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Anyone have any tips on where to look for a good service?
We are having a difficult time finding a new service in our home. We actually are thinking of having a live in housekeeper as we have just had such a time getting a service to show up on time and do a thorough job.
Our last house cleaners were awesome and we used them for many years on our rental and personal properties. They were recommended by a friend and did a stellar job-- cleaned the fridge and oven as part of the service, scrubbed the tubs really well, etc. We moved out of the area and now have people who basically dust and mop but don't do a whole lot else. (We have tried a few through word of mouth and Angie's List.)
Location: Foothills of Maryland Blue Ridge mountains
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We moved up to Frederick area from Bethesda area about 2 years ago. I tried a few cleaning people and Cleaning services in the Frederick area. None of them did a good job. I believe you live in Frederick, do I have that right?
I was able to convince the wonderful cleaning team I had in Bethesda to come up every other week. I’ve used them since 1992 and they are like family to me. They’ve helped us through a difficult time this past year.
Could you convince your old team to clean for you if you pay them more? I don’t know how far away they are from you now obviously. Have you registered on Nextdoor.com? I’ve gotten some i great recommendations from my neighbors on that site. However the housecleaning recommendations didn’t pan out. But you could try.
Merry Maids, best decision we ever maid. We tried various services and have been happy with the Merry Maids. They are very thorough prompt and careful. They hire quality people. We've been using them for years every 3 weeks.
I think all these vary greatly by area. In our area, we have used Angie's List as a starting point for many services and with a bit of research and parameters have been pleased. You mention that you did the same and it didn't yield great results.
IN our area, Nextdoor is not so wonderful but maybe in your area it is worth a try...
We moved up to Frederick area from Bethesda area about 2 years ago. I tried a few cleaning people and Cleaning services in the Frederick area. None of them did a good job. I believe you live in Frederick, do I have that right?
I was able to convince the wonderful cleaning team I had in Bethesda to come up every other week. I’ve used them since 1992 and they are like family to me. They’ve helped us through a difficult time this past year.
Could you convince your old team to clean for you if you pay them more? I don’t know how far away they are from you now obviously. Have you registered on Nextdoor.com? I’ve gotten some i great recommendations from my neighbors on that site. However the housecleaning recommendations didn’t pan out. But you could try.
No I don't live in Frederick. I posted once about looking at some property there but we decided against buying it as our full time home. We do own some places downtown but don't live in Maryland.
(I won't say where we live now for this reason. Lots of jumping to conclusions.)
Merry Maids, best decision we ever maid. We tried various services and have been happy with the Merry Maids. They are very thorough prompt and careful. They hire quality people. We've been using them for years every 3 weeks.
We tried them and a few different franchise services. I wasn't impressed. We had used Merry Maids in other areas with rental properties we own (move out clean) and they were decent.
Hire someone you know. An individual, not a company. The companies pay people next to nothing and treat them terribly. That is because they are accustomed to getting the wort workers, which in turn assures they get the worst workers out there. It woudl shock you to learn what some of those worst workers do in your home when you are not there. the turnover is constant, so if you do by some miracle get someone good, they will be replaced with someone terrible in a few weeks.
If you hire a cleaning company, choose a higher end cleaning company, like a company that does the cleaning for toyota or Amazon. You will pay more, but you will get better people and better supervision.
What we found was to find a semi retired person or a mom whose kids are grown who just wants to do a bit of work here and there to make some spending money. The current lady we hire is like a member of our family. She does all kinds of extra things, makes suggestions buy things for us, advises our children (teenagers). . . She stays until she feels she is done or has given us good value for the amount we are paying her. She offers to do things she notices we are having trouble finding the time to do. She will toss a load of laundry in as she passes the washer, fold a air of pants someone left in a stupid place and put them on or in a dresser or on a hanger, she guides vendors we have come if we are not home. You are not going to get that form a company.
The live in idea is a bad idea. Sounds like a good idea, it is a bad idea. We did that with nanny/cleaners for a few years. While there were some good ones who stayed and even became close friends. Most were either terrible or left in a few months to pursue a career, or college, or the Olympics, or get their family back together, or . . . .
Some were extremely terrible - despite background checks, interviewing references, intensive investigations, you can end up hiring someone with more than one identity, some of which have a criminal record and who might steal your car and forge checks on our account. (Not even the FBI was aware of her alternate identities, but they were looking for her under one of her five different names/identities for prior bank fraud and possibly for burning down a house for insurance proceeds). We had no idea she was this crazy criminal until she had lived with us for more than a week, At first she seemed perfect, sweet. intelligent, she passed the FBI background check and my personal investigation.
Ask the neighbors. If someone is already coming to the block, they can usually squeeze in another house.
Or ask on a local site like Nextdoor.com or a facebook group for your area. You may not know the person giving the recommendation so it's not quite as reliable as a person you actually know but it's not bad.
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We tried various services and have been happy with the Merry Maids. They are very thorough prompt and careful. They hire quality people. We've been using them for years every 3 weeks.
