The hourly rate is the number everyone compares, and it is the number that tells you least.
What the rates are
| Per hour, per cleaner | |
|---|---|
| Independent, cash | $30–$45 |
| Independent, registered and insured | $40–$55 |
| Local company | $45–$65 |
| Franchise / agency | $55–$80 |
Two cleaners at $50/hr is $100/hr in total, but usually fewer total hours, a two-person team on a three-bedroom house is often faster than one person by more than half, because they are not walking between rooms carrying the same kit.
Why the cheapest hourly rate is often the most expensive
The rate is the price of an hour. What you actually care about is the price of a clean house.
A cleaner at $40/hr who takes four hours costs $160. A cleaner at $60/hr who takes two and a half hours costs $150 and you got your afternoon back. Experience shows up as speed, and speed is invisible in an hourly comparison.
What actually sits inside a legitimate hourly rate: the cleaner's wage, ACC levies, public liability insurance, police vetting, products and equipment, travel between jobs, and the administration of being a real business. A $30/hr rate cannot fund all of that. It is not necessarily a scam, but you should know which of those you are not buying, particularly insurance and vetting, because those are the two you only notice when something goes wrong.
Hourly versus fixed price
Hourly suits regular ongoing cleaning where the workload is stable and you trust the cleaner. It is honest and flexible: a light week costs less.
Fixed price suits one-off jobs, deep cleans, vacate cleans, where you need certainty and the scope is defined. The risk shifts to the cleaner, which is exactly right for a job where they have seen the property and you have not done this before.
Be careful of the hybrid: a fixed price given without a site visit. That is not a fixed price; it is an hourly quote with an estimate attached and a variation clause underneath.
How to compare two quotes properly
Do not compare rates. Compare rate × estimated hours, and ask both to commit to the estimate.
Then ask what is included. A $45/hr quote that excludes products, and a $58/hr quote that includes everything and brings its own vacuum, are much closer than they look. And a quote with no written scope is not comparable to anything, because you cannot tell what you would be getting.
The thing nobody quotes on
None of the above tells you whether the work will actually be done to standard once you are not watching. That is the genuinely hard part of buying cleaning, and the reason every visit we do produces a task-by-task record with photos, so the question is answerable rather than a matter of trust.
More on comparing quotes in what to check before signing a cleaning quote.