Anyone have a maid?

**sandrark** · 08-18-2012, 11:29 AM

In our neck of the woods (NorCal) they charge by the hour.

It runs about $60-$70 per hour for two people. (We stopped last year, because we moved, and I've been too lazy to try and find another one).

For that cost, every two weeks, the team:

- Cleaned the bathroom: tub, sink, toilet. Wiped down the mirror, mopped the floor.

- Vacuumed the carpet in the LRm, DRm, hallway and three bedrooms (other than vacuuming, we kept them out of the bedrooms - easy for us to do, and we cared more about the "public spaces").

- Kitchen: wiped down all appliances, counters, sink, and mopped the floor.

- LRm/DRm: Wiped down and dusted the glass tabletops, TV, mantlepiece, and the DRm table.

It's lovely to have the help, not only because it freed me from the drudgery - it meant that every two weeks, DH had to deal with his piles of mail and clothing so the housekeeper could actually clean.

**sblatner** · 08-18-2012, 01:46 PM

We also live in NoCal. We pay $75 per visit and that usually means 2 people for 1.5-2 hours each. We "clean" our house before they come so they are literally cleaning - no picking up for us. I don't think the price is usually figured on square feet but by the hour. It is much better to have a fixed fee, though, than by the hour because then you know what you will be paying each week.

**elessar78** · 08-19-2012, 02:00 PM

We keep slowly edging toward this and I'm trying to fight it. My wife grew up with the idea of massive hours long cleaning sessions. Now, we don't have hours to devote to cleaning, but I'm trying to convince her that we need to just clean on a rotating basis the areas of the house and devote the 15-30 minutes we can spare.

One technique that I find works for us is to regularly have guests over (dinner or otherwise). It forces us to really get our cleaning hats on.

I'm not above getting help. I grew up in a country where labor was cheap and household help was the norm for middle class families. Obv not in this country, but when we're slammed I wouldn't mind.

Would we get any benefit from a once a month cleaning, as opposed to 2x a month?

**snafu** · 08-19-2012, 10:06 PM

We learned early on that with a few simple rulz, discipline and a routine we could manage a 4 level, 4 bedrm house with 20 minutes in the morning before leaving, 20 minute late evening ETE [Eliminate the Evidence] and an hour on the weekend to vacuum and Swiffer/wash floors [dry stuff/wet stuff] & wash clothes we were 'Company Ready' in spite of a couple of kids and a couple of dogs to undermine our best efforts.

**riverwed070707** · 08-20-2012, 06:38 AM

[QUOTE=elessar78;332501]We keep slowly edging toward this and I'm trying to fight it. My wife grew up with the idea of massive hours long cleaning sessions. Now, we don't have hours to devote to cleaning, but I'm trying to convince her that we need to just clean on a rotating basis the areas of the house and devote the 15-30 minutes we can spare.

One technique that I find works for us is to regularly have guests over (dinner or otherwise). It forces us to really get our cleaning hats on.

I'm not above getting help. I grew up in a country where labor was cheap and household help was the norm for middle class families. Obv not in this country, but when we're slammed I wouldn't mind.

Would we get any benefit from a once a month cleaning, as opposed to 2x a month?[/QUOTE]

Benefit being it would cost half as much? I guess it depends what you're going to have the housekeeper do. If its going to take them twice as long to clean if they come monthly, its probably not worth it, but in our case, we're constantly picking up, doing laundry, dishes, etc -- its just the big tedious jobs that often don't get done at all that I'd like to have someone do for us so I don't think I could justify having someone come every other week. I certainly don't dust or scour the shower 2x/month so why would I have someone else do it that regularly?

**riverwed070707** · 08-20-2012, 06:49 AM

Originally posted by snafu View Post

We learned early on that with a few simple rulz, discipline and a routine we could manage a 4 level, 4 bedrm house with 20 minutes in the morning before leaving, 20 minute late evening ETE [Eliminate the Evidence] and an hour on the weekend to vacuum and Swiffer/wash floors [dry stuff/wet stuff] & wash clothes we were 'Company Ready' in spite of a couple of kids and a couple of dogs to undermine our best efforts.

I don't doubt that we *could* do it. But I also think a couple hours of help every month would be a big burden off our shoulders. Rarely do I have time to give the bathroom a good scrub from top to bottom. DH and I work opposite hours. On the weekends I'm home with the kiddo and since I work FT and travel frequently, I'd rather spend my weekends (the ones we actually have free, which isn't many) enjoying my time with her rather than stuck in the house. I know its a want and not a need. I realize many people get by without a housekeeper and I don't disagree that its somewhat of a frivoulous expense, but since I don't really splurge on much else, I'm interested in weighing the pros and cons which is why I asked if anyone had a ballpark estimate on what it might cost. Hearing about how others manage their household cleaning doesn't make me want to clean mine any more than I did before.

Some people spend money on cable TV, golfing and fancy cars. I don't have or do those things, and given that we're currently saving 35% of our income, its not really a question of being able to afford it. A clean house makes me happy. A clean house I didn't have to clean makes me happier.

**BuckyBadger** · 08-20-2012, 07:07 AM

We had someone come in for a an hour and a half to two hours every week for $50 a week. This was probably super cheap, though, because we just hired a grad-student friend of ours who was interested in a few extra bucks and was one of those people who really *liked* cleaning.

We did it because, like you guys, we had limited time together and neither one of us wanted to spend it cleaning. I didn't want to clean on the weekends (which was the only time I was home -- I lived in another city during the week) and he didn't want to feel like he did all the cleaning all the time during the week. It became a pretty serious bone of contention between us and when we finally spent a few hundred bucks a month to get some help it made a big difference in our relationship. We would have done it at twice the price.

Now that we're moving somewhere where we'll both be living in the same place again we haven't yet considered hiring someone. Once we see how all our new bills add up and how my new salary shakes out we may consider it again.

The other issue I'm sure we'll have is that we trusted our friend implicitly with our pets and our belongings. She's the person who house-sat for us for days at a time whenever we went away. We'd probably have a harder time finding another person who we trust so much with our animals and with our "stuff."

So yeah, if you can fit it in your budget -- even if you have to stretch -- it may be a good idea. It sure made us happier.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 08-20-2012, 11:37 AM

$65 a cleaning every other week. Well worth it. They do more cleaning but it forces us to pick up and put things away that we never used to. We aren't the greatest cleaners but this forces us to clean up somewhat. With two kids we spend our time doing other stuff. We used to do a lot more things but with young children it's harder to find the time because one person always has to be watching the kids and right now it's harder with a newborn.

**Goldy** · 08-20-2012, 04:34 PM

We are going to try it out in the next week or so. 45 bucks every other week sounds pretty good to us. I travel a lot so my wife often gets stuck with keeping up with the house and I'm sure she would like a little help.

**esb3357** · 08-20-2012, 07:29 PM

We have someone come in every week for 4 hours or so. We pay her $13 an hour. She picks up and deep cleans. We found her on craigslist, she use to clean hotels and was looking for extra money. We are very happy with her. Cleaning between my husband and I was our one point of contempt. So we forgo the cable but have a house cleaner. We are happy.

**EarlyRetirementJoy** · 08-21-2012, 07:29 AM

I want to add one thought to this discussion - we pay $80 for a cleaning service to send two people out every **three weeks to clean our 2,400 sq. foot home, and haven't had our rates raised in the 17 years we've used the service.

This is true with our gardening service as well - no monthly rate increase in 20 years - so it may be a fairly common practice to try and retain customers over time.

We're in the larger metro Los Angeles area for pricing comparison purposes.

**The service used to come every two weeks before DH and I retired. I wanted to drop it to every three weeks in retirement to reduce our annual costs, and negotiated with the cleaning service to keep the rate the same. Because our home is so tidy and relatively clean when the team arrives, the owner of the service agreed to do so. As with an earlier poster - I want the service to focus on deep cleaning, not tidying our home.

**riverwed070707** · 08-21-2012, 11:15 AM

As an update I got quotes from a couple cleaning services in the area. One came to our home yesterday to see the space and specifically what we wanted done. She quoted me $40 (

) and said while it might take her 3-3.5 hours the first time, she doesn't charge more for the first cleaning since the future visits will take considerably less time which i thought was a pretty stellar deal. Signed up to get started next Tuesday!

For geographic reference, we're in the midwest.

**bjl584** · 08-21-2012, 12:07 PM

We have a local girl clean my Grandmother's house every 3 weeks or so. She charges around $30 or $40 depending on how much she does. My Grandmother has dimensia and has trouble getting around, so we have a cleaning lady do the cleaning. I live in the Pittsburgh PA area as a point of reference.

**Gailete** · 08-22-2012, 09:15 AM

I wish I could afford a maid to clean because physically I just can't keep up. Last month though a lady from my church came and cleaned my house for me--for FREE. Today whe is going to help me grocery shop. So many things I just can't do anymore and thankful for the help I get.

Anyone have a maid?