Everything you're wondering.

A home manager is a professional who runs your household the way a chief of staff runs an office — not just cleaning, but thinking ahead, handling admin, coordinating vendors and carrying the mental load of running a family home. At Ayi, we call it "a second you."

If you've ever searched for someone to help with stuff around the house, like a housekeeper but not quite a housekeeper, a home manager is the role you're describing: broader than a cleaner, more hands-on than a PA, and focused entirely on your household.

Four simple steps, designed to take the load off you from the very first call:

• Discovery — a quick chat to understand your home and where the load feels heaviest. No forms, no faff.
• Ayi Match — we hand-match you with a fully vetted Ayi based on fit, style and your household's needs.
• Home Profile — we map your rhythms and preferences, so your Ayi learns exactly how your household runs.
• Ongoing sessions — your Ayi begins regular visits, handling the Reset, the Larder, life admin and whatever that week needs.

We source Ayis from networks full of capable, trustworthy people — community groups, returning-to-work networks, and professional referrals — rather than generic gig-work listings.

Every Ayi is hand-picked for organisation, initiative and discretion, then vetted and trained to Ayi's service standard before being matched with a family. We match on fit and household needs, not just availability, and your same Ayi attends every visit so trust has time to build.

If it lives in your brain, it's on our list. It's everything you'd otherwise be doing during the second shift.

Here's a flavour of what our clients regularly ask us to do:

• The regulars, every session — laundry, kitchen and living spaces reset, meal prep, fridge and pantry restocking, returns and errands.
• The ad hoc — prescription collections, printing a Vinted label, chasing a tradesperson, picking up the thing you forgot.
• The bigger jobs — organising linen closets, going through outgrown school uniforms and drawing up what's needed for next term, a full seasonal wardrobe switchover.
• While you're away — we can call by to water the plants, feed the animals, and keep an eye on things.

If it's taking up space in your head, it's fair game to hand to your Ayi.

Ayi is pronounced "eye-ee" (/ˈaɪ.iː/). It comes from the Chinese word 阿姨, meaning "auntie" — but really, it's about having a trusted, known extension of your family: someone who simply knows how your household runs, the way an aunt would.

Most of us are a long way from that kind of built-in support today. That's exactly what we're trying to hold onto — and rebuild — for London's families.

Ayi is a membership, not a contract you're locked into. There are three packages — Supported, Steady and Held — ranging from one weekly session to three sessions a week, and you can start small and scale up as you need.

Not ready to commit? The Ayi Signature Session is a single four-hour taster visit with no ongoing obligation, so you can see what membership would look like before deciding.

This isn't really about income or family structure. It's for anyone who needs support running a household and wants their time back for the things that actually matter — instead of the drudgery of keeping a house going.

Most of our clients are working families, but we've also supported single parents, university students living away from their family's support network, elderly clients, and "sandwich generation" families juggling both children and ageing parents. If running a home is taking more from you than it should, that's reason enough.

Your Ayi arrives, does a quick scan of the home and your running list, and plans the session around what your household needs most that week.

The first hour is always the Reset — laundry on, kitchen cleared, living spaces tidied. The middle hours focus on your priorities: meal prep, errands, seasonal tasks. Before leaving, your Ayi leaves a quick handover note on what's been done and what's in the fridge, then the door closes and your evening is yours.

No — you don't need permission. You're doing an incredible job, and none of us were ever meant to do this entirely on our own. Just being here, asking the question, means part of you already knows there's more you want from your life than keeping a house running.

So: no, you don't need permission. But if you want it — here it is.

This matters especially for women and mothers. We've been told we can have it all, as long as we also do it all ourselves. That's not true, and it's not fair. Ayi exists, in part, to get women out from under domestic drudgery and into the things that actually light them up — whatever that looks like, however that takes shape. The world needs more of that.