Guides
Blog and Cleaning Guides
Practical cleaning guides for builders, site managers, property managers and business owners in Melbourne. They answer the questions we are asked most before a job is booked: what a builders clean includes, what a vacate clean should cover, what graffiti removal and floor work cost, and how the different kinds of construction clean compare. Each guide is written to help you plan and budget, whether or not you end up booking us. For the company behind them, start at Cleaningia, cleaning company in Melbourne.
Start here
Which cleaning guides should you read first?
Start with the cleaning guides that match your role. Builders and site managers should read what a builders clean is and how it compares with an after builders clean. Property managers and landlords should start with the vacate checklist. Building owners and facility managers will get most from the graffiti and floor cost guides.
Builders and site managers
You need to know what to ask for at each stage and what a proper handover clean looks like.
Property managers and landlords
You need a checklist that matches the condition report and holds up at the final inspection.
Building owners and facility teams
You need to budget for the jobs that come round every year or turn up overnight.
The guides are deliberately practical. A builders clean guide is only useful if it tells a site manager what should be finished at rough clean, what belongs in the final, and which items get missed when a crew is rushed. A vacate checklist is only useful if it follows the rooms and fittings an agent actually inspects. That is the test each guide was written against.
They are also written for Melbourne. Rules on rental condition reports, construction site safety and graffiti on private property are set in Victoria, and prices here are not the same as in Sydney or Brisbane. Where a guide mentions a rule, it links to the Victorian authority that sets it.
If you are short on time, the checklists and tables are the quickest way in. Each guide opens with a short answer to its main question, then gives the detail underneath, so you can stop reading as soon as you have what you need.
And if a guide doesn't answer your particular situation, such as an unusual floor, a heritage wall or a site with tricky access, ask us. Questions like that usually become the next update to a guide.
All guides
What does each guide cover?
There are five guides: builders cleans and their stages, a vacate clean checklist, what graffiti removal is likely to cost, pricing for floor polishing and resealing, and a comparison of builders, after builders and deep cleans. Each one also points to the service it relates to, if you would rather have the job done for you.
A builders clean, stage by stage
What a builders clean is, how the rough, detailed and final stages differ, and a checklist of what each stage should leave behind. Useful for anyone writing a cleaning scope into a build program.
Related service: builders cleaning
The vacate clean checklist
Room by room, for Victorian rentals and commercial tenancies, with the items agents look at first.
Related service: vacate cleaning
What graffiti removal costs
Costs by surface and size, how each surface is cleaned, and when a coating works out cheaper than repeat removal.
Related service: graffiti removal
Pricing floor polishing and sealing
Typical prices for buffing, polishing and resealing commercial floors, how often each job comes round, and what makes one quote higher than another.
Related service: floor polishing
Three construction cleans compared
The difference between the three, who usually books each one, and how to tell which your project needs.
Related service: after builders cleaningPrefer to go straight to the service? See builders cleaning, vacate cleaning, graffiti removal and floor polishing, each with its own scope, process and quote form link.
How they are written
How do the guides handle prices and rules?
Prices are shown as ranges and labelled as indicative Melbourne figures for the year they were checked, because every site is different and a guide can't quote your job. Rules are taken from the Victorian authority that sets them and linked, so you can read the source rather than rely on our summary.
For example, the vacate checklist is built around the condition report, because that is the document bond decisions come back to. Consumer Affairs Victoria's page on condition reports explains what the report records and why it matters, and the checklist follows the same rooms and fittings.
Costs work the same way. A range tells you whether a quote you have received is in the normal band, and the guide explains what pushes a job to the top or bottom of it: size, surface, access, how long something has been left, and whether work happens after hours.
What each guide includes
- A short answer first, then the detail
- A checklist or table you can use on site
- Labelled price ranges where cost matters
- Links to the official source for any rule
- The date it was last checked
Guides on carpet cleaning, weekly house cleaning or window cleaning at height. We don't do that work, so we don't write about it as if we did. The guides stick to the jobs we actually quote and carry out.
Do it or hire it
Which jobs can you do yourself, and which need a professional?
Small, fresh and low-risk jobs are often fine to do yourself: a studio vacate clean, a new tag on smooth painted metal, a light clean after a minor renovation. Jobs involving fine construction dust, stripping machines, porous masonry or a bond at stake are usually worth handing to someone with the right equipment.
| Job | Reasonable to do yourself | Better to hire |
|---|---|---|
| Clean after building work | Painting touch-ups or one small room | Cutting, sanding or tiling, where fine dust spreads through the house |
| Vacate clean | A small flat left in good order | Larger homes, heavy build-up, or a disputed bond |
| Graffiti | A fresh tag on gloss paint or metal | Brick, render, stone, glass or anything older than a few days |
| Vinyl floor refresh | Regular mopping with a neutral cleaner | Stripping old sealer and applying new coats |
| Timber floors | Dry mopping and spot cleaning | Sanding, recoating or repairing worn traffic lanes |
The guides are written so they are useful either way. If you do the job yourself, the checklists show what a thorough result includes. If you hire, they help you check that the quote covers everything and compare one company's scope against another's.
Questions
Questions about the guides?
How current they are, and whether you can use them.
Are the guides kept up to date?
Can we use the checklists on our own sites?
Read enough, and ready for a price?
Tell us about the site and the date that matters, and a written scope with a fixed price comes back.