How Much to Charge for House Cleaning: Work It Out From Your Hours

How do I price a cleaning job?

Price a house clean from the hours it takes you, then add supplies, overhead and margin. The size of the home only matters because it sets the hours.

1. Cleaner-hours = home size ÷ your square feet per cleaner-hour + drive and setup time.
2. Labour = cleaner-hours × loaded rate (wage × (1 + burden %)).
3. Overhead share = cleaner-hours × (yearly overhead ÷ sellable hours).
4. Break-even = labour + supplies + overhead share.
5. Price = break-even ÷ (1 − margin).

Most results for this search are forum threads and software blogs quoting price ranges from other people's towns, wages and homes. A range tells you where others sit. It cannot tell you whether a clean pays you. The method here is plain arithmetic, and every figure on the page shows its inputs so you can swap in your own.

The assumptions used throughout (replace every one): a $20 wage, 25% burden for payroll tax, workers' comp, insurance and paid time off, so $25 loaded; $10,560 a year of overhead (car, insurance, phone, booking software, vacuums and mops wearing out) spread over 1 person × 220 billable days × 8 hours = 1,760 sellable hours, which is $6 an hour; a 35% target margin.

House cleaning pricing calculator

Type your cleaner-hours, wage, supplies and overhead to see break-even and the price to quote. It opens on the 2,000 sq ft recurring clean worked below.

The same tool is on its own page as the free house cleaning pricing calculator. No signup, nothing to download, and your numbers stay in your browser.

How much should you charge for a full house clean? A price sheet by home size

On this page's assumptions, a recurring clean of a 2,000 sq ft home prices at $226.92 and a deep or first clean of the same home at $428.46. The table below applies the same formula to five home sizes.

Production rates are the assumption that moves every row: 500 sq ft per cleaner-hour for a recurring standard clean and 250 sq ft per cleaner-hour for a deep or first clean, plus 0.5 hours of drive and setup per visit. Supplies are $8 a recurring visit and $15 a deep clean. These are placeholders, not measured rates. Time three or four of your own jobs and replace them.

Every row is job(hours, supplies) from the same math the calculator runs. Clutter, pets, number of bathrooms and how long since the last clean all change the hours, so they belong in your hours estimate, not as a guess added to the price afterwards.

Two cleaners do not halve the cleaner-hours. They halve the time on site, but both people are paid, and both sit in the car during the drive. Price the total cleaner-hours.

Worked example: a 2,000 sq ft recurring clean

At 500 sq ft per cleaner-hour, 2,000 sq ft is 4 hours on site. Add 0.5 hours of drive and setup and the job is 4.5 cleaner-hours. With $8 of supplies it breaks even at $147.50 and prices at $226.92.

Check it: labour 4.5 × $25.00 = $112.50. Overhead 4.5 × $6.00 = $27.00. Break-even $112.50 + $8 + $27.00 = $147.50. Price $147.50 ÷ 0.65 = $226.92. Profit on the visit: $79.42.

How much to deep clean a 2,000 sq ft house

The first clean or a deep clean takes longer per square foot: baseboards, inside appliances, built-up grime. At an assumed 250 sq ft per cleaner-hour it is 8 hours on site plus 0.5 hours drive, with $15 of supplies.

Quote the first clean separately from the recurring price. If you fold it into the recurring rate, you either lose money on visit one or overcharge on every visit after it.

How much is a 3-hour house clean, and what fits in 3 hours?

A 3-hour clean, door to door, with $8 of supplies prices at $155.38 on this page's assumptions. Break-even is $101.00.

What fits in those 3 hours is your production rate. Take off 0.5 hours of drive and setup and 2.5 hours remain on site. At an assumed 500 sq ft per cleaner-hour, that covers about 1,250 sq ft of recurring cleaning. At the deep-clean rate of 250, it covers about 625 sq ft. If a customer asks for a fixed 3-hour booking, agree on which rooms come first so the time goes where they care most.

How much to clean a 1,000 sq ft house

A 1,000 sq ft home fits inside a 3-hour booking as a recurring clean: 2.5 cleaner-hours including drive, priced at $131.54 on the sheet. As a deep or first clean it is 4.5 cleaner-hours and $237.69, so one cleaner cannot finish it inside a 3-hour booking.

Is $50 an hour good for house cleaning? Is $20?

It depends on your costs, so work out your own floor. Before supplies, your hourly price is (loaded rate + overhead per hour) ÷ (1 − margin). On these assumptions that is ($25 + $6) ÷ 0.65 = $47.69 an hour.

So $50 an hour clears this page's cost base with a little room, as long as supplies are billed on top and the drive time is inside the billed hours. If your wage, burden or overhead is higher, $50 may sit below your break-even. Run your numbers in the calculator and compare.

$20 an hour is a different picture. If $20 is what the customer pays a solo cleaner, the $6 of overhead per hour comes out first, leaving $14 an hour before supplies, tax and any profit. If $20 is the wage you pay an employee, that person costs $25 an hour loaded, and the job must bill $47.69 to keep a 35% margin.

More on what goes into the burden percentage in the labour burden guide.

Flat rate or hourly? And should you charge per square foot?

Quote residential cleans as a flat price per visit, worked out from hours. Customers want one number, and a flat price rewards you for getting faster.

Hourly billing suits jobs you cannot size in advance, such as a heavily cluttered home or a move-out with unknown condition. Say so on the quote and set a minimum number of hours.

Price per square foot is a result, not an input. Divide the price sheet by home size and the rate falls as homes get bigger, because the 0.5 hours of drive and setup is spread over more floor:

A single per-square-foot rate would undercharge small homes and overcharge large ones. Keep the per-square-foot figure for sanity-checking, and quote from hours.

The common mistake: markup instead of margin

Adding 35% to your cost is not a 35% margin. On the 2,000 sq ft recurring clean, cost × 1.35 bills $199.13 and keeps 25.93% of the price.

That is $27.80 short on one visit, and $11,564.00 a year at 8 cleans a week. The fix is to divide: break-even ÷ 0.65. The markup vs margin guide has a conversion chart.

The second mistake is pricing the wage instead of the loaded rate. A $20 wage priced as $20 leaves $5 an hour of payroll cost unbilled before overhead is even counted.

Excel formulas for a house cleaning price sheet

Layout: B2 = home size in sq ft, B3 = sq ft per cleaner-hour, B4 = drive and setup hours, B5 = wage, B6 = burden %, B7 = supplies, B8 = yearly overhead, B9 = people cleaning, B10 = billable days, B11 = target margin %, B12 = minimum charge.

Copy the price row down with a different B2 and B3 for each home size and service type, and you have the table above.

Calculator, app or spreadsheet: what to use for cleaning quotes

Use anything that makes you enter your hours and overhead before it shows a price. For one quote, the free calculator is enough. For a saved price sheet, use a spreadsheet.

Have recurring clients, homes you clean weekly or biweekly? The $39 cleaning contract pricing calculator prices the recurring contract, not the clean: break-even per visit and per month, the monthly price to quote and the annual contract value. Its six facility types are office, medical/dental, retail, school, warehouse and residential home. For one-off deep and move-out cleans, use the free calculator. The same contract method for offices is in the commercial cleaning bidding guide.

What to put in your house cleaning price sheet

One row per home size and service type, a drive charge built into the hours, add-ons and a minimum. Everything else is calculated.

• Your timed square feet per cleaner-hour for recurring, deep or first, and move-out cleans.
• Drive and setup hours per visit.
• Supplies per visit, by service type.
• Loaded labour rate and overhead per sellable hour.
• Target margin, applied by division.
• Add-ons in minutes: inside oven, inside fridge, interior windows, laundry.
• Minimum charge, from the shortest visit you would drive to. A 2-hour visit with $8 of supplies prices at $107.69 here.

Reprice when your wage, fuel or insurance moves. With formulas, every row updates on its own.

Step-by-step: How Much to Charge for House Cleaning: Work It Out From Your Hours

1. Estimate cleaner-hours. Divide home size by your timed square feet per cleaner-hour for the service type, then add drive and setup time.
2. Load the wage. Multiply the wage by (1 + burden %) for payroll tax, workers' comp, insurance and paid time off.
3. Add overhead by the hour. Divide yearly overhead by sellable hours (people × billable days × 8) and multiply by cleaner-hours.
4. Find break-even. Add labour, supplies and the overhead share. Never quote below this number.
5. Apply your margin. Divide break-even by (1 − margin). For 35%, divide by 0.65.
6. Check the minimum. Quote the higher of the calculated price and your minimum charge.

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