Quote Originally Posted by limewave View Post
I have a couple of questions:
1) do you tip?
2) how often does one generally have their home cleaned?
3) Do cleaning services pick-up or just clean (dust, mop, vacuum)?

Anyone else have or have had a cleaning service? What was your experience like? Pros/Cons?
Congrats on the promotion! We are fairly tidy as a couple but we love our housecleaner. She comes over once every two weeks for vacuuming, mopping, wiping down counters, bathrooms, dusting, that sort of thing. Besides the time saved for us, there's always a slight difference between couples on what they consider "clean," whether by how thorough or how much time it takes. There are also those chores that, logically or not, we hate. This takes care of those issues, so there's one less thing to negotiate.

We do our own tidying beforehand to give her a fair shot at it, even if that means piling a bunch of stuff on top of the bed. If nothing else, it's sometimes a sobering reminder that maybe it's time to get rid of things if they don't have a good "home".

That said, this woman is almost TOO amazing. I've noticed that the top lip of my dresser drawers have been wiped down. She'll take all the frames down, dust them, and put them back. Or my favorite data point: we're avid homebrewers, and at one point I had brought out a bunch of empty beer bottles from the garage with the intent of sanitizing them in the dishwasher for the fill; except we didn't get around to it that evening. When I got home the next evening, I was astonished to discover that Laura had dusted each bottle until they were sparkling... (oops, sorry!)

We tip because we personally feel she charges way too little for the caliber of work she does.

-- gnat! (plus, that sensation of arriving home and everything glitters and smells lemony? bliss!)