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What to Charge for your Airbnb Cleaning Fee

July 30, 2015

An inevitable task associated with running an Airbnb is the cleaning and turnover of the unit. Airbnb allows you to set your own cleaning fee during the registration process of your listing. Here’s the best strategy to establish and stick to a perfect cleaning fee for your Airbnb unit.

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We always recommend setting your cleaning fee to your actual cost of cleaning. That gives you flexibility so that if someone wants to book a single night, your cleaning cost is covered. Then you're free to price your nightly rate at whatever makes sense without having to worry about "losing" money because of short stays.

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Hypothetically, if you charge $60 for your cleaning fee, the price the guest is paying “per night” depends on their length of stay. Here’s an example of how the cleaning fee diminishes (in terms of the guest) the longer a guest stays.

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For Hosts that Outsource their Cleaning

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The average cleaning fee cost of paying someone to clean your Airbnb unit between stays varies based on your location and size of your unit. However, if you do outsource the turnover of your unit, charge exactly the cost that you pay to get the unit cleaned. This will ensure that even if you book shorter stays, which we at Beyond highly recommend allowing, you do not lose money by subsidizing even part of the cleaning fee you are paying for the service.

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For Hosts that Clean their Airbnb Themselves

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A good starting point for hosts that do the cleaning themselves is around $50. Again, it depends on the size of the unit (a private room is much easier to clean than a 4 bedroom house), so to be sure you are charging a reasonable amount, check out what other experienced hosts in your neighborhood are charging. This will give you a ballpark idea of what the best price is to charge for your own personal cleaning services.

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In short, the cleaning fee isn’t often a game-changer when guests are booking, but it is important to make sure you are not losing money by undercharging or losing potential guests by charging too much.

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Once you get your cleaning fee established, you can focus on the more difficult aspect of pricing involved with your Airbnb: your nightly rate. Luckily, we can help you out with that and automatically update your calendar with dynamic price recommendations based on real-time supply/demand analysis of your neighborhood.