<p>I definitely look at all the costs. Utilities are a huge issue for me with a large house. Especially in the south where things sometimes start to mildew without ac. </p>
<p>Except for a short period of time when my children were very young I have done all my own housework. So the size of the house matters more to me than my husband. He was quite taken with some 5000+ sq ft antebellum architectural gems we toured when house shopping and I kept saying - “fine, if we agree to let it just fall down around our heads because no way I can keep this going at this level.” As empty nesters we had just closed off the majority of our former, larger home. We had a wing we really didn’t need most of the time. The kids and an assortment of their friends stayed there during the winter holidays, after which I cleaned everything up and shut the door. Imagine my surprise to visit that wing in mid February and realize the furnace on that side of the house had kind of exploded and puffed soot everywhere. </p>
<p>The gentlemen who did the insulation on my current house told me about other clients, a multi-generational immigrant family who were having them blow foam insulation into every conceivable empty space of their new 6000 sq ft home. Big makes sense to me in that context.</p>
<p>My current house is probably less than 1800 sq ft.<br>
I can clean this house in less than a day. That is why I can spend so much time on CC.
I am working on some outbuildings though and that is going to increase my workload :(</p>
<p>Cleaning 1800 sq ft “in less than a day” sounds like a LOT of time to me. Our present house is 1700 sq ft (main floor) and 600 sq ft (actively used basement). I can make it spotless in three hours.</p>
<p>My grandfather was an efficiency expert and I was raised with the idea that you always try to work out the most efficient way to do any job, BEFORE you start work. To clean a house, I model myself on a cleaning service. I get all the tools I’ll need ready before I start. I do all the “wet” prep first–put cleaner in the toilets and counters, spot treat floors and carpets, etc. I heat up the steam cleaner while I’m doing that. Bathrooms next, working top to bottom. In each bathroom, I drop the dirty towels on the floor and the last step is to use them to clean the floor (a bit of detergent and water). I leave the towels in place for now.</p>
<p>The main rooms usually only need vacuuming and general pickup-and-put-away. I carry a cardboard box around and anything that doesn’t belong in that room goes into the box as I vacuum and dust (dust first). </p>
<p>Last step is to walk around the house and empty the box. This is when I pick up the dirty towels (and replace them with fresh towels) and take them to the laundry room and start the load.</p>
<p>I should note that I clean the kitchen every day before bed; it takes about 15 minutes.</p>
<p>dmd: I didn’t say how much less than a day
I love how you clean. I pretty much do the same thing as you except no steam cleaner. Like you I clean the kitchen completely every night before bed. First thing I do in the morning after putting on the coffee is unload the dishwasher while waiting for the coffee to brew. Then drink coffee. Then make bed. Then start a load of laundry. Then prep dinner. I wipe up the bathrooms everyday. Every time I leave a room I take with me whatever doesn’t belong in that room. I have “holding areas” on each floor of the house and whenever I change floors I take what doesn’t belong on one floor to where it does belong. When I go to the end of the drive to pick up the mail, I take out the garbage and recycling. I have always been relatively neat but where I live now there are lots of drop in guests so I’m really conscious of unnecessary clutter. And because we’ve restored a local landmark lots of people show up unexpectedly and ask for house tours and I need to be prepared!</p>
<p>My house is 3000 sq ft, and it takes me just a couple of hours to clean it, because I do the same thing as dmd does. Additionally, a few minutes spent on PM prevent a lot of expensive jobs down the road, and touch up paint does wonders to “repell” major painting jobs.</p>
<p>Does anyone ever have someone come in for a one-time, deep cleaning? Our house is more than I can handle with my piddly energy levels and it would be nice if I could get somebody to do the heavy cleaning and then I can maintain it (for a while). Would probably be easier to convince DH of this approach vs. a regular service, too. </p>
<p>I feel like I am never caught up (and if you look around, it’s been that way for a long time)…</p>
<p>*Does anyone ever have someone come in for a one-time, deep cleaning? *</p>
<p>I think that’s called the “Spring Cleaning” option. But some also opt to have someone come in once a month to do the minutia that some of us miss…like baseboard cleaning (ugh)…</p>
<p>I find that larger houses are easier to keep clean than smaller houses. My smaller homes seemed to always be dirty. My larger homes stay cleaner longer. My own explanation is that in a small space we tend to loop back on ourselves all the time, do our living in a more confined space and it gets dirtier. </p>
<p>The other thing I’ve noticed are that two things really reduce cleaning work: (1) hardwood floors in a good neutral, not too dark, not too light, color and (2) baseboard heat.</p>
<p>Oh, the other thing is a great vacuum. My Miele cleans baseboards in a snap.</p>
<p>The traffic in front of the house makes tremendous difference in your cleaning effort. We used to live on a busy street on a slope, the fumes from the cars left a thick layer of dust in the house and we have to clean it often. Now we are on a quiet street, perhaps 50 cars a day from just the community, there is a major difference.</p>
<p>artloversplus, so true. My parents’ house was located on a dirt road with just a few cars passing by every day, but the amount of dusting and vacuuming we had to do was more than I could bear. I was so glad when the road got paved - it freed up a lot of my weekend time. :)</p>
<p>We have an electronic air purifier with very good filters in our current house, and it also makes a huge difference.</p>
<p>I didn’t think I needed a lot of stuff…and we did throw or give away almost everything we own before we sold our house. I even posted on this board that we don’t need stuff, but now that we are remodeling our new place… I see that we are buying more stuff than I imagined…or doing more work than I imagined. The not needing stuff I wrote about… I may have been full of s…</p>
<p>So of course…I am thinking of getting a washlet. Seriously. Who has one? They look…good.</p>
<p>Our local plumbing store has a washlet in their public restroom. I love the thing, but still didn’t buy one. It seemed like just another thing to go wrong and neeed repair.</p>
<p>Any particular reasons that you won’t consider Hayward? Hayward Hills? or Oakland Hills for that matter? If it is about schools, private schools are always an option and crime is everywhere.</p>
<p>btw, the house in the OP is in Berkeley South, I think.</p>
