House cleaning prices: how to price cleaning jobs

Price each clean as hours times cleaners times your hourly rate, about $48 an hour per cleaner in our solo example. The steps:

1. 1Add up a year of business costs.
2. 2Add your pay, or your staff wages plus employer taxes.
3. 3Divide by the hours you can bill to get a break-even rate, then add a margin.
4. 4Time your common cleans by home size and type, then turn them into a price list.

Most customers want a price per visit, not per hour. Use the hourly rate behind the scenes and quote a flat price by bedrooms, bathrooms and type of clean.

Our example solo cleaner spends $10,800 a year before taking any pay. The usual lines:

• Car: the business share of payments, insurance, maintenance and gas, or the miles you drive between homes.
• Supplies: products, cloths, mop heads and vacuum bags.
• Equipment: vacuums, steam cleaners and replacements.
• Insurance: general liability, and a janitorial bond that many customers ask about.
• Phone, booking and invoicing software.
• Marketing: website, Google Business Profile, local listings and referral rewards.

Track mileage from the first day. It's often the biggest cost a cleaner forgets to price in.

In our example, an $18-an-hour cleaner costs about $19.38 an hour before state unemployment tax and workers' comp. The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median wage of maids and housekeeping cleaners at $17.07 an hour, or $35,510 a year, in May 2025. On top of the wage you pay:

• Employer Social Security of 6.2% and employer Medicare of 1.45%.
• Federal unemployment tax of 6.0% on the first $7,000 of wages, which falls to 0.6% with the full state credit, so about $42 a year per employee.
• State unemployment tax and workers' comp, at rates your state sets.
• Paid drive time between homes, and your state minimum wage if it's higher than your pay rate.

Example figures for one cleaner:

That last line is the one to price from. Supplies, overhead and profit all come out of the gap between $24.23 and what you charge.

Paying cleaners as independent contractors instead isn't a choice you can just make; the rules on who is an employee are strict. Ask your CPA before you set it up.

If you clean on your own, self-employment tax is 15.3% of net earnings. For 2026 the IRS sets out:

• Self-employment tax: 12.4% for Social Security and 2.9% for Medicare, once net earnings reach $400, with Social Security capped at $184,500 for 2026.
• Estimated tax: generally required if you expect to owe $1,000 or more.
• Federal income tax, plus state income tax in most states.
• Sales tax on cleaning services in some states; check with your state's revenue department.

These are example figures to show the sum. They aren't averages for cleaners and they aren't Ringzel customer data.

1. 1Working time: 48 weeks x 35 hours = 1,680 hours.
2. 2Billable time: 70%, so 1,176 hours. Driving, quoting and laundry fill the rest.
3. 3Break-even rate: $50,800 / 1,176 = $43.20 an hour.
4. 4Add a 10% margin: about $48 an hour.

A standard clean that takes 3 hours comes out at about $143. That's inside Angi's $75 to $175 for a standard clean, near the top.

If that feels high for your area, look at the billable share before the rate. Tighter routes and fewer one-off quotes lift your hours more than a lower price lifts your bookings.

Angi puts house cleaning at $25 to $50 per cleaner per hour in 2026, from 98,643 projects. Its prices next to HomeAdvisor's:

Sources: Angi's house cleaning cost guide (updated 29 September 2026), Angi's deep cleaning cost guide (updated 29 September 2026) and HomeAdvisor's house cleaning prices guide (updated 17 June 2026).

The example rate of $48 is at the top of Angi's per-cleaner range and inside HomeAdvisor's. A company sending a team of two can charge per visit and pay each cleaner far less than $48, which is why company prices and solo prices look so different per hour.

Angi puts a deep clean at an average of $260 and move-out cleans at $140 to $500, so price them well above a regular visit. Build each one the same way:

1. 1Ask for bedrooms, bathrooms, square footage, pets and when it was last cleaned.
2. 2Estimate the hours from your own past jobs, not from a regular clean.
3. 3Multiply by your rate and the number of cleaners, then add extras like inside the oven, fridge and cabinets as their own lines.
4. 4For move-outs, confirm the home will be empty and the utilities on.

Angi says deep cleaning adds $35 to $100 or more per additional bedroom, against $25 to $35 for a standard clean. Ask for photos before quoting a first deep clean; it saves a lot of arguments.

Yes. The bottom of Angi's standard range is $75, and a short job still costs you the full drive.

A two or three hour minimum, or a minimum price per visit, is simple to explain; say it in the first quote. Regular weekly and biweekly customers are the ones to protect; a minimum on one-offs keeps those slots for them.

1. 1Rerun your costs every year, including any minimum wage increase in your state.
2. 2Raise prices for new customers first.
3. 3Give regular customers a month's notice in writing.
4. 4Track who leaves after a raise. If almost nobody does, you were cheap.

Keep the increase in round numbers. Customers accept $10 more a visit better than a 7.5% change that lands on an odd figure.

If you're adding staff, raise before you hire, not after.

A biweekly customer at $150 a visit is worth $3,900 a year, so a missed call that would have booked one time in four costs about $975. Those are example figures inside Angi's $100 to $250 biweekly range.

Someone looking for a cleaner can call the next company on the list in seconds, and a recurring customer you never spoke to is gone for years, not for one visit. Put your own figures into our missed call calculator.

Ringzel is an AI receptionist for cleaning companies and other small businesses. It answers every call 24/7, including the ones that come in while your hands are full, and takes down the home size and the clean they want.

On the Professional and Premium plans it can book cleans and quotes into your calendar and transfer calls to you. The Android app is on Google Play, with the iPhone app coming soon.

Plans cost $99, $179 or $299 a month, as shown on our pricing page, with a 14-day free trial and no card. Basic is $1,188 a year, under a third of one example biweekly customer.