How much would you expect to pay a gardener for day’s work?

£500 sounds fair to me.

Sounds horribly expensive, but I think it’s worth it as part of the cost of moving costs, and you just need to suck it up and hope it looks lovely when people come to view! When we listed we bought cheap new garden furniture, and a new L shaped sofa to define our snug, plus painted bedroom furniture white and replaced with a new IKEA wardrobe. We also borrowed or bought some dressing ‘bits’- headboard displays, matching bedspreads, that sort of thing. As a result the house looked immaculate for the pics and we had over twenty viewings.

Spend was probably £2k (plus significant input from me decluttering and painting!) but we transformed our home. I don’t think we added value, but we did increase the saleability. We sold quickly, at an excellent price, and got people through the door.

If I saw a house with the garden in a state I would wonder how many hidden horrors there were in the house, as it might indicate general poor maintenance, and would offer accordingly.

£500 sounds a bit pricey to me for just general clearance.

If they are actually landscaping then maybe it is more appropriate.

You don't need the best people in the world to clear stuff.

I suspect you are paying a "I live in a big house and need it done quickly" premium.

Mine mows and edges the lawn, weeds the beds and does general garden maintenance. He charges £25 an hour. I'd expect to pay more for things like tree surgery and heavier work. I'm in the relatively expensive South-East, for context.

That sounds very fair.

I objected to the young lad who turned up at my door looking for £50 for half an hour. (I posted earlier. He initially wanted £100. I must look as though I'm in my dotage.)

I get £29 an hour working as a supply teacher, so I wouldn't expect to pay much more than that for an hour's work from a gardener.

I paid £330 for one-off work last year and the gardeners were in and out very quickly - just under an hour. However, it was a squad of three men and they pruned a cherry tree, shaped some bushes beautifully and took all the rubbish away with them.

Given that it was heavy work that would have been very difficult for me and needed specialist equipment, plus they had to deal with a mature tree, I think that was fair.

Until recently, I was paying £50 for an hour with two gardeners.
They bring all own tools, work hard for the full hour.
Take away all the grass, hedge cuttings, weeds etc.

Although it feels a lot, that is wages x 2....waste disposal......van to be bought, insured and maintained..... all the equipment to be bought, maintained, and insured......presumably some liability insurance.......the owner will have to have insurance for injuries to employees........then build in sickness pay and cover for annual leave .........owner has to pay NI contributions and pension contributions on top of the wages the gardeners receive ........the rates have to be high enough to allow for the fact they might not work a full day or even occasional days (snow perhaps) when they can't work at all ........or presumably a buffer for a client dropping them suddenly, or a bad debtor etc.

You can see how it adds up - very different from Dave from the pub saying he'll cut your grass if you bung him twenty quid.

My gardener is coming for the first time tomorrow, and he is charging me £20 per hour for 6 hours work.

We pay our gardener £20.25 per hour.

£25 pp/ph

We just paid £220 for gardener and his youth (trainee? apprentice?) for a day, clearing beds and cutting back lots of overgrown shrubs. They also took down a rotting pergola type thing, it cost an extra £30 to dispose of the wood from that, as their permit for the recycling centre only covered garden waste. But I think Northern Ireland tends to be a bit cheaper for manual jobs still.

30-40 Euros here per hour per person so that would be between 350 and 500 pounds based on a 6 hour day.

We pay £25 per hour per person not including VAT.

£20 an hour each.

Possibly slightly less for a full day. Between £120-£140 per day each.

I have just paid £180 pp per day.

Here in the south-west a qualified gardener with van / insurance / tools is £25 per hour plus extra to remove rubbish.

Get the price beforehand.

A young lad came to my door looking for 'good, honest work'. Said he cleaned paths.

Great. My shoulder was shot at the time, so I could have done with the help.

How much to clean my front path?

£100.

I told him that I couldn't afford that. Straight away he went to £50. For half an hour's work?

I declined.

£400-£500

My peice of shit ex landlord charged us 1400

our gardener charges £350 per day in Yorkshire when it requires 2 people - 1st hedge trim of the year, etc., but the trimmings go elsewhere on our land so need for disposal.

Then more like £200 per day for a 'normal' day when needed.

For those saying less than £150, bear in mind the gardener is trying to run his business as well as pay himself. He has a vehicle, equipment, insurance, etc. to cover, as well as disposing of waste.

If costs are an issue why not clean the oven and windows yourself( do the upstairs outsides leaning out from inside rather than up a long ladder). You do not need to paint anything. Buyers will no doubt change your decorating scheme. People don't care about that stuff when buying. Can you just put the mower over the lawns and weed patios etc yourself?
I've never bought a house that didn't need painting and cleaning, never put me off. Son just bought a house which was really dirty and needs decorating, no problem, it's the basic structure and layout that are the important things. Full survey brought up no issues.
So don't waste your money if you'd rather not spend it on things you can do yourself.

I think anywhere between £300-£500 is fair really. Especially if they're bringing their own tools and taking away all of the rubbish. Top end of that if they're VAT registered, so will have to incorporate the 20% VAT to charge. (If they're charging that kind of money for two of them and they're doing it on a full time basis, they'll easily be earning enough to have to be VAT registered and charge VAT!).

You can't compare to a jobbing gardener/handyman kind of person who'd probably not have a van, use your tools, leave lawn cuttings and hedge trimmings in your green wheelie bin, etc. Proper garden clearance of a neglected mess needs power tools and a van/skip to remove the rubbish.

Making me very nervous. Have to accept that it’s part of moving.

I have never spent money on people coming in to do any of these things before moving. I would mow the lawn, clean and tidy and maybe a lick of paint but that’s about it. I haven’t ever paid a decorator, gardener or oven cleaner in though, I just do it myself (probably very badly!). I never had any spare money though, so had no choice!

£200 per gardener per day

My partner charges £25 per hour, double that as you have 2 of them, and add the removal costs £500 sounds right