There is an increasing demand toward hiring a housecleaner. With more and more families taking up challenging jobs and increasing responsibility, they hardly have anytime to clean their own houses! This has created a new business and being a housecleaning business owner is extremely rewarding!

Getting Started
If you enjoy cleaning your house and get satisfaction by leaving a room spotless, then this is an ideal opportunity to start being your own boss! Start by deciding what kind of house cleaning services you will offer. Options are from making beds, vacuuming, mopping and waxing floors, dusting etc. You can also think of specializing in a certain area such as, vacuuming and cleaning carpets only.  You will then have to purchase the cleaning equipments for the job.

Finding your clients
The best way of getting clients are by references. Word-of-mouth from family and friends about your cleaning business will help kick start your operations. You might also consider printing flyers / business cards and handing them over to people you meet who might be interested in home cleaning.
If you have any speciality, make sure you mention it! For example, today organic cleaners are much in demand. So if you use only organic cleaning mediums make sure you mention it in your flyer. This will definitely put you ahead of competition.

Pricing your service
The best way to start this is by doing some research yourself. Call up a few home cleaners in your area and ask them about their charges. You can then price your service accordingly. For the start it is best you price it a bit lower than your competition so that penetrating into the market will be easy. Once you have established a name for yourself, you can then increase your price.

You can also make various ‘cleaning packages’. Usually clients would want their homes cleaned weekly, sometimes even twice a week. So make a few ‘cleaning packages and include the services that will be included in each. Services such as window cleaning and oven cleaning is best not to be included in these packages as they are more time consuming and can be charged separately.

Insurance
Having an insurance policy will be a plus point when talking to potential clients about your services. The average cost for ‘liability insurance for contractors’ is around $300 a year for housecleaners. The chance is that clients will favour you over other cleaners who don’t have insurance policies.