The Insider's Guide to Hiring a House Cleaner
7 Things the Cleaning Industry Doesn't Explain Very Well
Hiring a house cleaner is weirdly confusing. Prices are all over the place, "standard" and "deep" mean different things depending on who you ask, and everyone does an AMAZING job.
So how the heck are you supposed to know who to hire?
Here's what I'd tell a friend.
— Jennifer
So you get three quotes for your house…
And naturally you're thinking…
What the heck is the $300 cleaner doing in there?! 😂
Maybe more.
Maybe not.
Because here's the weird thing about cleaning quotes: the price alone doesn't actually tell you what you're buying.
Cleaning is a lot like that. Two cleaners can quote the exact same house and still be selling very different services:
Cleaner A
Makes beds, dusts ceiling fans and brings every supply.
Cleaner B
Focuses on kitchens, bathrooms & floors, and asks you to provide the vacuum.
Neither is automatically wrong. They're just different.
Maybe you don't care about ceiling fans. Fantastic. The point is to know what you're buying before deciding which number looks better.
So instead of comparing the prices first, compare what's behind them:
Once you know that, you can actually compare your options.
Instead of asking:
"Why are you more expensive?"
Try asking:
"What am I getting for this price?"
You'll learn a whole lot more from the answer.
There isn't an industry-wide definition of a "standard clean" or a "deep clean."
Every cleaner gets to decide what those words mean.
Ceiling fans
Cobwebs
Tops of things
That may require a deep clean.
Counters
Sinks
Furniture
Floors
The everyday areas in the normal cleaning path.
Baseboards
Doors & frames
Lower details
That may be a deep clean too.
Same words. Completely different cleaning.
And get the answer in writing.
Let's talk about the slightly awkward part of hiring a house cleaner.
You're giving someone access to your home.
Not the lobby of your office.
Your home.
The place where your kids sleep, your dog is roaming around and your Amazon boxes are stacked by the front door because apparently we're all just going to pretend those aren't there.
So yes, you want someone who can clean.
But I'd be just as interested in who is actually doing the cleaning.
This is where you'll see cleaners and cleaning companies say:
Great. Those things matter.
But they don't tell you nearly as much about the person walking through your front door as you might think.
A cleaning service can check all the right boxes on paper and still have completely different standards for who they hire, how they're trained and when they're ready to be sent into a customer's home.
And whether you choose an independent cleaner who personally comes every week or a service with a staff of cleaners, either can be a fantastic choice.
What I'd really want to know is: who am I trusting, and what stands behind them?
If you're hiring an individual cleaner, get to know them.
If you're hiring a service that sends other people into your home, ask:
"How do you decide who you hire and send into customers' homes?"
That's a much harder question to answer with a checkbox.
Listen to what they tell you:
Because at the end of the day, you're not hiring a logo.
You're trusting a person with your home.
Jennifer's Take
I always say:
Cleaning can be taught. Character can't.
I can teach someone how we clean a shower. I can teach them how we make a bed.
I can't teach someone to be honest, dependable, kind or respectful of someone else's home.
So I'd worry a whole lot less about whether a website has "Licensed, Bonded & Insured" plastered across it and ask: "How do you decide who you hire?"
That answer would interest me a whole lot more.
Here's something I've noticed after doing this for more than a decade:
The cleaning usually isn't the thing that makes people fire their cleaner.
It's everything around the cleaning.
You hired someone to take cleaning off your to-do list.
But somehow, you can end up with a whole new list:
That's not exactly what you had in mind when you decided to outsource the cleaning.
None of that is unusual. What matters is whether your cleaning service already knows how it handles those things before they happen.
Mental file you shouldn't need:
"Things I Need to Remember About the People I Hired So I Could Have Fewer Things to Remember."
Is there a system…
or are YOU the system?
Jennifer's Take
Here's a question I'd ask:
"What happens if my cleaning falls on a holiday or my regular cleaner calls out?"
I'm actually less interested in what their policy is than whether they have one.
Because life is going to happen. You just don't want every little hiccup becoming your problem.
If you're constantly reminding, checking, chasing and coordinating your cleaning service…
They didn't take the chore away. They just changed it.
I hate to break it to you, but eventually your cleaner is probably going to miss something.
We're human.
It happens. But what actually matters is what happens next:
100% Satisfaction Guaranteed!
You'll see that on approximately 9 out of 10 cleaning websites. Cool.
But here's what I'd actually want to know:
What happens if I'm NOT 100% satisfied?
Listen to what they tell you:
And here's the big one:
"Does anything actually change next time?"
That's the real test of a cleaning service.
Because one dusty nightstand isn't usually what makes someone start looking for a new cleaner.
Eventually you stop saying something because it's easier to grab a cloth and wipe it yourself.
Except now you're paying someone to clean your house AND you're cleaning behind them.
And getting a little more annoyed every time you do it.
The Core Truth
That's when a missed spot stops being a cleaning problem and starts becoming a service problem.
Jennifer's Take
If something bothers you, SAY SOMETHING. Please.
I promise you, a good cleaner would much rather hear:
"Hey, the shower wasn't quite right today."
than find out you've been fixing it yourself and getting more annoyed with every visit.
Give them the opportunity to fix it. Then pay attention to whether they do.
Because the problem isn't the dusty nightstand.
It's the dusty nightstand you mentioned three times.
Getting your house really clean once isn't the hard part.
Keeping the quality from slowly slipping after 10, 20 or 50 visits is.
The Routine Trap
Because over time, it's really easy for any cleaning routine to drift onto autopilot:
And that's when the little things can slowly start slipping:
Nothing is terrible.
It's just… not quite as good as it used to be.
And that's why, if you're looking for recurring cleaning, I wouldn't ask "Do you provide consistent quality?"
Of course they're going to say yes.
"How do you make sure my tenth cleaning is as good as my first?"
Now listen to what they actually do to keep the cleaning consistently good:
- Structured Training
- Notes About Your Home
- Regular Feedback
- Quality Checks
Some way of making sure the cleaner is still looking at your home, not just going through the motions. Something besides "I'm a great cleaner."
A promise isn't a system.
Staying really good takes focus and consistency.
Jennifer's Take
I'm a big believer in being really good at one thing.
If I'm hiring someone to clean my carpets, I want the carpet person. If I need my windows washed, give me the window person.
And if I'm hiring someone to care for my home every other week, I want someone who lives and breathes house cleaning.
Can one business do all of those things? Absolutely.
But there's a difference between offering a service and specializing in it.
Your first cleaning tells you whether someone can clean your house.
Your tenth tells you whether they've built what they do around consistently caring for it.
Yes, you want a clean house. Obviously. But if all you wanted was a clean house, you could clean it yourself.
You're hiring someone because you don't want to have to.
The Classic "Shower Spiral"
You know when you're standing in the shower, letting the conditioner soak into your hair…
You weren't trying to clean the house.
You were just trying to take a shower.
That's the part nobody really talks about. Cleaning isn't just the physical scrubbing—it's the mental overhead:
A great cleaning service takes all of that off your plate too.
Walking through your front door
"It's already done."
And for the love of all things clean… you get to just take a shower and enjoy your home.
Jennifer's Take
A great cleaning service doesn't just give you a clean shower.
It lets you take a shower without cleaning it.
That's the whole point.
A clean house shouldn't be the best thing about your cleaning service.
Getting to enjoy it should be.
Now you know a few things most people don't know to ask before hiring a cleaner.
Whether you hire GreenTree, another cleaning service, or that amazing cleaner your neighbor has had for 15 years, I hope you find someone who makes your life easier.
And if what I've described throughout this guide sounds a whole lot like the kind of cleaning service you're looking for…
Well, that's exactly why we built GreenTree the way we did. 💗
Jennifer Murphy
Founder, GreenTree Cleaning Services
Because every home deserves a happily ever after.
