I would like to know how I would or should bid on a house that is 5000 square feet, and would also like windows inside and out cleaned within 3 days? I am currently in process of getting business license and ein. I currenlty charge average of 25 hour for regular homes but this one is by far the largest and I don't know how I shall bid on this job any help would be great thank you Cassie.

Is this a new empty house or is it furnished?

Stringer

Hi Stringer, Ty and this is an empty house. This is the homebuilders home.right now for windows I charge an average of $6 per window(one normal size meaning top and bottom in and out) but I also clean the seals and everything.

Hi Stringer, Ty and this is an empty house here in Iowa. This is the homebuilders home.right now for windows I charge an average of $6 per window(one normal size meaning top and bottom in and out) but I also clean the seals and everything.

Hi Ccleans,

Ok, first realize that in the end pricing is always your own decision.

I am in the Chicago area and I own an commercial janitorial company for the last 20 years or so. However my wife started a residential cleaning company from scratch about six years ago and built it to over 75 homes. She sold it for a nice profit about two years ago.

She figured her pricing for empty homes at 500 sq ft per hour. So if you figure this to be 5,000 sq ft then you are probably at 10 to 12 man hours total. This would be complete detail vacuuming, dusting everything including walls, top to bottom in the bathrooms, etc. I would go with the high side of this pricing per my figures above.

For my company I charge $2.50 per window pane per each side. So one pane in/out would be $5.00.

Good luck, let me know.

Stringer

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Stringer

Hi Ccleans,

Ok, first realize that in the end pricing is always your own decision.

I am in the Chicago area and I own an commercial janitorial company for the last 20 years or so. However my wife started a residential cleaning company from scratch about six years ago and built it to over 75 homes. She sold it for a nice profit about two years ago.

She figured her pricing for empty homes at 500 sq ft per hour. So if you figure this to be 5,000 sq ft then you are probably at 10 to 12 man hours total. This would be complete detail vacuuming, dusting everything including walls, top to bottom in the bathrooms, etc. I would go with the high side of this pricing per my figures above.

For my company I charge $2.50 per window pane per each side. So one pane in/out would be $5.00.

Good luck, let me know.

Stringer

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Hi Stringer, Thank you for your reply and great advise another question. I now have 23 houses I clean by myself in 2 weeks normally and salon also. On this though for pricing should I raise my hourly rate higher and include more =cost for supplies. Since I also have to do inside cabinets, pantry closet shelving because of dust etc. with supplies added in and extreme construction dust I was thinking minimum 400 and max 600. Do you think that is too much for cleaning?Windows will completely be separate that final clean. Thank you again ccleans1

It may depend on what is accepted and what your competition is doing, market areas are different. Some will include all costs even supplies in their hourly rate and some will charge separately for them.

You probably have a good sense of how long it takes to do the work, use these skills for pricing. Remember that all of us would like to charge more but it is always a competitive market Ccleans; don't over charge and do not under charge.

Remember that you have three days to complete this job, do you have help?

Is this job being bid by other companies?

Also it is important to have a walk through inspection with the client when you are finished so they agree that it was done properly. Much more difficult for them to come back later to say there are problems.

One way is to always find time to talk with the decision maker, get to know them and bounce some figures off them to give you a better idea of what to charge.

Bidding is a learning process. If you win great if you lose learn from it for the next time.

Stringer