cleaner – Bark.com Blog

How much does a house cleaner cost in the UK? 2020

Updated: Read our latest 2021 House Cleaner Price Guide.

Average price of a house cleaner in the UK

£10 – £20 per hour

What can I expect to pay for a house cleaner?

Want to hire a house cleaner but not sure of the cost? Read on to find out how much your cleaning expert will charge for regular visits, one-off cleaning services, deep cleans, and more. With the housework out of the way, you’ll have more time to focus on what matters in life.

Benefits of hiring a cleaning service

We all want a pristine home, but let’s be honest, scrubbing the floors or dusting for hours isn’t on the top of our list of priorities – especially when life is already so hectic! Whether you’re looking for a one-off clean or regular visits, hiring a house cleaner is a great way to keep your home in tip-top condition, giving you the time to focus on what’s important to you.

A house cleaner will be armed with the tools and knowledge to get rid of stubborn stains and keep your home germ-free. If you are looking for specialist services like oven or end of tenancy cleaning, Bark can help you find an expert for the job.

How much does a house cleaner cost in the UK?

There is no fixed rate for house cleaning, but to give you a general idea, we’ve put together a breakdown of the average cost based on the prices of local UK professionals:

Average cost (per hour)	£15
Minimum cost (per hour)	£10
Maximum cost (per hour)	£20

What changes the price of hiring a house cleaner?

The cost of domestic cleaning services can vary depending on a number of factors. These include:

Type of cleaning service
Number and size of rooms
Condition of your house – deep cleaning vs. regular cleaning
Location

Type of cleaning service

There are lots of different cleaning services available based on the requirements for your home. Some cleaning services need more time, effort, and specialist equipment than others, which makes them more expensive per hour. To get a better idea of how much different types of cleaning services cost on average, see our handy breakdown below:

Type of cleaning	Average price (per hour)
Window cleaning	£25
General cleaning	£15
Floor cleaning	£15
After building work cleaning	£14
Fridge cleaning	£12
Upholstery cleaning	£12

Some cleaning services are normally charged at a set price instead of per hour:

Type of cleaning	Average set price
Carpet cleaning (per room)	£25 – £35
Oven cleaning (per appliance)	£45 – £60

Number and size of rooms

It’s no surprise that the more rooms you have, the higher the price of a house cleaner will be. Some rooms take longer to clean than others. Bathrooms are notorious for being a pain to clean as they get dirty so quickly, so the more bathrooms you have, the more you will pay.

If you have bigger rooms, the cost per hour or set price will be higher. To give you an understanding of this, here’s how much a carpet cleaning service will cost on average depending on the size of the room:

Room size	Average cost (in total)
Small	£25
Medium	£30
Large	£35

Condition of your house

If you’ve neglected your home for too long, a house cleaner will charge more as they’ll need more time to whip it back into shape. If you feel like your home needs that extra little bit of TLC, you may want to hire someone for a deep clean, which is normally carried out every 3-6 months. A deep clean is more expensive than a regular clean, which is normally carried out every 1-2 weeks.

A regular clean involves:

Tidying the house
Cleaning the bathroom (toilet, shower, sink)
Cleaning the kitchen (wiping counters, cleaning hobs, removing rubbish)

A deep clean involves:

Removing limescale from shower heads
Oven cleaning
Window cleaning

Deep cleaning is more expensive as it requires a more thorough job.

Type of cleaning	Average price (per hour)
Regular cleaning	£10 – 15
Deep cleaning	£15 – £20

Location

Another factor to consider is your location. Like most services, expect to pay more if you live in bigger cities, like London. To give you a better idea, here is the average cost of a house cleaner in the big smoke compared to other parts of the UK. Find a house cleaner in London.

Location	Average price (per hour)
London	£15 – £20
Rest of UK	£10 – £15

How can I save money on house cleaning services?

Regular cleaning – If you hire a cleaner on a regular basis you will keep costs down as you won’t have to pay a hefty fee for a deep-cleaning service later down the line.
Keep labour time at a minimum – If you want to keep costs down, be picky when choosing which rooms need to be cleaned, as this will reduce the labour time needed and total price. Bedrooms are fairly low maintenance, so you could clean these yourself to minimise costs.
Price packages – Some cleaners will offer discounts for regular weekly or biweekly visits – so don’t be afraid to haggle!

Need a break from cleaning? Let us do the legwork for you. Find a House Cleaner on Bark.com

Cleaners’ confessions – the weirdest things found at work

We recently asked 2,011 of our Bark.com cleaners about the weirdest things they have found whilst in a client’s home and the results were certainly interesting!

In addition to the weirdest things they have found, cleaners were also asked what is the weirdest thing they have been requested to clean and what is the most awkward situation they’ve been in at work.

Ten of the weirdest items cleaners have found in a client’s house:

A cardboard box full of ashes
A collection of Voodoo dolls full of pins
A clean chicken carcass under a pile of magazines
A jewellery box full of ladies fingernails
5ft plaster cast statue of a penis
A sexual dollhouse brothel
A real elephant’s foot
A jar of dead moths
A replica farm in the living room complete with real grass and watering holes
A 10-inch wooden dildo

Cleaners also revealed the weirdest things they had been asked to clean:

A large stone statue of a very well-endowed man
A client’s grandmother
Miniature dolls posed in sexual positions (presumably for the dollhouse brothel)
The soiled area of a recently deceased person (could be smelt 200 feet away)
A taxidermy pigeon collection
A client’s dentures
A collection of moss covered rocks in the living room
A fridge full of maggots
Nazi memorabilia
A plastic fairground pig

A handful of respondents admitted that nothing really shocks them anymore, with others describing some of their most awkward encounters. Such as:

Arriving and seeing the client running around naked inside through the glass door
Being asked to dress up in a maids outfit
Being forced to wear a webcam
Letting themselves into what they thought was an empty home to find the occupant in the bath
A customer bursting in to use the toilet whilst the cleaner is cleaning the shower
Cleaning the TV and accidentally switching it on to show a pornographic film with the client in the same room
Walking in on the client having sex
Being asked to clean items outside of the house for neighbours to witness
Arriving to find the clients drunk and giving each other piggybacks around the house
Cleaning a bedroom and finding a used condom on the floor, to which the client came in and cleaned it up, apologising profusely

Kai Feller, Bark.com co-founder, said,

“It’s interesting to see the sorts of things people have in their houses, cleaners get a unique and intimate insight into the lives of others, I doubt there’s ever a dull day on the job!

“I hope member of the public will have a newfound respect for cleaners after seeing the results of our research – it’s obvious that they have to put up with the most weird and wonderful requests on a daily basis.”

You can hire a cleaner here, or to sign up as a cleaner click here.

Electricians revealed as the highest-earning self-employed pros in the UK

There are pros and cons to going solo, however over the last few years more and more people have made the switch to self-employed work.

With hundreds of thousands of self-employed pros using Bark.com, we’re in a unique position to find out which professional is the highest paid in the UK, when self-employed, and how it compares to their employed counterpart’s salary.

Surveying 20,000 professionals across 11 key sectors from our platform, we asked service providers about their earnings to find out the UK salary average for each service. In addition to information on their earnings, self-employed professionals were asked about their lifestyle and work-homelife balance. The research took a few months to collect due to the magnitude of the project. but allowed for a wealth of data for us to draw our conclusions from.

When results were processed it was obvious across all sectors that those who are self-employed have the potential to earn far more than their employed counterparts, and in some cases more than double.

Interestingly, electricians top the list of the highest earning self-employed pros, and independent cleaners can earn close to £30k a year, three times the amount of employed cleaners!

Here are the highest paid self-employed service providers in the UK:

1. Electricians £51,200

Employed salary £27,287

2. Counsellors £45,111

Employed salary £24,544

3. Landscape gardeners £40,140

Employed salary £19,143

4. Make-up artists £38,918

Employed salary £20,952

5. Graphic designers £38,760

Employed salary £22,012

6. Photographers £36,823

Employed salary £20,812

7. Plumbers £36,359

Employed salary £23,788

8. Tutors £34,147

Employed salary £22,630

9. Painter and decorators £33,075

Employed salary £21,405

10. Personal trainers £33,029

Employed salary £19,494

11. Cleaners £29,584

Employed salary £10,573

Despite a massive 90% of respondents stating that their workload is much more now that they are self-employed, more than two-thirds (68%) of professionals stated that they have been far more successful in keeping a healthy home and work balance. Nearly three quarters (73%) of respondents felt that their increased stress levels are worth it for the monetary increase.

Kai Feller, Bark.com co-founder, said,

“At Bark we work with thousands of self-employed sole traders, and thought it would be interesting to see how much they earn a year. We picked the top 11 most popular self-employed sectors in the UK, and you can see why so many people decide to go self-employed – a good living can be made from all of the professions.

“The survey took a good couple of months, but was well worth the wait, because the results speak for themselves – being self-employed results in a much higher income. We were expecting them to earn more, but almost double on average is a huge increase. That being said being self-employed comes with a lot more work, responsibility and pressure more often than not, it’s definitely not a career choice to be taken lightly.”

Turns out that going self-employed might be more beneficial than you thought!

*https://www.payscale.com/

Top tips to clear away those post-freshers blues

It’s so easy to get caught up in the joys of freshers week after the stress of getting to university and the nerves of meeting new people. And after all, fresher’s week is a time to relax and find your feet. But when the freshers cloud of cheap vodka and dodgy kebabs begins to fade, it can be hard to re-adjust and know what to do with yourself. Here are some tips to help clear away those post-freshers blues and get yourself going for the year ahead.

Quick off the block: It’s tempting to miss your first few classes – you’re exhausted from your first week and probably suffering from fresher’s flu. However, these first classes give out a lot of information and if you fall behind now, it’ll mean missing a lot of nights out later in the year. Try and make as many as possible and if you absolutely have to miss one then e-mail your lecturer to try and get some information.

Explore: It’s pretty safe to assume that most of your fresher’s experience took place in a kitchen, some questionable dark clubs and the local chicken shop. So get out and explore the area you’re in! Go for brunch, join a local sports team or get rid of all those fresher’s toxins with a nice spa day and massage. As an added bonus, you can get discounts for so many of these activities at the freshers fare!

Class Of University Students — Reminder – lectures are what you’re here for!

Supplement: It’s nice to have some down time, but remember you’ll never have this much free time again. You’ll probably regret it if you don’t make the most of your spare time at uni – so take up something on the side of your studies. Whether that’s photography or another language, broaden your horizons and you never know when it might come in handy.

Don’t feel trapped: Many students will spend freshers with their flatmates – mainly because this is easy and can help them feel more secure. This doesn’t mean you have to be best friends with these people for your entire life or even until third year – you can find friends in your classes or societies too. Do try and keep your flatmates on side though, you do still have to live with them and you don’t want to end up in a passive aggressive notes-on-the-butter stand off!

Get some kind of routine: Okay, so we’re not going military style but try and get something of a schedule. Nobody wants to be left with a 3000-word essay to write the night before it’s due with a hangover, all our plates to clean and a massive pile of washing (cleaners don’t tend to fit in to the student budget – although for the lazy of you, we can help with finding a cleaner!) It is inviting to “forget” about tasks like this, but they are all part of university life, and getting on top of them can make the difference between grades.

Change course: Don’t be afraid to switch subjects – it’s better to do it early than to find yourself going into 3^rd year with a course you hate. Do give things some time to settle though, as you might start to enjoy the course once you get into it. If this is on your mind go and speak to your advisor, head of department or even the careers department – all of whom are well placed to comment.

Budget: The most talked about – or the most ignored subject for students. Blowing all your money during freshers may seem like a great idea, but when you’re eating 18p instant noodles along in your room for the three months you might regret it! Many students do go into their overdraft so try and find one with no interest, but also thinking about getting a part-time job. It’s a great way of meeting new people and exploring the town a little more, and can help you make ends meet.

instant noodle — Trust us. You’ll regret it

If you’re looking for different opportunities of chances to learn new skills why not check out Bark.com to get help from professionals in your area?

For more Bark.com tips and insights, why not check out our other blogs?

Keeping cool with Back to School – top tips for kick-starting the Autumn term

Just when you thought you had enough on your plate trying to keep the kids busy during the summer holidays, Autumn term comes running round the corner, bringing with it a long to-do list to get them focussed and back into study mode.

We know there can be a lot to remember and little things that can easily slip your mind but not to fret, Bark.com are here to help with five top tips for preparing for the return of the school run.

Prep the kit: It’s no secret that the start of a new school year involves a lot of additional costs, whether that’s the all-essential new uniform and shoes, funky stationery or a rucksack to help them carry their books home. So make sure you plan ahead and look out for those great back-to-school deals to keep costs down. If you’ve got a particularly long check-list, why not make a day of it? Going with another parent may help ease the stress to it too!

You never know what they might need... — You never know what they might need…

Clear out and organise: Spring cleaning is fairly common place, but what about a Summer spruce? As the warmer months draw to an end, it’s also time to start thinking about packing away the summer dresses and getting out the woollies. It’ll make the morning rush far less stressful, especially for those with big families, if you can avoid wardrobe mix-ups from the outset, as well as keep your little ones happy and sniffle-free. And if you need an extra helping hand, why not look for a local cleaner to ease the load?

Find homework help: For both schoolchildren returning to the classroom, and Mum and Dad at home, the new school year means new level of work to tackle. Being a parent often requires you to also be an ad hoc tutor – but if the thought of racking your brain to remember what an iambic pentameter is, or what SOHCAHTOA stands for, maybe consider a private tutor to help bridge the gap. On Bark.com, we have a range of specialised professionals available to help children achieve the best grades possible, with backgrounds in subjects including:

Expand their horizons: While keeping on top of studies is vital, we all know the importance of hobbies and work/life balance, so why not look for fun and creative extra-curricular activities to keep your child active and entertained. Whether you’re looking for piano lessons or guitar lessons, dance instructors, martial arts classes or even sculpting teachers, there’ll be plenty of things they can take up in the local area to give them some variety as well as new skills.

DISCLAIMER - Sunday mornings may be sacrificed — DISCLAIMER – Sunday mornings may be sacrificed

Have fun! While the summer holidays may quickly seem like a distant memory, there are plenty of festivities to get the children feeling motivated and excited throughout the autumn months. From harvest festivals, to Bonfire night and, of course, Halloween, there’s family fun to be had all around so get ready for the trick-or-treating! Why not even find a local sewing class and see how creative you can get with your costumes?

Pumpkins, broomsticks and sweeties galore!

For more Bark.com tips and insights, why not check out our other blogs?