Airbnb Turnover Cleaning Cost
If you host on Airbnb, turnover cleaning cost is one of the first numbers you have to get right. Set it too low and you can't keep a good cleaner. Set it too high and you eat into every booking, or you push the cleaning fee up until guests notice it.
I've hosted on Airbnb since 2018. The cost isn't one number on a quote. It's a bundle of small jobs, and if you don't see each one, you can't control the total.
Two jobs, one cost
Every turnover does two jobs at once. The first is the clean itself: beds remade, bathrooms scrubbed, kitchen reset, floors done, trash out. The second is the reset: fresh linens, towels replaced, supplies restocked, the thermostat set, and a check that nothing's broken or missing.
A regular clean makes a home tidy. A turnover makes a home ready for the next guest. You're not buying hours, you're buying a finished turnover.
What turnover cleaning cost actually includes
Most hosts think of it as one line, the cleaner's fee. It's more than that.
| Cost | What it covers |
|---|---|
| The clean itself | Beds, bathrooms, kitchen, floors, trash, surfaces |
| Laundry and linen | Washing and drying sheets and towels, or a laundry service |
| Restocking | Toilet paper, soap, trash bags, coffee, cleaning supplies |
| Travel | Your cleaner's time and fuel to get there and back |
| Supplies and equipment | Cleaning products, cloths, and wear on equipment |
| Your time | Scheduling, checking photos, handling extras |
Laundry is the line most hosts forget, and restocking is the other one. A few dollars on every turnover doesn't feel like much until you add it up across fifty turnovers. That's why I keep a dated invoice for every turnover, not just a text thread or a Venmo note. It shows each line, so I can see what each clean actually cost.
Turnover clean vs deep clean
A turnover clean and a deep clean are two different jobs, at two different prices. A turnover clean is the reset between guests. It follows the same checklist every time, and it fits in the window between checkout and check-in. A deep clean tackles the buildup a turnover can't reach: moving furniture, cleaning behind appliances, detailing grout and shower glass. It takes longer, it costs more, and it doesn't fit in a checkout window. Most homes need a deep clean monthly for a busy listing, quarterly for a lighter one, agreed as a separate job, with its own price, in advance.
Cost, cleaning fee, and cleaner pay are three different numbers
Turnover cleaning cost, the cleaning fee your guest pays, and what you pay your cleaner are three different numbers, and they don't have to match.
The cost is what it takes to turn the home over. The cleaning fee is what you charge the guest. You set it in your listing, Airbnb doesn't set it for you, and Airbnb takes its host service fee from your payout. If you set it far below your cost, you're paying to host. What you pay your cleaner is the rate you agreed with your cleaner, for a written scope. A flat amount per turnover works best for me, with extras agreed in advance, like a deep clean or a messy stay.
| Number | Who sets it | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Turnover cleaning cost | The real work, and your local market | Clean, laundry, restocking, travel, and your time |
| Cleaning fee | You, in your listing | What the guest pays, less Airbnb's fee |
| Cleaner pay | You and your cleaner, agreed up front | The cleaner's rate for the written scope |
Check them every few months, because cleaner rates move.
What moves the cost up or down
There's no single number for every home, because the cost moves with the home.
Size comes first. More beds and baths mean more linen, more bathrooms, and more floors. A one bedroom flat and a four bedroom house aren't the same job. Laundry is next. Three sets of linens per bed help a lot, one on the bed, one in the wash, and one spare for stains, because the clean doesn't have to wait for the dryer. Restocking comes next. A home stocked to a fixed par level is cheaper to run than a home where the cleaner has to guess and buy on the day. Location and travel matter too, and so does the state of the home after each guest. A normal checkout and a messy stay aren't the same clean, so extras belong in the agreement in advance.
I don't put a dollar range here, because a range without a place, a size, and a scope would be a guess. Use the calculator below instead.
The interactive answer: the Turnover Cleaning Price Calculator
The honest answer to "what does it cost" is: it depends on your home. The Turnover Cleaning Price Calculator is free, with two modes, one for short-term rentals and one for regular homes. Put in your home's details and your market, and it gives you a per-turnover cost you can compare against your cleaning fee and your cleaner's rate.
If the number and your fee are close, you're in good shape. If they're far apart, adjust one or the other. For more on the rate side, see How Much to Pay Your Airbnb Cleaner and How Much Should I Charge to Clean an Airbnb, plus the Airbnb Cleaning Rate Guide.
Keeping the cost down without cutting corners
You keep cost down by making the job easier to do well, not by asking your cleaner to do less.
Use the same checklist every time, in the same order. Strip the beds and start the laundry first, so the machine runs while everything else happens. Work top to bottom, floors last. Ask for photos of each finished room, and of the five spots that cost reviews, the bathroom drain, under each bed, the inside of the microwave, the coffee machine, and the shower corners. Fix your restock par levels in writing, and pay on time, every time. A good cleaner who trusts they'll be paid stays.
Where CleanSlate fits
CleanSlate doesn't set your turnover cleaning cost, and it doesn't pay your cleaner for you. What it does is make the cost visible, and the payment simple, so the number doesn't drift. Here's how it works, in three steps.
First, connect one iCal link per Airbnb, Vrbo, or Booking.com listing. CleanSlate merges them into one calendar per property, so every checkout becomes a line on the calendar, and nothing gets missed. Regular homes work too, with a regular cleaning schedule instead of a booking calendar.
Second, the app builds the invoice from the calendar at the agreed rate. Your cleaner submits it, with the line items, the extras, and the photos, and you can see exactly what each turnover cost. If you need to invoice work that hasn't been invoiced yet, CleanSlate can backfill dates in the app. Invoices from before a cleaner connects don't export to your accounting software.
Third, you approve and pay by card through the cleaner's own Stripe, in US dollars, with Apple Pay and Google Pay where supported. Venmo and Zelle are external payee options on the invoice, and the app directs you to them, it doesn't process the payment itself. Invoices flow into QuickBooks, Xero, FreshBooks, and Wave, so the cost is in your books, not just in a text thread. When every turnover has a dated invoice, you can see what you actually spent. CleanSlate is built for the cleaner first, and the host second. It doesn't do dispatch, payroll, or property management, and it never texts your clients automatically.
Built by STR hosts, for the cleaners who turn homes over between guests, and the hosts who partner with them.
Soft close
Turnover cleaning cost isn't a mystery, and it isn't a single number you can copy from a list. It's the clean, the laundry, the restocking, the travel, and your time, added up on a fixed scope, at a rate you agreed in writing. Run the calculator, compare the number to your cleaning fee and your cleaner's rate, and write the scope down. If they're far apart, fix the gap now, while it's small.
Try CleanSlate free for 75 days, no credit card. After that it's $89.99 per year founding, or $12.99 per month, with unlimited properties.
No credit card.
Related articles
- How Much to Pay Your Airbnb Cleaner, how to set a fair per-turnover rate, in writing, with your cleaner.
- How Airbnb Hosts Pay Their Cleaners, the normal arrangement, and how to stop chasing payments by hand.