Those of you with cleaning people...

[phathui5]

What exactly do they do in your house?

I have one and I'm trying to figure out if I'm paying for more than I'm getting.

[mbm]

Clean kitchen and bathroom, including all floors/fixtures/surfaces
Laundry, ironing, folding
Dust, vacuum rugs, mop wood flooring
Change sheets on beds
Take out trash
Straighten/tidy little pockets of clutter

We have a 2 BR 1 bath house and our cleaning person stays all day. We try to leave the house mostly tidy and have laundry picked up and sorted before she arrives.

We have also used cleaning services which charge for a 3 hour block of time. Those people would generally wash, dust, and mop the surfaces, but would not do any laundry or tidying.

[SoulCakes]

We've been using a cleaning who lady who comes for a set number of hours (your choice). Honestly, I don't think it's worth it. She mops all the floors, dusts, scrubs the bathroom, kitchen surfaces, vacuums, and so on. No laundry or tidying. Maybe it's just the lady we have but I don't think she does it well enough. There's nothing more annoying than wiping your fingers across a dusty shelf after you've just paid someone to clean it.

Probably just our cleaner, though. I think we were better off doing it ourselves for free.

[Thalia]

Our cleaning lady:

Vacuums the carpets and mops and scrubs all the floors in the house (it would be worth it for her to do this alone!)
Cleans the bathroom and kitchen surfaces including scrubbing the stove and the the toilets
Dusts all surfaces
Washes, dries, and folds laundry (I don't have her do much, though, because laundry is easy for me to do and I'd rather she spend time on other kinds of cleaning)
Washes windows and mirrors that get dirty
Puts clean sheets on all the beds
Washes any dishes that happen to be in the sink at the time (usually not many)
Takes out the trash
Does some tidying here and there (our house is usually pretty tidy to begin with)

[Fuamami]

Originally Posted by phathui5

What exactly do they do in your house?

I have one and I'm trying to figure out if I'm paying for more than I'm getting.

I'm a cleaning lady! I charge about $25/hour, so how long is your person there? I also work very quickly, so that makes a difference.

[RollerCoasterMama]

I have a small house and a small budget, so mine only comes for 3 hrs every other week. ($25/hr)

The standing request is to do floors, kitchen, bathrooms. She generally dusts as well. She is very thorough and when she gets in a routine where it's just maintaining, then she'll add in other projects or start deep-cleaning floor-to-ceiling, or behind appliances....whatever needs doing. Once she organized my pantry---totally awesome surprise when I came home! She's very smart and professional, so I leave my requests pretty basic and let her think on her feet. I love her.

Since it's only 3 hrs, I always do the pick-up before she gets here. I'd rather she spend her time doing the deep-cleaning then the tidying up. So I always know that just under the clutter, it's CLEAN anyway! :-D She is worth every penny to me...if only to get me to tidy everything away at least every 2 weeks. It keeps things from getting too out of control. And the longer she's around, the easier it is to get ready for her visits. This is the same person I used when I was living with STBX as well, so I know we work well together and I completely trust her!

I know if I had a bigger house, she wouldn't have accepted the 3 hr time-slot.

[noobmom]

We don't have one now, but when we did, they would:

1) Vacuum and mop all the floors
2) Clean the bathrooms (toilets, showers, tubs, sinks, mirrors, floors)
3) Dust
4) Wipe down the kitchen countertops and shine the sink. Wipe down appliances and clean the inside of the microwave, etc.

Then whenever they had extra time they would do random things like clean the oven or the ceiling fans. Stuff that wasn't necessary to do every visit (they came every other week).

In our house we have a lot of hardwood/Pergo-type floors, so vacuuming and mopping is a huge job right there.

I should mention that I never asked (or wanted) her to do laundry or sheets. I always picked up all the clutter and cleared off any surface I expected her to clean. For me, I'd rather a cleaning lady help me clean, not have to spend her time to tidy up.

[littlehoneybee]

I don't have one, but my mom tried all the big name companies when I was growing up. They were supposed to clean all the bathrooms and kitchen, dust and vacuum, and take out the trash. Our experience was that they all started out doing a good job, but started slacking off so much that we often couldn't tell that they'd even been there. We got rid of them for good after my mom realized they were stealing.

[Sarah W]

Originally Posted by noobmom

We don't have one now, but when we did, they would:

1) Vacuum and mop all the floors
2) Clean the bathrooms (toilets, showers, tubs, sinks, mirrors, floors)
3) Dust
4) Wipe down the kitchen countertops and shine the sink. Wipe down appliances and clean the inside of the microwave, etc.

Then whenever they had extra time they would do random things like clean the oven or the ceiling fans. Stuff that wasn't necessary to do every visit (they came every other week).

Our service does pretty much the above. They come every other week. We pay $108 and have a 2400+ sq ft home w/ 3br 3.5ba.

When we lived in FL, we had a single person doing our house. She came weekly and she would also do laundry/put it away, walk our dogs, do dishes. She was $65 a week for an 1100 sq ft apt w/ 2br 2ba.

[PoetryMom]

I've got a husband and wife team that comes every other week. They have a set fee for however long it takes them to clean your house, but they do not do any extra projects or deep cleaning. If they finish early they just leave. We clean up most clutter and kids' toys before they come. DH also puts away anything fragile on his sink or nightstand, because they have accidentaly broken things in the past. I have a 3-bedroom, 2 1/2 bath, 2story house. Together they spend about 3 hours doing the following:

1) Vacuuming and mopping all floors
2) Dusting all surfaces (they used to dust blinds but have stopped)
3) Cleaning bathrooms
4) Making any unmade beds
5) Vacuuming rugs
6) Tidying anything left messy (usually by DH - newspapers, glass or dish in the bedroom)
7) Washing any dishes in the sink or counter (usually minimal)
8) Cleaning all kitchen counters, stove, sink, and microwave, polish refrigerator door (stainlees steel)
9) Emptying all trash containers including kitchen garbage and taking it all out

They do not:

1) Clean windows
2) Clean ceiling fans
3) Do any laundry (but they have folded towels I accidentally left on the couch)
4) Clean any of the kids' toys (like the toy kitchen) nor their bookshelves (I have not told them not to, I just notice they haven't)
5) Clean under furniture
6) Move items to dust (except from the nightstands)
7) Clean any light fixtures

So I do sometimes wish they would do a better job, but what they lack in thoroughness they make up for in loyalty and trustworthiness. I hired them when my 6 year old DD was born. In the begining, I stayed home the entire time they were here, then I started to wait for them to arrive, let them in, then go food shopping. After a while I got tired of having somebody in the house on my day off, so I switched them to a day when I work and I leave them the key, but it took almost 5 years to get to that level of trust, and I would hate to have to start from scratch with someone else. So i'm kind of stuck with them - they're not perfect, but I trust them in my house.

[Usually Curious]

I cleaned houses for a few years.

I did not tidy up - only cleaned.

I did not do laundry w/the exception of one load of sheets and towels that I stripped off the bed and pulled out of the bathroom.