Why it matters
The two services sound alike and are priced about $40 to $45 apart, so people moving out often book the deep clean to save a little. That choice tends to show up at the inspection.
Here is how it goes wrong. A tenant in Abbotsford books a deep clean for the Friday before moving day, while the furniture and boxes are still in the unit. The crew does good work on everything it can reach. On Saturday the movers take the couch, the bed and the dresser, and leave behind three rectangles of dust, a line of grime where the fridge stood, and crumbs in every kitchen drawer that was full the day before. The landlord's walkthrough is Sunday. The tenant spends Saturday night with a bucket, cleaning the parts of the unit a deep clean was never meant to cover.
The real difference is that a deep clean works around your belongings and a move-out clean assumes there are none.
What both include: everything in a standard clean done more thoroughly, the inside of the oven and fridge, baseboards and door frames, window tracks and interior glass, and limescale removed from taps and shower glass.
What a move-out clean adds:
- Inside every cabinet, drawer and closet in the home, not only the kitchen and bathroom ones
- Inside the dishwasher and microwave as well
- Floors where furniture and appliances stood
- Marks and scuffs on walls removed where possible
- Light fixtures, switch plates and vents
- A sweep-out of the balcony, patio or garage where there is one
In BC, a tenant is expected to leave a rental reasonably clean, and the move-out condition inspection is where that gets judged. Inspectors open the oven, pull out drawers and look inside closets, which are exactly the places the move-out list covers and an occupied-home clean cannot.
How Honourable Cleaning helps
We offer both, with flat prices shown on the website before you book. For a two-bedroom, two-bathroom home in Abbotsford, a deep clean is $295 and a move-out clean is $335, before GST. The $40 difference buys the empty-home work in the list above.
A few things make a move-out clean go well:
Book it for after the movers. The home needs to be empty, or very nearly. If your mattress is staying one more night, tell us in the notes and lean it against a wall, and the crew will work around it.
Leave the power and water on until the clean is finished. The crew needs hot water, and a vacuum needs an outlet.
Defrost the freezer the day before. A crew cannot clean a freezer that is still frozen, and thawing it takes hours.
If you are staying in the home, a deep clean is the right service. It is what we recommend for a first visit, for spring, or before guests arrive.
Key takeaways
- Staying in the home: deep clean. Handing back the keys: move-out clean.
- A move-out clean needs an empty home. Book it after the movers, not before.
- The price gap is small. Skipping it to save $40 can cost you an evening of cleaning before the inspection.
- Defrost the freezer and leave the utilities on until the crew is done.
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See my price →Call (604) 751-6260Questions people ask
What is the difference between a move-out clean and a deep clean?
A deep clean is a thorough clean of a home people are living in. A move-out clean is done on an empty home and goes further: inside every cabinet, drawer and closet, inside all the appliances, and the floors and walls that furniture used to hide. If you are handing back keys, book the move-out clean.
Related pages
Move-out cleaning in Abbotsford Deep cleaning in Surrey