End of tenancy clean diy or hire someone?

[Deptofdebt]

Been quoted just shy of £500 for an end of tenancy clean. This feels absolutely barking mad to me 😭 we are absolutely flat broke at the moment, rising costs has put our living expenses to over £5000 a month so we are constantly in the negative, using credit cards to buy milk!! However, if we don’t pay someone what are the chances of the LL keeping our deposit? We desperately need it all back in order to pay for our new rental. It’s a pretty big house, 4 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. I have a 4 year old and a 16 week old baby so it would probably be easier to pay someone, however I would need to borrow it from somewhere (not sure where!).

has anyone done their own end of tenancy clean? I’m not even sure if it’s allowed?! It probably sounds like we are very wealthy with a big house, but we were housing DHs family who left us up shit creek with all their bills and their rent and completely destroyed us financially so… 😬

Yes, recently cleaned a 3 bed 2 bath and got the full deposit back.

It's not actually legal anymore for a landlord to insist on professional cleaning so it's fine to do it yourself. You just need to be thorough!

Dust everywhere, don't forget the tops of door frames. Clean the tops of the kitchen cupboards. The soap drawer in the washing machine. Wipe all the sockets and light switches. These are the kind of places people miss and the LL might be awkward about.

All I can advise is if you are hiring somebody, make sure they provide a service. I did this once and MY LIFE, they were was utterly useless. Only one turned up - she brought no cleaning materials.
i was packing and had to start cleaning also and all I kept hearing was “what shall I do now?” “what shall I do next?” me gesturing everywhere*
When she opened a full cutlery draw and asked if I wanted her to tip thr contents binned, I had enough. I paid her to leave. Don’t make my mistakes.

I’m No Expert but that amount is Far Too Much, it’s actually laughable it’s so ridiculous.
Who gave you that quote?

It can be done.

But you need to give yourself a lot of time, and with a baby you might not be able to devote continuous hours to it.

Can you start asap on things like cleaning the top of doorframes, the oven, windows, window sills, top of windows, and scuff marks on the walls? Do some every day. Pack in the evenings when the children are asleep.

Do you have friends who could help with carpet shampooing? Cleaning the bathroom and kitchen within an inch of their lives as soon as you move?

It helps if you can find somewhere to basically camp out for a few days between leaving the old place and moving into the new place - could you stay in a cheap hotel and go back for two days of cleaning? Could anyone care for the DCs while you clean?

The last time I left a rental where the landlords insisted on a professional clean, it was nowhere near as good as the one I'd done in an earlier rental. And the cleaner took an item belonging to the landlords away "to keep it safe". I dobbed the fucker in right away.

It does take time, so work ahead.

Hire someone. You could probably get someone cheaper though. Ea’s do thorough inspections and the cleaners clean inside your oven, the bathroom and get rid of all limescale and staining, professionally clean the carpets and floors, every surface in your house . Diy jobs always forget skirting or cupboards or leave hairs around. It’s a whole different level of clean. New tenants these days generally expect a professional clean and the EA would probably have to oay for one if you don’t do it. Then you would get charged.

Sorry just read you can’t afford it. Do it yourself but clean it twice. Everywhere.

I am a landlord and got professional cleaners in when the last tenant left. It was £350 for a 3 bed house. They were there 8 hours and did an amazing job. The oven, bathrooms were sparkling. It was a lot - I didn’t think it would be that expensive but they did a far better job than I could.

If you're physically capable of clean, I'd do it myself. Knowing it's coming up, I'd start with cleaning windows, wiping down doors and skirting boards. If you white goods aren't integrated, pull them forward now and remove dust, grime. If white goods are staying give them a good clean now, that way it'll just be a quick wipe over. Any tiles or cupboards that have grease, again clean them. That way, when you more it'll be more hoover, clean bathroom, quick wipe down cupboards inside.

We did our own twice (3 bed, 2 bath both times) - once it was fine, no issues, the second time we didn’t vacuum inside the bottom of the wardrobes and it turned out one of our cats had regularly been sleeping in there and left a lot of hairs so they knocked off £100 for a carpet cleaner. Still much cheaper than a full clean would have been 🤷‍♀️Luckily they had given permission for the cats so at least that wasn’t an issue.

My husband also did his own when he moved out of a modern flat and it took them a month to inspect, then they tried to charge him for a cleaner because there was dust on the skirting boards - luckily he’d taken pics throughout just before he handed over the keys, so he sent them those and told them they were having a laugh. They refunded the full deposit.

So I would say in you’re circumstances, rather than borrow, I would do it myself but a) clean EVERYTHING and b) take photos afterwards.

I did the post tenancy clean myself. Then I took detailed pictures of every inch of the flat. When I chased the agent for my deposit on day 32, they said 'the flat needed a light clean so shall we say £500.'

I pointed out that I'd scrubbed a one bed flat for two days, washed walls, skirting boards, windows & sills, shampooed the carpet and what exactly needed cleaning as I had photos of everything? At which point they returned my full deposit.

Be prepared to prove the flat is spotless.

I'm a landlord (one property, my previous home) and I did the last clean at changeover of tenants. This took me 10 hours, plus a trip to the dump, plus a good bit time trying to get hold of a knew fridge seal as the previous one was black with mould. This was after the tenant minimal effort. The house wasn't damaged but very grubby. Obviously they didn't get their full deposit back.

So, all in probably 12 hours, plus travel time, plus cleaning products. So I don't think it will ever be less than several hundred £. Definitely doable by yourself though if you have the time, and the attention to detail, as I am not a cleaner by trade.

If you can get all your belongings out a couple of days early and then either you or DH tackle it solo without the baby, then it should be doable.

Most tenancy agreements will stipulate that the property needs to be professionally cleaned and that you need to produce a receipt. I used to work for a lettings agents and sadly we saw all too many times what some tenants thought was clean (i.e. filthy)

You can’t afford this! If you’re putting milk on a credit card then you can’t afford £500 for a clean.

Start early, double clean and take plenty of photos. You’ve got this.

we once hired cleaners who did a worse job than we did. I will always do it myself now.

If the quote includes professionally cleaning carpets (wet extraction), oven, curtains and windows (inside and out), it is probably worth finding the money.

I always clean myself apart from carpets, curtains and external windows. I've always had full deposit back as I'm thorough and have an overlap with both properties as 4/5 bed, 3/4 bath is a lot to clean with absolute attention to detail.

Don't forget maintaining the garden can affect your deposit too.

Have a good look at your check in inventory. This is the level of cleanliness you need to achieve. If it was documented as sparkling when you moved in, it should be returned that way. However, if there's no inventory with photos, the landlord will have a very hard time trying to deduct from your deposit.

Years ago, we did it ourselves and forgot the soap drawer of the washing machine!! They kept £50 off our deposit. I was livid. Lol. Everything else was spotless!

Do you know anyone who keeps a show home? MIL is a neat freak so we paid her rather than a company (and she probably did a better job than any company could). Think we gave her £50 at the time. These days I'd probably make it £100.

I had a similar experience with our last property! Hired fantastic cleaners and they did an awful job, to the point that we were then charged by the landlord for another clean!! I was gutted. They refused to refund us as well because we weren’t wearing shoe covers in the photos we sent in with the complaint 🥴

that quote was direct from the EA so we could probably find cheaper but from previous experience at least if we pay them and the clean isn’t up to scratch they would have to redo?!

i think I could do it myself, and we do have 3 days crossover where the house will be empty so that makes it easier! Definitely won’t forget the washing machine drawer 🤣🤣 Has anyone got any tips for removing hard water stains/limescale from shower door windows?!

I'm a LL and I don't care who has done the cleaning. Just care it is left clean, particularly the cooker as next tenant has to use that. You could clean house yourself provided you think you can get it to high standard and pay person to do cooker as they have the chemicals needed to make the shelves gleam.

I always clean myself, never had a problem getting full deposit back - make sure you dust skirting boards!

Worth mentioning that staffing shortages and rising costs have hit cleaning companies too, which might explain the £500. My cleaner went bust a couple of months ago because he couldn’t hire or keep staff and the costs were rocketing.

Also i forgot to add that our LL didn’t do an official check in so no reference for how the property looked before! Does this mean we’re screwed?!

Quite the opposite! They will be unable to prove the condition on move in. Just give the place a general clean, take lots of photos
and claim your full deposit from TDS. The onus is on the landlord to prove that it's in worse condition, which they have zero evidence of, so TDS will side with you.

I got a professional cleaner for a 2 bed house paid £300 and my god two of them spent 2 1/2 days on it. I'd have struggled to spend more than 2 hours . Which may explain the length of time needed...