I ran a housecleaning service, and I have had help from friends and services with routine, extreme, and fire-recovery cleaning.

For me the bottom line, if I am paying-- how can I get the biggest bang for my buck? If I can get in there ahead of whoever is helping me achieve a clean house, they can spend their time on the clock doing what I could not do. I do not look at it as a job to delegate as much as a job I need help with.

The best was the fire-recovery cleaners, even beyond the insurance paying for it. I was a room ahead of them each night, filling up trash bags and organizing where I wanted stuff to be. On the insurance, they are required to clean every item present, but they do not sort, decorate, or organize. They have to wipe each piece of paper, for instance, and put it right back where it was. They said a lot of people are so freaked out after a fire that they get very anal-retentive about their stuff, even their trash. Well, I used their unexpected assistance to de-clutter what had been left after the kids moved out. I did the sorting and trashing, but they happily toted out fill trash bags, and deep-cleaned what was left.

I do the parts I can do and enjoy knowing that with the help, the rest will actually get done for a change, too.

When I ran a service, we expected stuff to at least be picked up and made vacuum-ready-- don't make the help to clean up after you, but pay them properly to clean for you. Make it easy to get at surfaces if you want the surfaces cleaned. (Put out trays they can use to remove a shelf-full of accessories at a time, too.)

And if you pay someone to clean a house that is a filthy mess-- don't be surprised if their work only elevates it to a lower standard than you might have hoped for. If it's a sh*thole when they arrive, they figure you don't really care or won't notice how it turns out.

Finally, if you are paying-- make it really clear exactly what you want, and what products you want used where-- and be prepared to pay for the time for them to actually do it well. Yours may be just one of several homes they are cleaning that day-- you don't think people can actually live on what you pay for your house's cleaning, do you? So they will tend not to clean as fast as you might in a blitz to get done and get on with your day-- they will pace themselves, and rightly, so that they can do a good job and still be physically able to do more than one home.

~Susan