What's the average house cleaning rate in the US in 2026?

Most cleaners charge $25–$75 per hour per cleaner depending on region, or a flat $120–$200 for a standard 3-bed/2-bath home. Small towns sit near $25–$35 per hour, while high-cost metros like New York and San Francisco reach $50–$75.

Should I charge hourly, flat rate, or per square foot?

Use hourly for unpredictable jobs like first-time deep cleans, flat rates for recurring standard cleans so clients see a fixed price and you keep efficiency gains, and per square foot ($0.10–$0.25) for large homes and commercial-style spaces.

How much more should a deep clean or move-out clean cost?

Deep cleans run 1.5–2x your standard rate, about $200–$400 for a typical home. Move-in/move-out cleans run 2–2.5x, typically $300–$500, because they cover inside cabinets, appliances and landlord-inspection detail work.

How do I price Airbnb turnovers?

Charge a flat fee per turnover, usually $80–$150 depending on the property's size, including laundry, restaging and restock checks. You're selling speed and same-day availability, so confirm the fee also covers your drive time.

How do I raise prices without losing clients?

Raise 3–6% annually, or correct any client sitting more than 15% below your current rates. Give 30 days' written notice with the exact new price, keep the message short and confident, and remember the math: a 10% increase keeps revenue even if 1 client in 10 leaves.

How Much to Charge for House Cleaning (2026 Pricing Guide)

Here's the short answer for 2026: most house cleaners in the US charge $25–$75 per hour per cleaner, $0.10–$0.25 per square foot, or a flat $120–$200 for a standard 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom home. Where you land inside those ranges depends on your city, the type of clean, and — this is the part most owners skip — your actual costs. This guide breaks down all three pricing models with real numbers, walks through a step-by-step cost-plus-margin calculation, and covers the two things nobody teaches: the pricing mistakes that quietly kill margins, and how to raise prices on clients you've had for years.

Hourly rates in 2026: $25–$75 per cleaner

Hourly is the default model for solo cleaners and the safest choice for unpredictable work — first-time cleans, post-renovation dust, homes that haven't seen a professional in years. What you can charge tracks your local cost of living more than anything else:

Small towns and rural areas: $25–$35 per hour per cleaner.
Mid-size metros (Dallas, Phoenix, Atlanta, Orlando): $30–$50 per hour.
High-cost metros (New York, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle): $50–$75 per hour.
Deep cleans, move-outs and specialty work justify the top of your local range; recurring standard cleans sit near the bottom.

The weakness of hourly pricing: it punishes efficiency. As you get faster, you earn less for the same result — and clients get nervous about an open-ended bill. Use hourly to learn your numbers on new work, then move recurring jobs to flat rates.

Per square foot: $0.10–$0.25

Square-footage pricing shines on larger homes and commercial-style jobs, because size predicts time better than bedroom count once you pass roughly 2,500 square feet. Typical US ranges: $0.10–$0.15 per square foot for a standard one-time clean, and $0.15–$0.25 for deep cleans and move-outs. Example: an 1,800 sq ft deep clean at $0.18 per square foot quotes at $324. For weekly or biweekly recurring service, effective rates drop below that range, because a maintained home never gets far from clean.

Flat rates by home type

Flat pricing is what clients prefer — one fixed number, no surprises — and it's the model that rewards you for getting faster. Typical 2026 flat rates for a recurring standard clean:

Studio or 1-bed/1-bath apartment (~700 sq ft): $80–$120.
2-bed/1-bath (~1,000 sq ft): $100–$150.
3-bed/2-bath (~1,800 sq ft): $130–$200.
4-bed/3-bath (~2,500 sq ft): $200–$300.
Large homes, 3,500+ sq ft: $300–$450 and up.

These numbers assume a maintained home on a recurring schedule. A first visit should always be quoted higher — see the service-type multipliers below.

Standard vs. deep clean vs. move-out vs. Airbnb turnover

The same house is four different jobs depending on the service. Anchor everything to your standard-clean price and apply multipliers:

Standard clean (your baseline): surfaces, floors, bathrooms, kitchen. This is your recurring flat rate.
Deep clean: 1.5–2x the standard rate, or $200–$400 for a typical home. Baseboards, inside the microwave and oven, scale removal, detail work. Make it the required first visit for new recurring clients.
Move-in/move-out: 2–2.5x standard, typically $300–$500. Empty home, inside cabinets, appliances and closets — plus landlord-inspection expectations, which means zero tolerance for missed spots.
Airbnb turnover: a flat $80–$150 per turnover depending on property size, usually including laundry, restaging and restock checks. You're pricing speed and same-day availability, not just cleaning.

How to build a price from your costs (step by step)

Market ranges tell you what clients will accept. Your costs tell you what you can accept. Here's the math for a 3-bed/2-bath that takes one cleaner 3.5 hours:

Labor: 3.5 hours × $20/hour wage = $70. Add about 15% for payroll taxes and workers' comp = $80.50.
Supplies and consumables: about $8 per job.
Drive time and fuel: about $12.
Overhead share (insurance, software, marketing, admin): about $15 per job.
True cost of the job: roughly $115.

Now apply your target margin — and divide, don't multiply. For a 35% margin: $115 ÷ (1 − 0.35) = $177, so you quote $175–$180. If you had multiplied $115 × 1.35 = $155 instead, your real margin would be only 26%. That single arithmetic slip is one of the most common reasons cleaning businesses run thinner than the owner believes.

Pricing mistakes that kill margins

Copying competitors' prices without knowing their costs — or yours. A franchise with dense routes can survive a price that bankrupts a two-person team.
Charging the recurring rate for the first clean. First visits take 30–50% longer; quote them as a deep clean or hourly.
Ignoring drive time. A $150 job 45 minutes away is a $150 job minus 1.5 unpaid hours on the road.
Quoting blind. Always ask: square footage, bedrooms and bathrooms, pets, general condition, and when the home was last professionally cleaned.
Underpricing to win the job, then resenting the client. Fixing a bad price later is far harder than starting with a fair one.
Leaving prices untouched for years while wages, insurance and supplies climb.

Raising prices on long-time clients

If you haven't raised prices in over a year, you've effectively taken a pay cut — supplies, insurance and wages all went up. A healthy habit is a small annual increase of 3–6%, plus a correction whenever a legacy client sits more than 15% below your current rate card.

Give 30 days' written notice with the exact new price and the start date.
Keep it short and confident: 'To keep up with rising costs, the rate for your biweekly clean will be $150 starting March 1.' No over-apologizing, no long justifications.
Do the churn math: raise 10% and even if 1 client in 10 leaves, revenue stays even — and you free capacity for better-priced work.
For your oldest, best clients, a phased increase (half now, half in six months) preserves goodwill.

Quote fast, then track what actually happened

Speed wins jobs: the company that sends a clear written estimate the same day usually gets the yes. But the quote is only half of pricing — the other half is checking whether the job really took the hours you assumed. CleanOS builds estimates and invoices, tracks actual time and cost per job against what you quoted, and shows which clients and services are truly profitable — so your next price is based on data, not hope.

Pricing isn't a number you pick once; it's a system you tune. Know the market ranges, build your floor from real costs, quote by service type, and revisit every price at least once a year. Do that and every job pays you — instead of just keeping you busy.