The article aims at analysing the employment pathways of migrant women in housekeeping and care-giving activities in the Italian labour market. A dataset of 597 in depth interviews has been exploited in order to highlight a) the characteristics of labour contracts, b) the processes that lead to segregation and entrapment in housekeeping and care-giving activities and c) the subjective aspects concerning how women consider domestic/care work, what expectations they had before leaving their home country, and what opportunities they think they have in the Italian labour market. A special focus on work histories of women coming from Philippines, Ecuador, Peru, Romania, Ucraina and Morocco has been developed in order to analyse more deeply expectations and aspirations of interviewed people.