Maid Services

[WCUgirl]

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[AGDee]

Many of the women I work with have a cleaning lady and we hire one for my mom also. Most of them have the cleaning lady come every other week and they pay $20/hour. They will usually let you know how many hours they think it will take them to do your house. Depending on how many rooms, square footage, etc., I've never seen them take more than 3 hours. They do CLEANING, but they don't pick up clutter, so you have to make sure you pick up all the clutter. If there is a shirt on the floor, they may very well just vacuum around it!

Wish I could afford one...

[Rudey]

Originally posted by AXiD670
Ho-kay...I've come to the realization that in the fall when I go back to school I am NOT going to have time to work full-time, go to school part-time and keep our new house in tip-top shape. I'm trying to convince the mister that we should look into hiring a maid service to do the basic cleaning that I'm not going to want to do in what free time I have. Has anyone here used one of these services, such as Maid Brigade or Merry Maids? How often do you have them come and clean? How much does it cost?

For some reason I see Rudey responding to this thread.

Fine. FINE. OK I'll answer.

You find yourself a nice immigrant and pay cash. You'll get a better deal than if you used Merry Maids or any chains. I've used Merry Maids before and it's a rip off. I like good old immigrant elbow grease and I felt that I didn't get that with Merry Maids.

Your choice of immigrant labor will most likely come down to Mexican, Polish, or Carribean. Immigrant rates are lower and you can set something up so they come once a week if you're a slob and pay her probably 40 bucks for your whole house. I have no idea how big your house is but that's what I imagine it costs. I'm sure you can find someone real good for 10 bucks an hour. It depends if you want them to do your laundry and dishes and all that stuff. Plus if you have your own cleaning supplies, you could probably bargain them down.

Oh and lock up your jewelry and valuables...those ladies love shiny objects. You can just ask your neighbors who they use and then call that lady for it. But you should also see fliers in supermarkets or on craigslist for this stuff.

-Rudey
--The roads are truly paved with gold in America.

[Tom Earp]

Got a biker Chick across the street that does mine when she gets off of Her Rear. $50.00 for two bed duplex and family room. Second bed room is a catch all so the main part is Bath Room and Kitchen that I worry about.

God I hate cleaning!

Oh, of course the dish waher shot craps so off to find a new one soon. Use only Monthly, but when need, it should be there!

[honeychile]

I've used both Molly Maids and The Maids.

The Maids send 4 women, and it's $100 an hour. It rarely takes more than an hour, but they take a short break.

Molly Maids send 2 women, and it's $60 an hour. They rarely take more than an hour, too, but don't take a break.

Both companies pay their women about $1 more than minimum wage, but the Molly Maids pays them better.

Neither are adverse to picking up and tidying - they'll even strip the linens and do laundry, if you want. I just want them to do the things that are hard on my allergies, so I make it easy for them (yes, I'm one of those people who will clean before the cleaning ladies come!). I schedule them for every other week, so I can have a Thursday or Friday; Molly Maids discounts for that but The Maids don't.

My mother always had a cleaning lady, but we haven't been able to find one for her in a long time. She uses The Maids.

[aephi alum]

The advantage of a maid service is that they usually send 2 or 3 people, and they are bonded and insured. The disadvantage is that you pay more than you would if you can find someone reliable and pay them off the books.

If you do go with a maid service, don't use Molly Maid. When my husband and I bought our new house, we decided to have them in to give it a thorough cleaning before we moved in. The 2 women took most of a day to clean an empty house, and then charged more than double their estimate.

[jess_pom]

My mom pays our Amish cleaner $8/hr. It usually takes her 3 hours to clean the downstairs only. Granted, it's a fairly big house with hardwood floors. But you probably don't live near the Amish, do you?

[tunatartare]

We have a nice Russian immigrant who comes to our house every two weeks. We pay her $50 for a 2 bedroom apartment. My mom doesn't tip her. Not sure if you have to tip maids from an agency though.

[macallan25]

Our maid comes 3 times a week from around 8-3, one of which to do laundry and ironing. I believe she makes around 420$ a week. Bessie is great, been with our family since before I was born.

[_Lisa_]

Originally Posted by AXiD670

*bump*

Do you tip the maids?

If you've got a maid through a cleaning service & I would tip 10-15% depending on the service. If you've got a maid that has set her own rate with you then I would wouldn't include a tip everytime she comes, although I could see maybe giving a tip around the holidays.


When I lived at home we had a maid that came bi-weekly & she didn't work through a cleaning service. She became a friend of the family & we would have her family over for holiday gatherings. Usually my parents would include a tip for her cleaning service separate of having her & her family over around the holidays & for other milestone gatherings.

[PenguinTrax]

We use a local, bonded & insured, service. They usually send anywhere from 2-4 people are are in and out in about an hour. My house is much cleaner than anything Molly- or Merry Maids had done. Not to mention, the national services often just wipe down surfaces, they don't clean them. When my cleaning crew is finished, you could eat off the shower floor. We have weekly service and it's worth the $75 a week we spend. We don't tip, but do give the owner a holiday tip to be spread out amongst the crew members (we dont' have the same folks every week)

[honeychile]

FWIW, I always love the sheen of my kitchen appliances and sink after the Maids came (the few times I had them). I asked one of ladies how they get them SO shiny, and she told me that they use baby oil in their final cleaning spray! It does make a huge difference.

As for tipping, since mine usually show up just before lunch, I usually ask them if they'd like pizza for lunch. They usually do, so I give them a special coupon for a free pizza (with everything they want). If not, I give them 15% and also a bonus for the holidays.

[greekalum]

A lot of those chain Maids use baby oil or other special shine-enhancers- but not much else. It takes hot water, an actual cleaning product, and a little effort to get a surface clean, but it just takes a spritz and some moving the grime around to get a surface LOOKING clean- which is what the chain maids are trained to do.

I guess it depends on what your priorities are.

[Buttonz]

A lot of my friends have Russian or Spanish cleaning ladies...they usually get about $10 an hour and are great.

We used one of my friends once and it took her about 3-4 hours to clean up everything, but the house looked great after. My mother is a neat freak, but it was one of those spring cleaning type of things.

My ex is a total slob, and it takes his cleaning lady about three hours to do everything in his room, the bathroom, and kitchen...she washes the dishes, changes the sheets, takes any clean laundry that's in the laundry bags out and puts it away, puts dirty laundry into the bags, etc.

No one I know tips them, but then again, they don't use cleaning services.

I think your better off getting recommendations from friends/family in the area to see if/who they use, what they pay, etc.

[greeklawgirl]

Originally Posted by honeychile

FWIW, I always love the sheen of my kitchen appliances and sink after the Maids came (the few times I had them). I asked one of ladies how they get them SO shiny, and she told me that they use baby oil in their final cleaning spray! It does make a huge difference.

I'm having a cleaning team come into our home this week and I have to ask, do you know if they use baby oil on countertops as well? Because I would have a cow if they put that on my granite and marble. I'm thinking I should just leave my own cleaning supplies out for them just to be on the safe side.