The wage is the smallest surprise
When you pay a cleaner $20 an hour, an hour of cleaning costs you more than $20. You also pay payroll taxes and workers' compensation, the supplies used in that hour, and a share of everything that keeps the business running: insurance, phone, scheduling software, marketing, bank fees. Add those and the true cost of a cleaner hour is the number to price from.
| Cleaner pay | $20.00 |
| Payroll burden, 12% (payroll taxes, workers' comp) | $2.40 |
| Supplies per cleaning hour | $1.50 |
| Overhead: $450 a month ÷ 140 cleaning hours | $3.21 |
| True cost per cleaner hour | $27.11 |
|---|---|
| Billing rate at a 30% margin ($27.11 ÷ 0.70) | $38.73 |
Payroll burden varies by state and by how you pay people. If you work alone as a sole proprietor, you do not have payroll burden in the same way, but you do pay self-employment tax on profit; put your own pay in at the rate you would pay a cleaner, so the price still works the day you hire.
Cost and billing rate by pay level
| Cleaner pay | True cost per hour | Bill at 30% margin | Bill at 25% margin |
|---|---|---|---|
| $16 | $22.63 | $32.33 | $30.17 |
| $18 | $24.87 | $35.53 | $33.16 |
| $20 | $27.11 | $38.73 | $36.15 |
| $22 | $29.35 | $41.93 | $39.13 |
| $25 | $32.71 | $46.73 | $43.61 |
The same overhead and supplies are used in every row. Each extra dollar of pay adds $1.12 of cost per hour and about $1.60 to the billing rate at a 30% margin.
Cleaner hours, not hours on site
The billing rate is per cleaner hour. Two cleaners for three hours on site is six cleaner hours, so the visit needs to bring in about 6 × $38.73 = $232 at $20 pay. Quoting "$40 an hour" for a two-person team and charging for three hours bills $120 for $163 of cost. When you send a team, multiply by the team size before quoting.
The hours you cannot bill
Overhead per hour depends on how many hours your team actually cleans, not how many they are paid. Driving between homes, quoting, re-cleans and gaps in the schedule are paid time that nobody bills. If 140 of 170 paid hours a month are cleaning hours, the 30 hours in between are part of what each cleaning hour has to cover. Two things follow:
- Tight routes are worth real money. Grouping homes by area cuts drive time between jobs, which lowers the cost of every hour you bill.
- A slow month raises your cost per hour. At 100 cleaning hours, the same $450 of overhead is $4.50 an hour instead of $3.21. Price from a realistic month, not your best one.
Charge by the hour or by the visit?
Most residential cleaners quote a flat price per visit and use the hourly rate behind the scenes. A flat price is easier for clients to accept and rewards an efficient team: if the visit is quicker than estimated, you earn more per hour instead of billing less. Build that flat price as minutes × cost per minute ÷ (1 − margin), as in how much to charge for house cleaning, and use the hourly rate for jobs that are hard to estimate, like hoarding cleanups or post-construction cleans.
Frequently asked questions
What should a cleaning business charge per hour?
Enough to cover the true cost of a cleaner hour and your margin. With $20 pay, 12% payroll burden, $1.50 of supplies and $3.21 of overhead per hour, that is about $39 per cleaner hour at a 30% margin. At $16 pay it is about $32; at $25 about $47.
What is a good profit margin for a cleaning business?
After paying every cleaner, including yourself, 25% to 35% per visit is a healthy target for residential cleaning. Below 20% there is little left for slow weeks, breakages and the unbilled time spent on quotes and scheduling.
How do I work out overhead per hour?
Add up a month of costs that are not tied to a single job: insurance, phone, software, marketing, bank fees, vehicle costs not covered by mileage. Divide by the cleaning hours your team works in a normal month.
Should I charge more for a two-person team?
Charge for cleaner hours. A two-person team finishes faster, but the total hours, and the cost, are about the same as one cleaner taking twice as long. The price stays the same; the client gets a shorter visit.
