Surely everyone cleans the house they're moving out from?

[MyVisionsComeFromSoup]

Bought a house last week, the sellers faffed around so much on their moving out day and didnt get out for 6 hours after completion, which annoyed me to start off with.

But then I realised that they hadn't done any cleaning whatsoever, it's taken us the best part of three days just to de-grease the kitchen!

Surely you'd leave a house at least vaguely presentable?

Well that's what's supposed to happen but some people don't and even if you do, you still get called a minger.

This happened to us too. Sadly not everyone has the same standards! I would be mortified to leave a home unclean.

When I moved into my current house we turned up over an hour after completion to find the owner in there attempting to mop floors, we told her to leave. The house had been empty for months she didn't live there she had been renting it out previously! It was absolutely filthy. Ive no idea why she decided to start cleaning AFTER completion. People are strange

You’d like to think but we also moved into a house that was in a disgusting state - it had been sat empty for a few months too so plenty of time to be cleaned. When we viewed it had been freshly cleaned so not so much the way the owners children had maintained it, they just stopped bothering once they knew their inheritance was coming in soon!

You'd think so but a lot don't.

I have always done this and not had a problem with houses we have bought. However, relatives bought a house that had dragged on and on and on before completing. The buyers had a small child and were expecting another. When they moved in they found the house filthy. All the walls were filthy, nothing looked like it had been cleaned for months. They were so upset and to have to start cleaning a house and painting it with a toddler and whilst heavily pregnant was horrible. The person they bought it from had moved round the corner, no excuse at all.

Rental agreements have clauses saying you need professional cleaning when you move out and they ask for "cleaning certificate" (even tho one "professional cleaning company " i used turned out to be a girl who turned up with a dustbuster portable car hoover and a dettol spray and still charged 250 for the privilege and certificate)

If it is not in the contract it is not in the contract
If they moving out furniture on the day there will be trails of dust
If they lived with manky oven then....

In short, no they don't.

In fact some people see moving out as an opportunity to do no cleaning for 6 months.

I'm really worried about this. Realistically, if all our furniture leaves on the day, and we're moving 2 hours away, I'm not sure how much time I'll have for a final deep clean. Obviously I'll do what I can before hand but doubtless something won't be up to standards/ expectations and I feel so bad to be letting the buyer down like that.

That said, I'm planning to get a professional deep clean booked ASAP for our new house.

That clause in rental leases is not lawful and is completely unenforceable.

Most do but some don't. When we moved out ours was spotless but when we had moved into that one it was filthy. They clearly had just stopped cleaning about 2 weeks before tooth paste all over the sinks etc and they trodden soil from the garden all up and down the stairs carpet 🙈 it's rude though

How disgusting

You’ld hope. I moved into a house that was disgustingly bad. They already were annoying us because they were not out at the appointed time, sat 2 hours waiting and then she apologised and said she hadn’t time to clean the oven - it would have taken a day or more just to get that kitchen respectable, not an hour or so. We actually ripped the oven out because it had an inch of grease on the bottom and stunk (also too small and was our intention, just not that soon!)

I didn't clean the last rental I moved out of - for the first time in my life. I have M.E. so cleaning generally sucks, but we were moving 2.5 hours away, it took us 3 weeks to do it (pain, exhaustion and illness), through shocking weather, and were almost broken at the end of it.

I did, however, agree in advance with the LL to chuck her some money so her own cleaner could do it, because I had a fair idea we wouldn't be capable.

You never know what people are going through in their personal lives. I'd always been quick to judge icky houses until this experience. Now I try to be a bit less judgy.*

*I'd probably pay to get a sold house cleaned, but not everyone has the £350 necessary to do that anyway

Yes, it's the done thing to clean a house on moving out. But how clean? I always clean kitchen, bathroom, wipe down shelves and window sills, do a good hoover etc but I don't deep clean (eg washing walls, cleaning curtains, polishing windows). Partly because it is just too much, as a single parent, to move out and deep clean in that tiny sliver of time you get after completion and before moving. And partly because of past experience I have had of the buyers sending builders straight in for a full renovation.

The current system of having to get out as soon as the money has transferred, and the mad ensuing rush, does complicate things. It would be nice to send off the moving van and then have, say, four hours to have a quick lunch and then focus on leaving the place lovely.

Well, presumably because their furniture is usually only leaving on the day of the move, and there's often not much time before your removal vans arrive -- I certainly think that even if you've been cleaning around big, immovable things for weeks, everything always suddenly looks much worse when huge, heavy items of furniture are removed and suddenly there are dust bunnies, dusty, unfaded squares of paint and carpet etc. Or burns and stains in carpet someone threw a rug over ten years ago and forgot about.

I've moved into spectacularly clean houses and disgusting houses. The last house we left was left cleaned within an inch of its life when we left but because of Covid-related delays, it would inevitably have been dusty by the time someone moved in, months later.

Our current house was absolutely disgusting when we moved in. The woman we bought it from, whose marital home it had been, had moved away and left the house to be used by her student sons and their friends. Once the divorce finalised, she sold, but it was neglected and dilapidated, and filthy.

It's going to be like most things in life, some people will clean, some won't but unfortunately youll only find out when you move in

Id assume they won't and be pleasantly surprised if they do

We didn't as we where specifically told not too, the house had horrible rising damp and rotted subfloor so they where going to be gutting the walls, floor, kitchen, bathroom, carpets etc... so fully renovating anyway which means the clean would be pointless.

The house we moved into had been empty for a year and was a doer up, we bought it 'as is' (it was empty but obviously no one cleaning it). We also ripped out the kitchen and had building work done which was messy anyway so weren't bothered about say the grease round the oven or dirty carpets etc...

There was a light fitting that had not been cleaned in near 40 years, it was actually REALLY satisfying to clean. It literally changed colour, we thought it was gold with frosted glass but that was just dust and it turned out it was silver with clear glass after cleaning.

I had it added in the conditions of purchase along with the stuff that was ‘being left’ - put our stuff into storeage for 2 days and stayed in hotel - we had moved out of a rental so had to do it on ours if I wanted to ever see my deposit again.

You’d think, wouldn’t you? But no, apparently some people don’t have the same values. I’ve bought and sold three houses. Cleaned all the ones I sold thoroughly and left champagne. I’d have been ashamed to have left them dirty. Of the houses I’ve bought, only the last house was cleaned. The first was filthy. We found a dust caked wedding ring in the seventies style carpeted hallway - no idea how many years it had been since they hoovered. TBF we did buy it as a do-er upper. The second, they were still moving out of the house into the evening of the day we completed, because they thought they’d do it themselves (we sat for hours with our unimpressed removals company while we watched them load one lamp at a time into the back of a family car). So they didn’t clean, because they didn’t have time. Did cause a flood in the kitchen disconnecting the dishwasher though. The last house was immaculate - the owners were moving within the village but were also decent, normal people.

I have always cleaned a house I was leaving - probably cleaner than when I lived there! Last week, despite all sorts of delays and stresses, I managed a full deep clean the week before I moved out (including things like degrease tops of cupboards in kitchen and radiator fluff removal) and then a good clean the day I moved out.

But yes, I would say of the 7(!) houses I have bought, 4 were not clean, 1 was a total abandoned renovation job, 1 was sort of clean and 1 was properly clean.

We have only bought houses that we have managed to knock some money off because work needed doing, so I knew they weren’t ‘just put furniture in and carry on with life’ houses. I therefore didnt expect them to be clean, and they weren’t.
However I think if you’ve got full asking or close because of your ‘immaculately presented’ home, then yes it’s fair and reasonable to leave it at least as buyers saw it on viewing.

After 15 years of being an Army wife, I cant imagine not leaving a house spotless. Even the house that had been condemned, we had to clean it...

When we bought out last house, it soon became apparent that when they stained the wooden floor in the living room, they had just done it "around" the large rug and sideboard 😅

We've always left a clean house, and we've done things like cleaning behind cooker (which was being removed) and behind beds a few days before anticipated moving date, as well as cleaning fridge and cooker we've left. Windows were't immaculate, but we were generally cleaning more with viewings and then in case buyer wanted to come back. That way, it's not too bad. Removers have always said they'll work around us, so we've had a complete room emptied one at a time. Last time, we were still on kitchen when purchaser arrived outside at 12.30pm - we hadn't quite finished, but purchaser was lovely and said she was quite happy to sit in car and wait, even though she could have come in!

First home was clean, second home - everywhere was clean except for the kitchen and it was filthy behind cooker (DH actually said he couldn't expect me to clean, so did it himself - doesn't normally do cleaning). Current house, we inherited a filthy built in oven, which I was annoyed at as we'd left our old oven spotless.