Wandsworth Common is the far edge of our patch, east of Earlsfield and still SW18. The houses on the roads around the common are double-fronted Victorian, and they are a different size of job altogether from the Grid terraces we work on at home. More rooms, more stairs, longer days.
Bigger houses, longer days
Two reception rooms, four or five bedrooms, and a fair few with a lower ground floor as well. A three bedroom move-out clean is £339 and a four bedroom £425, which is a full day for two cleaners in a house this size. Bedrooms are what we count. A study that has never had a bed in it does not add anything, though a converted loft room does.
Carpets in a double-fronted house
Through lounges are the common one here, £61 for the run, and there are usually two flights of stairs at £41 each. Wool dries slowly. Wool carpet is much more likely in these houses than in the rented flats near the station, and it wants a lower moisture setting with a longer drying window afterwards. The full carpet list is the same one we use everywhere else in SW18.
Regular work round the common
Four hour weekly visits, mostly, at £22 per cleaner per hour. Some people would rather have two cleaners for two hours so the house is done and quiet again before the school run, and that costs the same £88 either way. Ironing is £12 an hour.
Deep cleans and building work
Houses this size go through builders more often than the rest of our patch, and a deep clean after the builders have finished a basement dig or a rear extension is a bigger job than the £186 starting figure suggests. Three cleaners over four hours is £342, which is a fair guide for five bedrooms with dust still sitting in the window runners. Wait a week. Plaster dust keeps settling, and a clean done too early gets done twice.
What we do not take on
No rubbish clearance, no chimney work, and nothing outside above the ground floor. Sash windows on the front elevation get done on the inside only. If a house is still full of furniture that needs shifting into storage, that wants doing before we come rather than while we are there.
Getting here
Fifteen minutes from Southfields when the traffic is kind. Our van comes out this way on Thursdays as a rule, so a Thursday slot is the easiest one to get at short notice, and the round usually starts on our Earlsfield streets and works east from there. Same prices as the main list, nothing added for the drive.
Questions we get asked
How much is an end of tenancy clean on a big house near the common?
£339 for three bedrooms and £425 for four, fixed before we start, with one oven included. A house that size is a full day for two cleaners. Carpets and a second oven are priced separately on top.
Do you charge extra for wool carpets?
No, the room price is the same, £36 a bedroom and £61 for a through lounge. Wool takes a lower moisture setting and dries more slowly, so we allow more time for it and warn you the room will be out of use for longer.
Can I have two cleaners at once?
Yes, and plenty of the larger houses here do exactly that. Two cleaners for two hours is £88 at the weekly rate, the same as one cleaner for four hours, and it gets the house finished before the school run.
Rather talk? Ring 020 8077 8130, seven days.