To think that it's fine to just do the cleaning basics?

[MoreDangerousThanAWomanScorned]

Yes, this is basically a whinge about my husband, but I want MN validation that I am right. I am prepared I may instead get told that he is, in which case I shall simply never tell him I asked...!

DH and I both work four days a week in fairly full-on jobs, have two young kids, we volunteer, both have hobbies, the older kid has hobbies. Basically we are busy people. One of the consequences of this is that our house is quite far from a show home. I would say we split the domestic stuff pretty evenly but that we have quite different attitudes to what 'doing the cleaning' is, and it's driving me potty. I feel that, at this stage in our lives, if we get the hoovering done, all the surfaces clean, the clutter manageable and the sheets and towels are changed with a reasonable regularity, we're doing well. He thinks that 'a job isn't worth doing unless it's worth doing properly'. But in practice this means we spend the same time cleaning, but I can do basically the whole house in that time and he works industriously on making a tiny area perfect.

For instance, yesterday. His parents were coming over for lunch, so in the morning we agreed we needed to clean. I went upstairs and changed all the beds, tidied all the rooms (making the kids 'help' me with theirs, which was actually considerably slower than doing it solo), cleaned the upstairs bathroom and vaccumed the stairs and upstairs. I came downstairs to find a kitchen sink that literally gleamed, two kitchen cupboards fully reorganised and cleaned, the microwave fully cleaned inside and out, and DH bent over the oven carefully getting crumbs out of the dipped line around the hob. He hadn't been secretly slacking off - he clearly had been cleaning the whole time. But he had also, to my mind, achieved naff all in the greater goal of making the house look as if civilized humans live there.

He says if we did it my way all the time the 'fiddly jobs' would never get done - that cupboard would stay a disorganized mess for ever more. I think that in our current stage of life that is normal, and basically we can just live with the cupboards being a mess for the sake of having the whole house look ok. AIBU?

YABU = he is right, the 'deep jobs' need doing and if that means you live in a house where every other room is chaos but the understairs cupboard looks fab so be it
YANBU = you are right, there is limited time and so it is fine to do everything to an ok standard rather than anything being done to perfection

I would write a list and colour code so you each know what priority jobs are and who is doing it.
Neither of you is right or wrong, you have your way of doing things. My husband is similar to yours so we write a list, and tackle a room at a time together. I think you should be doing this every week though, not just when you are in a rush because someone is popping over. I think doing it that way is far more stressful!

Mad priorities?

If you both work 4 days a week, that means you each have 3 days a week off.

If volunteering is affecting your housework so much that 3 days off isn't enough, I'd say you both have your priorities wrong at this stage in your lives.

We had guests coming in the afternoon and agreed to clean in the morning. I did the upstairs and came down to find DH painting a door.

Life is too short to be falling out over cleaning. This is the sort of thing uni students in house shares get arsey with each other over.
Pay a cleaner or agree to disagree.

If volunteering is affecting your housework so much that 3 days off isn't enough, I'd say you both have your priorities wrong at this stage in your lives.

I'd say volunteering trumps housework TBH - who cares if you hoover once a week or once a month as long as no-one's suffering.

i don't think either of you are being unreasonable, he thinks that he is as right as you think you are.

personally , i would accept that you both have different ideas of cleaning and harness those strengths.

yesterday, he could have argued that you didn't need to change the beds for guests coming (unlikely they'd be going in the bedrooms).

So in cases like that, i'd agree with DH that he deep cleans the room downstairs, seen by guests which most needs it (or 2 rooms) whilst you do the surface clean of the rest of the house.

And if you tend to do a house clean each week, that you do that each time - you do the surface clean, he deep cleans each room at a time.

To be honest, i'd probably drop the volunteering until life is easier as well, sounds lie you have a lot on your plate.

I don’t think it’s a straightforward answer really, you’re both right. The deep clean does need to be done, so does the surface level cleaning. We also have a young family currently so we basically do a deep clean on a weekend so cupboards are sorted, oven/sink etc properly cleaned, floors & bathrooms deep cleaned and then mid week it’s the surface level stuff, wiping benches, hoovering, tidying toys, changing beds etc.

You can’t just leave the deep cleaning indefinitely

You two could be the perfect cleaning match.

Currently i am in a new cleaning routine we have daily tasks which are laundry, dishwasher, make beds, quick clean of bathrooms, hoover and kids tidy away any toys. Also a 30 min task which is pick a room/job and do it fot 30 mins. Theory being that each room gets a 30 min more detailed clean regularly so the more you do it the cleaner everywhere is and the deeper the cleans get as happening regularly. But to do what he can in 30 mins and he can go back to it the next day. The basic jobs can be done easily in 30 mins if you're doing them every day.

You guys are not compatible, he needs someone who would either live like pigs with him or be (literally) happy to clean up after him / sort his home out. I know it might be a surprise to many but both types of such women do exist, however few and far between.
For you though, OP, Time to move on.