You are booked. You are turning work away. Everybody tells you the next step is to hire somebody.
Maybe. Or maybe the next step is to charge more and keep your evenings.
The only way to know is to price the hire honestly, and almost nobody does, because the number people compare against is the wage.
The wage is the small part
Say you would pay twenty an hour. That is not what it costs you.
On top of the wage there are employer payroll taxes. Workers comp, which in cleaning is not cheap because of the injury profile. Liability and bonding, because half your commercial clients require it. Supplies and equipment for a second person. Uniforms. A background check, because clients ask. Mileage or a vehicle if they drive between houses. A seat in whatever software you use.
Then there are the hours. You pay for eight. They are inside houses for maybe five or six once you count driving between jobs, restocking, and the fact that the schedule is not perfectly packed.
Stack it up and the real cost of an hour of that person's time is a long way from twenty dollars.
Work out what your first hire really costs
Wage is the smallest part of it. This adds the employer taxes, the insurance, the supplies, the training time and the hours they are on the clock but not in a house.
Your numbers
What that means
This person has to produce more than $86,224 of value a year to be worth it. Most owners never do that math and then resent the hire.
Tax and comp rates vary by state and job classification. Use your actual rates from payroll for a real number.
What this assumed
- Burden rates vary by state, trade and carrier. Use your own figures, not the defaults.
- Management time is charged at the rate you enter for your own hour.
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This is an estimate
This tool returns an estimate based on the numbers you entered. Your real result depends on your own costs, rates and conditions. Check it against your own records before you make a decision with it.
How to run it, step by step
- 1Start with the honest wage. What you would actually have to pay to get somebody reliable in your area, not what you wish the job paid. In cleaning, the difference between those two numbers is the whole turnover problem.
- 2Add employer taxes and insurance. Payroll taxes, workers comp, and any liability or bonding your clients require. Rates vary by state and by classification, so use your own quotes rather than a rule of thumb.
- 3Add the costs that come with a person. Extra supplies and equipment, uniforms, background check, phone or app seat, and mileage or a vehicle if they drive. Every one of these is real and none of them are in the hourly rate.
- 4Count unbillable hours honestly. Drive time between houses, restocking, training weeks, and the gaps in a day that is not fully booked. A cleaner paid for eight hours who is in houses for five is costing you three hours of nothing.
How to read what it gives you
- The loaded hourly cost is what an hour of that person actually costs you. Compare it to what you bill per hour, not to their wage, or you will convince yourself of something that is not true.
- The break-even is how many billable hours a week they have to run before they stop costing you money. If that number is close to a full schedule, the hire is fragile and one slow month hurts.
- Run it a second time at ninety percent of full schedule. That is a realistic year with sick days and cancellations in it, and it is the version that tells you whether this works when things are normal instead of perfect.
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The three outcomes
The break-even hours are comfortably below a full schedule. Good. You have room for a slow week without the hire becoming a problem. This is the version where hiring works.
The break-even is close to a full schedule. This hire only works if everything goes right. One sick week, one client pausing, one slow month and you are paying somebody out of your own pocket. Either raise prices first or wait until you have more demand than one person can absorb.
The break-even is above a full schedule. You cannot hire at your current prices. Not "hiring is hard right now". Cannot. The hire would lose money in a perfect month. This is a pricing problem wearing a staffing problem's clothes, and it is the most common result.
The option nobody offers you
Stay solo and raise prices.
It is not the ambitious answer and nobody posts about it. But a solo cleaner charging properly, with a tight route and no payroll, often takes home more than the same person running two employees at prices that were set back when they were doing it all themselves.
Growth is not the same thing as income. A bigger business with thinner margins and a payroll to make every Friday is a different job with more stress, and it is worth choosing on purpose rather than drifting into.
If you have never worked out what your hour has to be worth, start there. It is written for lawn care but the math is identical for cleaning, and the answer changes this decision more than anything else on this page.
If you do hire
Hire into a full book, not into hope. They should have a nearly full schedule on day one, from work you are already turning away.
Write down how you do it before day one. Not in your head. Room order, products, what "done" looks like, what to do when the dog is loose and what to do when something breaks. Cleaning businesses lose clients on the third visit from a new person, not the first, and it is almost always because nobody wrote down the standard.
Get the classification right. Employee versus contractor is not a preference, it is a legal test, and in residential cleaning where you set the schedule and the standards it very often lands on employee. Ask an accountant in your state before you make the choice, not after a letter arrives.
Expect the first ninety days to cost more than the math says. Training hours, mistakes, and a rework or two. Budget for it so it does not read as a failure when it happens.
The honest summary
Hiring is not a reward for being busy. It is a bet that you can sell enough work to keep another person full, at prices that cover what that person actually costs.
Run the number. If it works, hire with your eyes open. If it does not, raise your prices and enjoy a business that fits in one truck.
Questions people actually ask
Employee or contractor?
Be careful here. Whether somebody is legally a contractor depends on how much control you have over how and when the work gets done, and the tests differ between the IRS and your state. In residential cleaning, where you set the schedule, the route and the standards, workers are frequently employees regardless of what the paperwork says. Misclassification penalties are serious. Ask an accountant or employment attorney in your state before you decide.
What if I just raise prices instead?
Often the better first move. A price increase has no payroll tax, no workers comp, no training time and no turnover. Work out what a ten percent increase would do to your take-home before you take on a person, because for a lot of solo cleaners it beats the hire outright.
How many clients do I need before hiring?
Enough that the new person has a nearly full book on day one, plus enough demand that you are turning work away. Hiring into hope is how cleaning businesses end up paying somebody to sit. The break-even hours in the tool are the number to beat.
What does turnover really cost?
Recruiting time, background checks, training hours where you are paying two people to clean one house, and the client who leaves because the third new face in six months did not do it the way they like. That last one is the expensive part and it never shows up on a payroll report.