How clean should I leave the house?

[HelenTheHunter]

We are hoping to exchange this week with completion in a few weeks.
Our buyers have messed us about a bit and taken quite a chunky price chip for frankly spurious reasons. I was planning to pay for a deep clean on the day we move but def won't be doing that. We have a cleaner weekly so it's hardly dirty, I'm just planning to hoover each room as there will be dust under the furniture and make sure there's no skid marks in the loo. Will that do??

I’d leave it as clean as you’d expect your new place to be. Wipe around surfaces, hoover etc. Wouldn’t go to length of cleaning windows or steaming grout etc. I’d always do a deep clean of my new place anyway, but it is nice not to deal with someone else’s visible grime.

Agree that I wouldn’t pay for a professional clean if the sale process hasn’t been pleasant!

I think your sale negotiations are irrelevant to leaving a clean house.

Whether you pay for a clean or do it yourself depends on how much time you've got in on the day. The last time we moved, I had enough time to give it a once over myself. Dusted, hoovered, cleaned the floors, made sure bathrooms were clean as well as inside of fitted appliances. The windows had been cleaned on their usual schedule (every 6 weeks) so I didn't do anything special on the day.

It didn't really take a lot of time once the house was empty to do the jobs.

Those reasons might or might not be spurious to the buyer!

We were pissed off with our buyers (they delayed by a day on exchange which was stressful as we had left the property and were looking at staying in a hotel but luckily not), and messed us about before.

However we cleaned the house including the cupboards etc to make it as clean as possible. Came in handy because we needed them to forward the odd random parcel etc.

Compare that to our sellers who “cleaned” the house but it felt dirty with horrific dust, the smell of dog everywhere etc etc.

We're in a similar boat. Just endlessly waiting to exchange. I won't do a deep clean or anything when we move, but I'll definitely give the place a good hoover and make sure all surfaces and the bathrooms are clean.

It definitely won't be grotty or anything!
It will certainly be in a state that I'd be happy to move in to. Our cleaner will come 2 days before we move as normal which will help.
I had (naive) thoughts that it would all go swimmingly as they seemed lovely at the viewing and we had plans to pay extra to have the appliances cleaned, leave them a moving in present etc. But need to claw back every penny we can now to be honest! They can use some of the money they've gained to pay for their own deep clean
Was just wondering what sort of standard is usual to do to if you're doing it yourself so these replies have been really helpful, thanks. I think I will be aiming for a basic surface clean, like kitkat.
Should I clean the oven??
I'm anticipating having to fully clean the house we are moving to (Was a rental, not in great shape) so am loathe to clean two ovens in one day but will if I have to...

I recently moved. I cleaned my bathrooms and kitchen to within an inch of their life, wiped all surfaced, swept, hoovered and cleaned all cupboards. Its a matter of pride for me and they will be talking the the neighbours ive known for the last 7 years.

On the other hand, you could have left the house like my sellers did. Shit and piss still in the toilets, nothing cleaned, rubbish left everywhere becuase they couldnt be bothered to take it with them / do tip runs. Its a matter of shame. Some people clearly have none.

Our buyers messed us about a bit - got the price reduced a bit; were awkward about completion date. I still did a thorough clean, although didn't pay for someone else to do it. Glad I tried to keep relations positive, as our cat escaped the night before the move and we had to ask the buyers to let us know when she turned up. And the buyers probably weren't that pleased with the moth holes in two areas of carpet that we discovered when we moved furniture!

Eek! Def won't be leaving it like your new house shires!

Yes, clean the oven and the fridge and freezer if they are staying.

Its a true fact that other people's dirt is always worse than yours. So whether you leave a pristine palace or a house from hell they'll find fault. So just clean to standard you're happy with.

Try Oven Pride for cleaning your oven cheaply . Sometimes you see it in the £1 shops, but most supermarkets stock it. Very easy to use., Comes with big plastic bags so you can brush it on the shelves and stick them in the bag overnight.