r/HouseCleaning

I hired a cleaning company over a year ago to clean my 2 bathrooms and kitchen every other week. 3 hours, 1100 sq ft house. $144 to the company plus a $20 cash tip. I told the company I only wanted those three areas cleaned.

From the beginning the cleaner vaccuums the hallway and bedrooms, makes the beds, and a few other things. i am usually at work when she comes. I tried explaining “solemente cocina y banos” but I don’t think she got it. I emailed the company once and asked them to explain that I needed her to spend more time deep cleaning the bathroom and kitchen and skip the rest of the house. She is not very detail oriented, for example, the drain area in the kitchen sink was not thoroughly cleaned. more like she just surface cleans.

Anyhow, I decided to just let it go. But a month ago I found out she was cleaning my 70 year old hardwood floors with Mr Clean. Yikes. So now I leave a microfiber mop and wood floor cleaner in the entry way. I never left it out for her before because she wasn’t supposed to be cleaning that area anyways.

Anyhow, the woman speaks very little English. My Spanish is ok. How can I simply say to her “deep clean the bathroom and kitchen and don’t worry about the rest of the house unless you have extra time.” I will be home the next time she comes. I want to say it in a nice way and not sound rude.

This is Day1 of the challenge. For the next 30 days I'll post videos on how to grow your house cleaning business. How to get leads, how to get reviews and video testimonials, how to build a killer website, how to hire the right people, and much more. I've owned several home service businesses and I've helped hundreds of home service business owners scale their businesses.

I've written 3 books, "Home Service Millions Method", "Home Service Lead System", and "Home Service Hiring System". My books are available on Amazon for free if you're a Kindle member!

Day 1 of the Home Service Business Growth Challenge

Im cleaning an apartment where a resident smoked for nearly a dozen years. Whats the best way to clean the cabinets and everything else to get rid of the oil and smells?

I moved out for the first time and now I live alone, away from my family, and I realized I basically don’t know how to clean most things. I only know the very basic stuff. Most of the time I end up searching random YouTube videos like:

• how to clean shower glass
• carpet stains
• greasy pans
• washing machine smell
• bathroom yellow stains

but it feels all over the place and the advice is often different depending on the video.

Did you learn from your parents, YouTube, TikTok or trying things yourself?

I’m curious what actually worked for people because learning how to live on your own feels kind of confusing sometimes.

So I moved into this rental about 6 months ago and honestly just avoided using the garbage disposal because it smelled absolutely horrible. Well, I finally can't ignore it anymore because the whole kitchen reeks whenever I run water down the drain.

I've tried the usual stuff like running hot water and throwing some ice cubes down there, but it's still pretty gross. The smell is like a mix of old food and something sour that just won't go away no matter what I do.

I'm worried I might have really messed it up by letting it sit for so long. Has anyone dealt with a really neglected disposal before? What actually works when the basic cleaning tips aren't cutting it anymore?

My glass coffee table is constantly smudged. What's the fastest, most effective way to get it streak-free without a ton of effort? Bonus points for natural solutions!

Hi all. Moving into a 2,000 sq ft home (3/1.5) in the Chicago suburbs that was well taken care of by previous owner. Fridge and stove aren't immaculate, but the place is basically clean.

For other context, we are currently having the whole house painted and a bathroom remodeled before move-in. The company doing the work is meticulous, so I assume they will clean up after themselves reasonably well.

Nevertheless, before we move in, we want to hire a cleaning service to deep clean the easily neglected parts (sills, etc.). Two parents working FT with a 5 yo... just trying to get a fresh start. Put a nice shine on a 99-yo Dutch colonial. :)

House will be nearly empty for the cleaning--sofa in the living room, beds in two bedrooms, and a couple of stools at the kitchen island.

In accordance with community rules, I am NOT searching for a cleaning service here.

Any ideas about how much this should cost or other tips?

Thank you!!

Hello. I'm looking for an old fashioned house cleaner, paid by the hour, for a 2-3 hour bi-weekly cleaning of studio apartment. Full cleaning, not inefficient tidy up that's rushed and overpriced, and leaves me with an increasingly dirty apartment over time, as most 'residential cleaning companies' do now.

ANYONE have a recommendation? Much appreciated...

I saw a really cool post a few weeks ago where he said he created a sustainable business cleaning empty houses. If anyone understands the market, I'd like to ask some questions about whether this business works in Brazil. The way he said he prospected was by calling real estate agents. I tested this here in Brazil, and all the agents I spoke to said that this was the tenant's or landlord's responsibility. I'd like to know from you: who are the right people to prospect? Is it different in the US than in Brazil?

Contacted customer support and they claim its for cleanings that occurred in 2020 and 2021. They never contacted me to give me a heads up and explain that there might have been a billing error they were going to remedy. Instead they just used the card on file and charged it. That's super sketchy. Don't use these guys.

I hope this is allowed, because I could really use advice on how to handle this situation please, or if someone could point me to a thread that may be a better place?

Yesterday I hired someone to help with decluttering and organizing. However they seem to be a heavy smoker, which I forgot about. As soon as they walked into my apartment, I started coughing and then I smelled the cigarettes/smoke on them and I asked if they had just smoked, which they said they did. I didn't say anything after that for maybe 15 minutes, but in the meantime, every room they walked through the smell lingered, and I could smell it from other rooms as well, so I ended up opening all of my windows. After debating for awhile if I should ask, I asked (nicely) if next time she could please not smoke directly prior to working on my apartment? Because it is affecting my ability to breathe with my asthma, which has already been having issues with it for months. (Before this, we had already hired them to come again on Sunday, two days from today) They said they would keep that in mind. However they still ended up smoking twice in the few hours they were here. They did go outside to do that, but it just worsened the smell, and it felt disrespectful.

I told them I'm not trying to impede their rights but it literally is making it hard to breathe in my own apartment, and they said they respect that, but they're still going to smoke.

I left my windows open all day, but my apartment still smelled like 9 hours later when I was trying to sleep They weren't even in my bedroom but I could still smell it in there. It's also starting to be that time of year where I can't have my windows open because the heat and humidity affects my asthma as well.

Is it wrong for me to ask someone I'm paying to help clean my house to not smoke when working on my apartment so that I don't need to worry about being able to breathe in my own home? (I am helping as much as I can, but am disabled) I don't know how to handle this situation, and I'm on a short deadline and don't have many options for help.

I’ve been trying to keep my apartment cleaner lately because between work, cooking, and constantly tracking dirt inside, it feels impossible to stay ahead of the mess. I sweep almost every day, but dust and hair still collect around the couch, under chairs, and especially near the entryway no matter how often I clean. Recently I started looking into getting a robot vacuum coz I want something that can help maintain the floors during the week instead of waiting until everything already looks dirty again. I watched reviews, checked comparisons, and even browsed a few models on Amazon, Alibaba and eBay jus to understand which features people actually find useful in real homes. My biggest concern is whether these machines actually work well in normal apartments with rugs, tight corners, dining chairs, cables and small spaces where dirt builds up fast. Most videos online show huge open rooms that look spotless already. So it is hard to tell what daily use is really like. For people who have owned one for a while, did it genuinely make house cleaning easier long term. Especially with dust and pet hair or did it slowly turn into another gadget that mostly sits unused after the first few weeks?