Is a Cleaning Business Profitable? Learn How to Make $4K+ Per Month

How much money can a house cleaner make?

In the United States, the median hourly rate for a house cleaner is $16.08. The highest-earning house cleaners make $45,680 annually. Salary ranges vary by state and by years of experience. 

As a cleaner, you can earn higher than the average hourly rate, especially if you own your own business and complete more than one job per day.

Let’s say you’re cleaning homes by yourself. If you charge $250 per cleaning and book four cleaning jobs per week, that’s $1,000/week, $4,000/month, or $48,000/year.

You’ll make even more as a business owner, once you have a team of cleaners. According to ZipRecruiter, a cleaning business owner’s salary can be anywhere from $25,000 to nearly $340,000 a year.

How much do cleaning companies make in revenue?

Revenue is the total money a customer pays you for completing the cleaning service. The average cleaning business income is just under $56,000 (USD) per year for a one-person company.

When it comes to how much a cleaning company makes, the amount can vary depending on:

• Whether you provide residential cleaning, commercial, or industrial cleaning services
• How much you charge for your services and what your profit margins look like
• How many new and existing clients you have on your books
• How quickly you’re able to generate new leads and business
• How many jobs you’re comfortable booking per day, or within a week
• If you’re working on your own or employing other people on your team
• If you offer specialty services, like green cleaning or carpet cleaning

Say you run a business with two teams of two cleaners each. Both teams clean two houses a day, five days a week, for $300 per job. That all adds up to $6,000/week.

So, if you’re wondering how much a cleaning business makes in a month, it can be well over $24,000/month in revenue.

How profitable is a cleaning business?

As the business owner, your profit is what your business gets to keep after subtracting labor, overhead costs, materials like cleaning supplies, and other expenses.

Let’s break that down using our example above, where your cleaning teams bring in $6,000/week in revenue:

• Labor: Each cleaner makes $18/hour, or $720/week with a 40-hour week. With four cleaners, that’s $2,880/week. (Don’t forget your salary of $1,000/week as the owner!)
• Overhead: Your overhead costs add up to about $500/week. This includes costs like cleaning insurance, cleaning business software, gas for company vehicles, and so on.
• Materials: Your cleaning teams use about $75 in supplies and materials each week, for a total of $150/week.

Your expenses add up to $4,530/week, giving you $1,470 in profit that you can put back into the business. That’s a profit margin of 24.5%, which is pretty healthy for a small business.

How much can residential cleaning companies make?

The amount of money your company makes will depend on how much you charge for house cleaning.

If you clean five homes each week for one calendar year, charging a flat rate of $200 per home, your residential cleaning business could earn more than $50,000/year before taxes, overhead, and other expenses.

Now, let’s say you can book two cleaning jobs per day, five days a week, at that same $200 flat rate. Your residential cleaning business could earn $2,000 per week. Even with two weeks of vacation time, you can make $100,000/year in revenue.

Your total can increase when you charge a higher rate, fit more jobs into a day, offer special services or add-ons, or add more house cleaners to your team.

How much do commercial cleaning companies make?

In general, commercial cleaning companies have the potential to make more income than residential cleaners. That’s because the jobs are often larger and require more labor.

The business’s income potential depends on your rate and how many commercial contracts you sign. Commercial cleaning prices are often based on square footage, with 11¢ per square foot being the average rate.

For example, cleaning a 10,000-square-foot facility (at 11¢ per square foot) could earn $1,100 per visit for your commercial cleaning business. If you clean three facilities this size each week, that’s $3,300/week, $9,900/month, or more than $165,000/year.

Pro Tip: Use commercial cleaning software to manage your business income and expenses in one place. You’ll free up time to grow your business and earn even more money.

Should I start a cleaning business? 8 reasons to go for it

1. There’s high demand for cleaning services. Many people are willing to pay someone else to clean for them—even when the economy is unpredictable, or the homeowner has to cut other costs. It’s a highly competitive market but there’s room for you, too.
2. Startup costs are low. If you’re wondering how to start a cleaning business with no money, you’re in luck. Getting your new cleaning company started is usually straightforward and inexpensive. You just need to create a basic business plan, purchase a few cleaning supplies, and bring a positive work ethic.
3. Finding new clients is simple. You can promote your cleaning business to potential customers in person, on social media like Facebook and Instagram, through Google ads, or on websites like Craigslist and Angi. Try different methods to see which way is best for getting clients for your cleaning business.
4. You don’t need previous experience or education. As long as you can do the work well, there’s no need for a college degree or past cleaning experience. That said, proper training can help you offer a “white glove” experience and run your business better.
5. You can be your own boss. As the business owner, you get to run the day-to-day on your own terms and make the decisions that move your business forward. This includes your cleaning business name and logo, whether you work from home or out of an office, what your working hours look like, and what types of cleaning services to offer.
6. Set your own quality standards. If you’ve had past experience with cleaners, you might have been frustrated by poor service—or inspired to reach the same high level. Running your own cleaning business allows you to set your own standards. When you use cleaning business software, you can offer an even better experience for your clients.
7. Work alone or with others. As your business grows, you can decide if you still want to be out in the field, or if you’d rather run operations from an office or home base. To grow your small business, you can start hiring cleaners and train cleaners to follow your existing processes and quality standards.
8. Do work that makes a difference. A cleaning business gives you meaningful work and transforms the lives of your clients. By providing an essential service, you’ll give clients back their time—while redistributing money into your community.

Tips to increase your cleaning business profit

There are a few sure-fire ways to improve your profit margin while you’re still getting your business up and running:

• Set your prices for profit, and don’t be afraid to increase prices when you need to. Prepare your customers for the higher fees with a price increase letter.
• Keep up with cleaning industry trends, like using cleaning business apps and taking online payments, to ensure you’re staying competitive.
• Offer higher-tier, premium cleaning services. You can upsell clients with add-ons like carpet cleaning or green cleaning services.
• Look for ways to reduce overhead costs and become more efficient with the supplies and resources you use regularly.
• Use house cleaning checklists to keep track of work hours and requirements per job. You’ll also get more repeat customers when you do consistently excellent work.
• Test new marketing methods to promote your cleaning business and reach more of your ideal clients. Use special sign-on discounts to incentivize more contracts.

Owning a cleaning business can be incredibly rewarding—and profitable. Just keep your clients happy and keep working hard. You’ll be running a successful cleaning business before you know it.