Here Is Everything I’ve Learned In 35 Years Of Cleaning Large Homes in Southern Utah

The House Had a Suit of Armor and a Rolls Royce In The Garage. I Still Had to Clean the Toilets.

When I first moved to St. George, I cleaned a very large, luxury home in Santa Clara for a while. It was 8300 SF and had 5 bedrooms and 6.5 bathrooms. The owners wanted the entire home cleaned every time. It was an all day job. 

Two interesting notes: 

1. That was the only home I ever cleaned that had a suit of armor in the entrance hall.
2. They also owned a Rolls Royce. Rolls Royces are almost non-existent in St George.

They had made their money by buying a fixer-upper motel, fixing it up and then selling it.

Here is their home on Zillow: 3096 Somerset Ln, Santa Clara, UT 84765 | Zillow

I only cleaned their home for a few months because they got a divorce and sold the house (and probably the Rolls Royce). 

That huge home still needed standard housecleaning, just a lot more of it.

Your Home Probably Isn’t 8,000+ Square Feet. These Thoughts Still Apply.

I’ve cleaned homes all my life and the 8300 SF home taught me a lot about house cleaning. 

I can tell you that I’m glad the home appeared smaller from the front than the actual size, otherwise it might have scared me off. 

Of course, by the time I was done working for them I could call myself an elite house cleaner (my mom was so proud – lol). 

I’m 99% certain that the person reading this owns a large home. Of course a home that size is very unusual. Most large homes are around 4500 SF and half of that is a walkout basement. That’s probably your home.

How To Hire The Perfect House Cleaner Or House Cleaning Service For Your Large Home

Image above: Krisandra, my head house cleaner

There are several things to consider, starting with you.

If you hire just one house cleaner do you mind if they split the home into two parts and then clean half one week and the other half the next week? The reason for doing this is that you probably don’t want a house cleaner who’s worn out cleaning your kitchen or your master bathroom. 

For a home the size of yours you would want to meet the housecleaner first. Some home owners call it an interview. Don’t use that word. It’s too strong. “Meet” is the right word to use. 

It’s kind of hard to get to know someone well enough in such a short period of time, but here are a few important questions you can ask that will help:

1. How long have you been cleaning homes? (I’d probably try to get someone that has been at it for at least a year, two is even better.)

1. How many people do you work for? 

1. Can you easily fit a weekly (or biweekly) client into your schedule? 

1. Do you have insurance? Mistakes happen. Insurance for house cleaners is cheap at around $50/month. I once broke the glass of a picture twice. I think they took the picture down the second time. Mistakes happen, insurance helps.

1. Hire on a probationary basis. Something like “I’ll try you out for 6 weeks. If we like each other, we’ll continue to work together after that.” A good housecleaner or housecleaning service won’t be upset about that. 

Also check their Google reviews before calling them.

Square Footage Alone Doesn’t Tell You How Long Your Home Will Take to Clean

I will admit that some large homes will take longer than usual. Factors include:

• • If a family with younger children live in the home that home will take extra time to tidy and clean.
  • A home with just two people living in it may keep the home cleaner than a home with a family. I live in a 5,000 SF home myself. It’s just my elderly dad and I living here. I keep my part of the home, the basement, clean. My dad is messy and so we have a housecleaner come in every 3 weeks to clean the upstairs where he lives. 
  • If a home has cats or dogs that adds a bit of extra time to clean up pet hair.
  • Some homes have rooms and sometimes bathrooms that are very rarely used. If the housecleaner can skip those rooms that will save time. I personally would have an unused bathroom cleaned monthly. Running the water, flushing the toilets and dusting are necessary. I once had a client in Scottsdale, AZ that never (?) used his large 2nd home. The bathrooms were hard to clean because of how neglected they were, especially the toilets.

  

You Probably Don’t Need Every Room Cleaned Every Time

If you live in a large home and only 2 people live there you probably have a room or two that are not used very often. 

We have a guest room downstairs that we never use. I use that room for creating YouTube videos. 

We have a client in Stone Cliff who only uses one bedroom out of 4. We vacuum the empty bedrooms every time we clean but those bedrooms and bathrooms only need a good cleaning when his sons stay with him. We charge him the same each time whether we clean those rooms or not. 

I’ve been in homes where only one elderly person lived and they had every bedroom and bathroom door closed because the rooms are unused. This saved the person a ton of money over a year of having their home cleaned. 

Last thought: Casitas. Just because you don’t see them doesn’t mean they don’t need cleaning. The biggest issues with casitas are toilets, dust and bugs, especially cockroaches and flies.

Large St. George Homes Have Their Own Cleaning Problems

Large homes have issues that smaller homes don’t. 

I mentioned the guy that lives in Stone Cliff. When I am helping my cleaning person there, I find the amount of cleaning area a bit overwhelming. For example the kitchen is about 3 times as large as a regular size home’s kitchen. The home also has a lot of tile flooring. A lot if you get my drift. 

Another thing about large homes is that there will be areas that the cleaner doesn’t notice or they can’t reach. Back to the Stone Cliff house: In the living room and master bedroom there are shelves which can’t be reached without a ladder. Of course there are expensive, fragile items on those high shelves. So far we’ve only broken one of those items in his home.. Luckily he didn’t make us pay for that. 

Housecleaners break things. It is a part of touching just about everything in a home. Large homes have more stuff, so damage of some kind is a given. (My head cleaner once broke the glass in a shower door). When there’s more stuff, there is more of a chance of damaging something.

What I’d Do If I Owned a Large Home

I would strongly urge you to hire a house cleaner to clean your home. However, if you want to do it yourself here is the cleaning schedule split into two weeks:

Week one:

• • Clean the kitchen (done weekly actually). It includes cleaning the kitchen floor.
  • Clean half of the bathrooms and also the bedrooms nearest to the bathrooms you cleaned.
  • Dust as much of the home as you can take. 15 minutes? 30 minutes? An hour?
  • Do 30 minutes of misc. cleaning like ceiling fans or baseboards or outdoor furniture.

Week two

• • Clean the kitchen
  • Clean the rest of the bedrooms and bathrooms
  • Clean the laundry room
  • Vacuum all floors that haven’t been vacuumed yet
  • Dust as much of the home as you can take. 15 minutes? 30 minutes? An hour?
  • Do 30 minutes of misc. cleaning, like ceiling fans or window blinds or outdoor furniture.

Large Homes Don’t Need Complicated, Difficult Cleaning

Cleaning a large home is doable if you split up the work.

Of course your best bet is to hire a good housecleaner. 

Call or text me today to get a free over the phone estimate of how much your cleaning would cost.

First Impressions House Cleaning: (435) 879-1239

Here Is Everything I’ve Learned In 35 Years Of Cleaning Large Homes

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