households.
For most domestic couple searches, we shortlist matched couples for you, with paid trial days in your home if needed before you commit to them.
If you’re looking to hire a domestic couple, you’re in the right place.
Years placing Domestic Couples
Applications to our couple jobs since 2022
Vetted candidates
Candidates registered as couples
Source: our candidate database, and applications to our domestic couple job ads, May 2022 to June 2026. How we count
What does a domestic couple do?
A domestic couple is a two-person team who run a private home together. Usually one of them works on the inside and the other the outside, the cars, and the grounds. They almost always live on the property.
How they split the work depends on the home and the family as well as their own skills. The setups we see most often in the US:
Housekeeper and houseman.
The woman in the partnership does the inside. Cleaning, laundry, linens, ironing, light cooking, getting guest rooms ready.
The man works on the outside, fixing things, driving, errands, and security.
This is quite normal for areas like the Hamptons or Aspen.
Cook and caretaker.
She cooks daily meals and runs the kitchen.
He looks after the grounds, the pool, the cars, and lets the suppliers in.
Common on second homes in Florida, Montana, and the Carolinas.
Butler and housekeeper.
Formal service inside the home,
and full housekeeping tasks.
More normal in main residences than vacation homes. We find that this is the least common of the three mentioned here.
Half of our domestic couple searches for clients in the US were for a second home. The family lives there for part of the year and the couple keeps the place ready year-round so it never feels closed up.
That means
- stocking the fridge before the owners arrive.
- Running the cars.
- Checking the property after storms.
- Dealing with the gardener, the pool guy, the alarm company.
- And just being there.
Morgan, our co-founder, calls it
“having a human in the property when the owner is not there.”
For more on the day-to-day, see our domestic couple job description section below.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
What do US families ask a domestic couple to cover?
The whole property, both inside and out.
| Home and year | What the couple covered | Applicants |
|---|---|---|
| Country estate, West Newbury, Massachusetts, 2022 | Live-in. Several buildings to keep up, housekeeping, vegetarian and vegan cooking, the family dog | 10 |
| Family home, Woodside, California, 2023 | Live-in. Six-bedroom house and guest house, cooking, gardens, the pool, driving, the cats | 27 |
| Beach home, Longboat Key, Florida, 2025 | Part live-in, part live-out. Housekeeping, daily meals, the pool, vendors, repairs, errands | 86 |
| Second home, Beverly Hills, California, 2025 | Live-out, Monday to Friday. Housekeeping, garden and pool, meals and events when the family is there | 10 |
| Vacation home, Westhampton, New York, 2026 | Live-in. Keeping the house ready all year, light meals, gardens, pool services, the security system | 15 |
| Farm estate, Nokesville, Virginia, 2026 | Live-in, part-time. Running the estate for an owner who lives there full-time | 39 |
In all of these briefs the couple had to deal with vendors and contractors. Five in six asked for cooking, laundry, small repairs and help with dinners or events.
Care of a swimming pool was in two in three briefs, and two in three of the homes already had other staff working there, from a part-time housekeeper and gardeners to a team that rotated.
Security is also very important and a big part of this role.
The family in Massachusetts we recruited for wanted one partner in the couple to have a security or police background, and the Westhampton home wanted a couple who knew how to use its smart-home security system.
Most briefs had a split of the work between the house internally and the outside.
The search for a client we did in Virginia mixed it up in a different way. One partner would be the household manager, running the house and the vendors, and the other a houseman on a 15-acre farm estate.
Co-founder Laurine Mallet sums the job up in one word, guardian:
“The main function of [a] domestic couple is to be guardian[s] … So it means security … because you’re not here. … You need to have [a] couple to maintain, clean and to ensure the security of your property.
“So most of the time, that’s for a second residency.”
Source: Morgan & Mallet job ads and applicants for these US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. A job advertised in English and French counts once, with both sets of applicants (187 applications in all). How we count
How much does a domestic couple cost in the US?
According to Morgan & Mallet’s 2025/26 Household Staff Annual Report, domestic couple salaries in the private households we recruit for are from $100,000 to $250,000 a year combined.
Morgan Richez, co-founder of Morgan & Mallet:
“In the US, if you are looking for a domestic couple, you need to pay at least $150,000 a year. That’s the minimum.”
Morgan goes on to explain that salaries have gone up sharply over the last three years. The pool is small, most career couples are between 45 and 55, and the next generation isn’t replacing them.
Our briefs for clients in the US confirm this.
| Brief | Pay offered |
|---|---|
| Woodside, California, 2023 | $160,000 to $180,000 a year for the couple |
| Westhampton, New York, 2026 | from $175,000 a year combined |
We see that pay isn’t everything to couples though. In Europe, Morgan sees more of them asking for whole weekends off:
“It’s not only about the money. … The people, they would like to have the full weekend, for example Saturday and Sunday. Of course, when the principal, the family, is there, they can be flexible. …
“But when the [family is] not there, they would like to get the Saturday and Sunday off.”
Source: our 2025/26 Household Staff Salaries Annual Report, and the pay in our US domestic couple job ads, 2023 to 2026. How we count
Do you pay a domestic couple one salary or two?
Usually one. In all our briefs from clients wanting to hire domestic couples since 2022, 9 in 10 of the briefs that said who the pay was for gave one figure for the couple.
Some families pay each partner. Our briefs in Beverly Hills for a client there offered a competitive salary to each of the two.
One French family paid one partner a monthly salary and the other by the hour. So it really can vary.
Couples apply as a pair as well. 95% of our ads for couples are set up for the two partners to apply together.
Benefits are part of the package. Half of our searches for couples in the US had benefits listed, from paid vacation and sick leave to health insurance and a bonus each year.
Morgan’s advice is to put both jobs in one contract and say what happens if one partner leaves.
“If someone is fired, like the woman, the man has to lose the job as well, because you can’t keep one of those. … It’s a package,” says co-founder Morgan Richez.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job ads for domestic couples in 17 countries, May 2022 to June 2026, and our US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
What kind of accommodation do domestic couples need?
Almost every domestic couple role in the US is live-in. Morgan:
“When we’re talking about domestic couples, almost 99% are going to be live-in. There is no live-out position for a domestic couple. It doesn’t really exist.”
That is true for most of the homes we’ve done searches for. Two in three were fully live-in.
The exceptions to this were a family in Beverly Hills we recruited for who wanted a couple working Monday to Friday and living out, and a Florida family who wanted a mix of both.
That makes accommodation the thing first-time employers most often get wrong. It needs to be a separate, decent unit. This is not optional.
A converted basement or a studio above the garage only works if it’s properly finished. Windows, heating, a proper kitchen, a real bathroom. A guest cottage or detached staff quarters is what we see on most US estates.
Morgan our co-founder:
“Some clients, the accommodation is completely bad. Without windows, in the basement. The accommodation is a very important point. You need to offer decent, furnished, modern accommodation.”
To keep a good couple you need to have good accommodation, they just won’t stay if it’s not good enough.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
How does Morgan & Mallet vet a domestic couple?
Every candidate goes through a 90-minute interview before they join our database.
We test discretion, technical skills, and we go through real situations that could happen.
For household couples we also want to see how they actually work as a team. We look at how they communicate, how they split the work, and how long they’ve genuinely been doing it together.
Lots of couples sign up with us, but only 331 people on our database have actually worked as a domestic couple before. That is why we check a couple’s shared history so closely.
In the interview, we ask each partner about their own duties as part of the couple and look at how the other one reacts. Laurine trains our recruiters to look for this.
“You need to analyze the situation and to understand how they behave [with] each other, how they act and react. …
“As soon as it will be the husband who can talk, perhaps the woman, she’s going to talk for him. So it’s a first red flag.”
We need to see that the couple have been together for a long time and understand how each other works. The success of the placement really rests on this so this is very important for us to check.
We ask former employers detailed questions so we get a clear picture of how they worked together in the past.
Source: our candidate database, the work history of people registered with us, June 2026. How we count
How long does it take to hire a domestic couple in the US?
Domestic couples take longer to hire than most roles, because fewer people apply.
If the right couple isn’t available straight away, we will let you know. We’d rather extend the search and find the right people than rush you a placement.
Our domestic couple ads in the US have had 17 applicants each on average, under half the 37 our ads in the US attract over all our roles.
It’s the same in the 17 different countries where we’ve advertised couple jobs since 2022. We get about 24 applicants per ad, compared to 45 for all our ads.
That’s why our Household Staff Industry Report lists the domestic couple as the hardest role to fill.
Caretaker couples, who in the main look after the grounds and the building, receive a few more applications. About 36 per ad over our 131 caretaker couple ads, most of them in France.
| Where | Couple ads | All our ads |
|---|---|---|
| In the US | 17 | 37 |
| In 17 countries | 24 | 45 |
Morgan our co-founder:
“If we struggle to find a domestic couple, of course we can suggest splitting the role and finding two people.
“But the accommodation is set up for a couple, not for two individuals. So it’s not always easy.”
If we’re four to six weeks into the search and the right couple hasn’t been found, we usually give you a few choices.
Extend the search and we’ll brief you on what’s slowing it down.
Raise the salary range to widen the pool.
Or split the role into a housekeeper-cook and a houseman, though that means two sets of accommodation, not one.
If you split it, we can do two searches, one to hire a live-in housekeeper and one for a property caretaker.
Broadening the job like this gives you more choice.
Our Longboat Key search in 2025, which a single house manager could also apply for, received 86 applicants, the most of any of the couple searches we’ve carried out in the US.
A live-in cook and housekeeper job that was happy with a couple or one person had 126 applicants over three briefs in 2025 and 2026.
Morgan Richez:
“There is not many candidates, [so it] is very important to open the job the maximum we can, in order to find people. … The client sometime[s] accept[s], sometime[s] not.”
Once we have matches, you see the candidate couples. We set up the interviews and a paid trial in the home.
Laurine Mallet, our co-founder, on keeping a couple once they’ve started:
“It’s to tell a little bit in advance to the couple when you are going to arrive in your property. … [S]ome owners are going to think, ‘Okay, I will call Wednesday the couple and we are coming Friday.’ …
“Sometimes they can be very busy, or it can be very tricky for them, and especially [if] the owner is coming [with] six or seven people. So to be able to plan, if possible, in advance. …
“[I]f you ask [at] the last minute, the couple won’t get enough time in order to prepare the property.”
Resumes only tell you so much. You need to see how a couple actually works in your space before you make any decisions.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job ads and applicants: our domestic couple and caretaker couple ads, April 2022 to June 2026, and all our US ads, May 2022 to June 2026. Averages count the ads that had applicants. How we count
Is there a guarantee on a domestic couple placement?
Yes. Every Morgan & Mallet domestic couple placement comes with a three-month replacement guarantee. If it doesn’t work out, we replace the couple at no extra cost.
Couples can leave quickly. Morgan remembers a San Diego couple who resigned at the end of their first day after a disagreement between the two of them.
When that happens, several of our recruiters will work on an urgent replacement together.
“It’s not possible to do 100% placement[s],” Morgan says.
“What we try to do at the beginning, we do a big meeting with two or three recruiter[s] and say, ‘Guys, do you have any domestic couple on your mind ready to go?'”
We also help with the employment paperwork. Household payroll, tax withholding, and we can connect you with attorneys who handle domestic employment in New York, Florida, California, and the other states where we regularly staff.
We place domestic couples nationally. Our recent searches for domestic couples have been in Massachusetts, California, Florida, New York and Virginia.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
What skills should a domestic couple have?
A domestic household couple has to cover more skills than any single role. Between the two of them, you need:
Strong English. Both partners need to communicate clearly with the family, the staff, and the suppliers.
One partner with weaker English can work if the other handles the talking with the family and the calls coming in, but both need enough to follow instructions and report back.
A clean US driver’s license, both partners. Most US briefs assume both can drive. They’ll be running errands, doing airport pickups, and moving the family between the property and town.
Every search we’ve done for a domestic couple in the US apart from one wanted a driver’s license. If the family needs someone driving every day, a private driver who has other duties might be the better option.
Real cooking ability from at least one partner. Not chef-level. We mean proper daily meals, the odd dinner party, and basic dietary things like gluten-free or low-carb.
Morgan:
“They’re looking for someone on the couple who can cook a very good cuisine, because this is a holiday home, so when they come for the summer they would like someone who knows how to cook.”
Some homes have the two roles. Our Westhampton search for a client in 2026 asked the couple to cook light meals and work with private chefs when the family was there.
If you want to have restaurant-level food every day, then a full-time private chef is what you need.
Five-star service training or a hotel background, ideally. Couples who came up through hotels know how to stock a pantry, get a guest suite ready, and read a room.
Comfort with everyday tech. WhatsApp, shared calendars, basic apps for scheduling and reporting. Nothing complicated. Morgan: “It can be just WhatsApp or just to fit some planning online, you know, this kind of thing.”
Working with other staff and vendors. They’ll be coordinating with a gardener, a pool guy, an alarm company, sometimes a chef or a nanny too.
They need to give clear instructions and know when to call you and when to just handle it.
Personality is as important in the role as skills though.
Laurine Mallet, our co-founder, compares it with placing one person:
“It’s harder. For example, [a] personal assistant, it’s just one person, one personality to adapt [to] the client. With [a] couple, that’s [a] woman and a man. …
“Plus, they are working and living together. … They need to adapt to the clients.”
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
Who actually works as a domestic couple in the US?
Career domestic couples in the US tend to be between 45 and 55. Most don’t have children at home, either because they never had any or because the kids are grown.
Many have been together fifteen years or more by the time they take a couple role. Some met working in service together.
Our actual records show them a little younger than this, though. Of the people registered with us as part of a couple who told us their age, the middle age is 49, and about three in ten are under 40.
That’s over all our couples, not only ones in the United States.
Where they come from depends on where you are. Morgan:
“If we’re talking about Miami, the people will come from Mexico, Cuba, this kind of country.
“If you’re talking about New York for example, it’s going to be more people from the US.”
Roughly:
- Florida and the Gulf coast. A lot of Latin American couples, often bilingual English-Spanish or English-Portuguese. Most have hospitality backgrounds.
- New York, Connecticut, the Hamptons. US-born couples and Eastern European couples at the top of the market. Many came up through five-star hotels.
- California. Mexican and Filipino couples make up a big part of the pool. Filipino couples are known for being flexible and good at live-in.
- The mountain markets and the Carolinas. Often US-born, sometimes coming from local hotels or estate work.
Work authorization is what stops certain nationalities being able to work.
We only present couples with valid right to work in the US, and we’ll tell you upfront if the salary range and the location are going to make that hard to meet.
Good couples often move up with the same family over the years.
“You can start [as a] domestic couple and, years after years, you can be much more [a] house [or] estate manager,” Laurine says. “So it’s a real motivation for them.”
Source: our candidate database, people registered as part of a couple who gave their age, June 2026. How we count
Domestic couple job description
This is the kind of job description we would write for a family hiring a full-time, live-in domestic couple for their second home in the Hamptons. It shows the sort of detail that would attract experienced, long-term couples.
It covers how the work is split between the two partners, what the accommodation is like, and the terms on offer.
Real briefs are this detailed.
Our couple briefs in the US that set a minimum asked for three to five years’ experience.
Our brief for a couple needed in Woodside in 2023 wanted 40 hours a week over five and a half to six days, as well as overtime when needed.
A one-line brief isn’t going to find anyone or help you. We need as much detail as possible. Morgan gives this example of one that is lacking detail:
“They come to us and they say, ‘Oh, I’m looking for a domestic couple, a woman and [a man] with five years[‘] experience.’ … And they bring only this information. This is not enough.”
Example of a domestic couple job description
The example is for the most common US domestic couple setup, which is a housekeeper-cook on the inside and a houseman role on the outside.
Morgan Richez, co-founder of Morgan & Mallet, says couples who worked together as yacht crew before moving into household roles are some of the strongest candidates we see for second-home placements.
About the family and property
A high-net-worth family is hiring a domestic couple for their second home in East Hampton. The property is a six-bedroom main house, a two-bedroom guest cottage, and grounds that include a pool and a tennis court.
The family comes out for weekends most of the year and stays for the full summer. They host friends and family regularly when they’re at the house.
The role is full-time, live-in. The staff cottage is a separate two-bedroom unit on the property, with a private kitchen, full bathroom, and laundry.
Responsibilities
Inside (housekeeper-cook partner)
- Housekeep the main house and guest cottage, including daily cleaning and deep cleaning before the family arrives
- Laundry, ironing, and linen rotation
- Daily cooking when the family is at the house: weekday meals for the family, plus dinner for up to twelve guests when they entertain
- Stocking the kitchen and pantry before family arrives
- Getting the guest cottage ready for visiting friends and family
- Light household admin such as tracking expenses, receipts, and a weekly update for the family
Outside (houseman partner)
- Looking after the family’s cars, including cleaning, fueling, scheduled servicing
- Driving when needed, airport pickups, errands, or local trips for the family
- Property maintenance and small repairs
- Managing outside vendors, pool service, gardener, alarm company, contractors
- Walking the grounds after storms and bad weather
- Security awareness, including knowing who’s expected on the property and when
Together
- Keeping the property ready for guests at any time all year, even during long periods when the family isn’t there
- Keeping each other and the family in the loop
- Covering for each other when one partner is sick or on a day off
- Managing the change in pace between empty-property weeks and full-house weekends without the family noticing any change
Requirements
Essential for the partnership
- Minimum 5 years working together as a domestic couple in HNW or UHNW households, or as a yacht crew couple
- Verifiable references from previous private families covering the partnership, not just each partner individually. Hamptons or comparable second-home experience is a plus
- Both partners with valid US work authorization and clean US driver’s licenses; the property is twenty minutes from the nearest town and there’s no public transport
- Both partners fluent in English. The family’s main household is in Manhattan and the inside partner will be on regular calls with the family’s PA during the week
Personal qualities (both partners)
- Genuinely good at working as a team, including managing disagreements between yourselves without it affecting the family
- Discreet about everything seen and overheard inside the home and on the property, including when the family has summer house guests
- Comfortable working independently for long stretches when the family isn’t there. Off-season weeks at the property can be very quiet
- Stable, settled, and looking for a long-term placement (not a stepping stone)
Work conditions
- Full-time, live-in
- Separate two-bedroom staff cottage on the property, fully furnished, with a private kitchen, bathroom, and laundry
- Health insurance for both partners
- Two days off per week when the family is at the house; flexible time off when they’re not
- Use of a property vehicle for errands and personal use within reason
- Salary based on combined experience, paid as a single household salary
This job description was reviewed by Morgan Richez, co-founder of Morgan & Mallet.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
Frequently asked questions about hiring a domestic couple
Call us on +1 (646) 965-2308 or tell us about your home and a recruiter will get back to you.
Do domestic couples need to be married?
No. A long-term partnership matters more than a marriage certificate. We do need to see they’ve lived and worked together for at least two years.
Can a domestic couple bring children to the live-in role?
Most US clients prefer no children living on-site, mostly because of accommodation. We do place couples with children when the home has space for them. Couples without kids have more options and earn more.
“If the employer provide[s] accommodation with one room, we are not going to provide candidate couple[s] with children, because where do they sleep?” as Laurine puts it.
Can a domestic couple manage more than one property?
Yes. In a third of our domestic couple searches in the US, the couple would need to work in more than one home.
A family in Massachusetts wanted their couple to travel with them to a winter home, and a Woodside family asked theirs to help look after its other properties.
In 2024 we searched for a house manager couple to run a 140-acre estate in Pennsylvania and look after the family’s Maryland house too.
What background checks do you run?
Full criminal background, identity verification, work authorization, driving record, and reference checks for both partners.
What about employment law?
Household employment law varies by state. We help you set up payroll, advise on contracts, and connect you with attorneys who handle domestic employment in your state.
Source: Morgan & Mallet job briefs, US domestic couple and house manager couple searches, May 2022 to January 2026. How we count
Call us on +1 (646) 965-2308 or tell us about your home and a recruiter will get back to you.
New York
office address
260 Madison Avenue, 8th floor, 10016, New York, NY - United States
phone
+1 (646) 965-2308
opening hours
Monday - Thursday : 9AM - 6PM
Friday : 9AM - 5PM
Saturday & Sunday : Closed
Miami
office address
1221 Brickell Ave, Miami, FL 33131, United States
phone
+1 305 710 3380
opening hours
Monday - Thursday : 9AM - 6PM
Friday : 9AM - 5PM
Saturday & Sunday : Closed
Los Angeles
office address
895 Dove St, Newport Beach, CA 92660, United States
phone
+1 305 710 3380
opening hours
Monday - Thursday : 9AM - 6PM
Friday : 9AM - 5PM
Saturday & Sunday : Closed