Fast & Efficient Vacation Rental Cleaning Tips
Keeping a spotless vacation rental is important to impress your guests. As a vacation rental host, you want to be sure you are properly cleaning and presenting your home in the best possible light. Here are some helpful fast and efficient cleaning tips for your vacation rental.
- Make a checklist
Whether you are doing the cleaning or hired a cleaner to clean your vacation rental, making a checklist ahead of time is very beneficial. With your busy schedule, it is easy to forget to take care of some important tasks for cleaning. Making a set checklist for your cleanings will solve this issue. If you have hired a vacation rental cleaner then a checklist is very important so that the cleaner knows exactly what you would like done for your property.
- Set time limit per room
Setting a time limit for cleaning each room of your house is a good way to ensure a fast cleaning process. You can base the time spent on each room based on what you have on your cleaning checklist for each room.
- First, start high!
A smart place to start is with tall pieces of furniture. This way when you dust tall furniture, the dust does not dirty your previously cleaned floor.
- Vacuum
When it comes to dusting tops of drawers and dressers: We recommend you do this step before you vacuum, this way you can vacuum any dust. The cleaning tasks you wish to be completed in your home can be compiled on a checklist for your cleaner on TurnoverBnB. Vacuuming does not take long but it is an important task to complete after each guest.
- Carry your cleaning caddy
While you are cleaning each room, carry around your cleaning caddy! This is a simple way to save time having to stop cleaning to retrieve different cleaning products. Having all of the products you need with you at once will save you this time and prove to be a good way to make for a fast and efficient Airbnb cleaning.
- Ice cubes to remove wrinkles
A quick fix for wrinkled sheets is ice cubes and some heat. By putting sheets in the microwave with ice cubes for about 5 minutes, you will have perfectly steamed linens.
- Tell Airbnb cleaners to follow checklist
If you yourself are not completing the cleaning and you hire an Airbnb cleaner, make sure the cleaner knows to follow your checklist or of any time constraints. Find your perfect Airbnb cleaner on the TurnoverBnB marketplace!
WHAT MAKES A VACATION RENTAL CLEANING DIFFERENT
A vacation rental cleaning goes above and beyond what you’d expect from a typical house cleaning. Your housekeeper needs to be ready to provide a higher level of service, and handle tasks like: test
- Cleaning the linens that were used by previous guests
- Sanitizing surfaces after previous guests check out
- Checking that the next guest has sufficient quantities of toilet paper and cleaning products
- Keeping an eye out for damage
- Checking for missing items and taking pictures of any damage
- Testing various items in the house to be sure they work
In other words, your housekeeping service isn’t only cleaning. It’s also going to make your home guest-ready
Establishing standards for cleaning
Good, bad, or otherwise – guests know exactly what to expect when booking with brands on both ends of the spectrum, from Hilton and Hyatt, to Motel 6 and TravelLodge. You are a brand as well, whether you manage one home or 1,000, and that brand should carry a standard, too! What can your guests always expect, without fail, when they book a stay with you?
If you want to guarantee the crispest linens and sparkling silver – say so, and commit to it. Your guidelines should address regular, and seasonal or periodic, procedures.
Your brand standard sets the bar for what you consider acceptable…while still always aiming to over-achieve. But keep it realistic. Don’t promise to slap up a fresh paint job between each stay when this is certainly not a task you can accomplish in the typical window of a couple hours between back-to-back guests.
Even if you’re not seeing bookended bookings now, you have to prepare for the scenario and give your cleaners a reasonable task list to meet in the allotted time. In the interest of accountability and transparency, detail your standards clearly for your staff and your guests, including specific expectations for a presentable, rent-ready home.
How to simplify cleaning in your vacation rental house
Everyone is looking to keep their vacation rental cleaner and more inviting but without putting in too much time and effort.
How can you do so?
Here are a few tips that simplify the cleaning and maintenance process of your home while still ensuring that the house is as clean as possible.
- When the house is not being used, cover furniture with sheets or special furniture covers to eliminate excessive dust
- Store mats and area rugs where they won’t get dusty or stained
- Have pest control add a barrier around your home so bugs and spiders won’t take over the unused property
- Remove all food from the house that could attract mice or other uninvited guests
- Keep lawn/patio furniture indoors and covered to protect it from the elements
Think like a hospitality professional
If you don’t have a background in the hospitality industry, it can be a switch to think like a professional hotelier instead of a homeowner who’s letting guests have temporary use of your property. But once you make the switch to paying guests, you also have to switch to that hospitality mindset. Think about when you’ve stayed at hotels. What made an impression on you or convinced you to choose one property over another? Then, figure out cost-effective ways to duplicate those aesthetic or experiential extras for your guests.