'Clean your own house'

[LovelyTheresa]

This is just something that bugs me about this site. Every time there is a thread about the etiquette of employing a housecleaner, whatever the question is, someone invariably says 'clean your own house'. Why is that? It is so utterly bizarre, nobody would say 'do your own plumbing' 'do your own plastering' or even 'do your own garden' so why is it seen as so odd to have a cleaner!? I have a cleaner, everyone I know has a cleaner. It is only on this site that that is seen as out of the ordinary.

My cleaner gets £18.00 per hour, which might not be as good as a plumber, but is better than someone who works in a shop, I would imagine.

I guess another difference between the examples of outsourcing is that cleaning is a regular on-going service whereas there can't very many people who have a weekly plumber/plasterer....as well as the latter being more skilled jobs that people generally aren't able to do themselves (as opposed to dislike/don't have time for)
However where I live there are all sorts of ongoing or occassional services that I had no idea were a thing til I moved (oven cleaning, car valeting, present wrapping, school name labels, pushchair valeting, de-cluttering, meal planning, dog day spa, cleaning the garden of dog poo etc etc)

Part of it is what you are used to. My grandad was a ft gardener for a wealthy family, my dad worked in an office but did our own garden as well as other people's gardens as a side hustle. He did all the decorating or odd jobs around the house, my uncle was a plumber so he would sort stuff like that out. My mum was a TA but did cleaning as a side hustle. I'm sure she would feel it was very lazy if I didn't do my own cleaning (but I accept that's a me problem - especially as she died 13 years ago so can't voice that opinion to me!)

"I don’t want to hire a cleaner precisely because it will most likely be a woman and I wonder whether it is progressive to have another woman tidy up for us, especially if you have teenagers. Where do they learn responsibility for the mess they made."

@Goldenbear I know at least 2 people with male cleaners.

But in a shop you get paid every hour for a however many days you work and employment benefits like pension and holiday. A cleaner may do 3 or so clients a day or 6 a week as well as ones who are full...they have unpaid travel time can get cancelled and have no benefits so if legal pay their own tax national insurance etc.

I’m a cleaner. My clients are a mixture of people. Some with busy family/work lives who don’t want to start cleaning on their days off or when they get home from work. Some are older people who need help keeping on top of cleaning and ironing. A few I’m the only person they see from one week to the next and like a chat whilst I clean. Most just want me to concentrate on the kitchens and bathrooms/toilets. I like my job, going into a dusty/grubby house and coming out knowing it looks good and smells great.

Outsource as much as you can afford - cleaning, gardening, ironing, valeting the cars, DIY. There are no prizes for being a martyr to housework.

I worked three jobs through all of my university degrees. At one point, I worked as a cleaner. As a working mother for seven companies, I hire a cleaner every two weeks. With two cats and a child, it’s worth it. She gets £20 an hour and does a great job and I leave her alone to it. She’s funding her university degree too. I could care less what anyone says. It’s my life and I’m not going to waste time with my son/family cleaning and stressing myself out.

@jannier

But in a shop you get paid every hour for a however many days you work and employment benefits like pension and holiday. A cleaner may do 3 or so clients a day or 6 a week as well as ones who are full...they have unpaid travel time can get cancelled and have no benefits so if legal pay their own tax national insurance etc.
A cleaner can choose their hours to work around childcare. They can take holidays when they want. They can take on more or drop clients to suit. A good cleaner never struggles to find work.

People working in a shop have none of this flexibility. Higher hourly rate and total flexibility.

Yes you can work 24 hours a day 7 days a week but you won't get sick pay etc. And you won't get holiday pay. If you're working around childcare that's 2 or 3 2 hour cleans a day. If minimum wage of £11.24 an hour its not that great a wage at what most say they pay and unpaid travelling in between.Aldi pay over 23s up to £17 an hour and they get benefits.

@jannier but most jobs don't allow for the flexibility. I pay my cleaner £18 ph not £11.
Obviously different people want different things. She could get a job in Aldi but she doesn't want one. She wants the flexibility she has. She doesn't want to have to struggle with school holidays and school runs and taking a day off when her dc are poorly. She just says she can't come in.

Not everyone pays their cleaner the bare minimum, although there are plenty that do, and think the whole house should be cleaned in 2 hours. Under those circumstances I wouldn't do it.

I pay my cleaner £20 an hour for 4 hours and she comes every other week at a time and day to suit her.

I WFH and himself is retired, but I'm not compromising on this.

@jannier My Mum worked a cleaner when I was young due to the flexibility it offered. While another job may have paid more, she wouldn’t have been able to do it because she needed to be available to take care of me. She made a conscious decision to do this job because, after weighing up her options, this worked best for her.