Table of Contents
The short answer
For a regular clean, our published guide is 2 hours for a studio, 3 for a one-bedroom apartment, 4 for a two-bedroom and 5 for a three-bedroom, each with one cleaner, and 2 cleaners for 4 hours each for a villa of four or five bedrooms. A deep clean starts at 2 cleaners for 3 hours each, whatever the size of the home, and rises to 4 cleaners for 5 hours each for that villa.
With your own products and equipment, the regular clean costs AED 65 for the studio, AED 120 for the two-bedroom and AED 240 for the villa. The deep clean costs AED 180, AED 240 and AED 580. Our materials add AED 5 for each cleaner-hour, and every figure includes VAT.
These are starting points for a home in ordinary condition. The hours guide on our price list is marked as an estimate, and the hours are confirmed with you before the visit. The rest of this page gives the full tables, explains what pushes a home above its row, and sets out what happens if the hours turn out to be wrong on the day.
Cleaner-hours: the unit a clean is measured in
A cleaner-hour is one cleaner working for one hour. Two cleaners for three hours each is six cleaner-hours. One cleaner for six hours is also six. The amount of cleaning is the same, and the time on the clock is not. Most questions about how long a clean takes become easier once they are put this way, because a home needs a certain amount of work and you then choose how many people share it.
The price follows the same logic, with one twist. Each cleaner's visit is priced from the list by its length: AED 55 for 1 hour, AED 65 for 2 hours, AED 30 an hour for 3–4 hours and AED 25 for each hour after that. A longer visit costs less per hour, from AED 32.50 an hour on a two-hour visit to AED 27.50 on an eight-hour one, because travelling and setting up take the same time however long the cleaner stays. So six cleaner-hours from one cleaner cost AED 170, and the same six from two cleaners cost AED 180.
One booking has limits: between 1 and 8 hours for each cleaner, and up to 4 cleaners. We work every day, 8 AM – 8 PM, and the work has to finish by closing time, so the longest visits need a morning start.
A regular clean: hours and cost by home size
A regular clean maintains a home that is already in reasonable order: dusting, the kitchen, the bathrooms, the bedrooms and living areas, and the floors vacuumed and mopped last. The table gives the published team and hours for each size of home and the price of that visit, first with your own products and equipment and then with ours.
| Home | Team and hours | Your products | Our materials |
|---|---|---|---|
| Studio | 1 cleaner × 2 hours | AED 65 | AED 75 |
| One-bedroom apartment | 1 cleaner × 3 hours | AED 90 | AED 105 |
| Two-bedroom apartment | 1 cleaner × 4 hours | AED 120 | AED 140 |
| Three-bedroom apartment | 1 cleaner × 5 hours | AED 145 | AED 170 |
| Villa, four or five bedrooms | 2 cleaners × 4 hours | AED 240 | AED 280 |
How to read the regular table
The apartments are all one-cleaner jobs, and the hours rise by one with each bedroom. The step from one row to the next is the price of one more hour on the list: AED 25 from a studio to a one-bedroom, AED 30 from there to a two-bedroom and AED 25 more for a three-bedroom. The villa is the first home where the guide brings in a second cleaner, because 8 cleaner-hours from one person would fill the whole working day.
On the price list the larger homes are shown as a short range, since they differ most from one to the next. The figures here are the team the booking form suggests when you choose that size. You can change both the cleaners and the hours before you confirm, and the price updates as you do.
Where the hours go
In a routine visit the kitchen and the bathrooms take the largest share of the time. They are the rooms where grease and limescale have to be removed, not just dusted away. Bedrooms and living rooms go faster. That is why the number of bathrooms tells you more about the hours than the floor area does. A two-bedroom apartment with three bathrooms is a longer job than a three-bedroom with two.
Our home cleaning page describes a two-hour visit to a studio or a small one-bedroom as enough for a thorough routine clean of the kitchen, the bathroom, the living space and the floors. In a tower, allow a few minutes at the start for visitor registration and the lift. The apartment cleaning page asks for the building's access details at booking for that reason.
Both pages also say that a home which has not been cleaned professionally for a while takes noticeably longer on the first visit, and that weekly or fortnightly visits then settle into a predictable time. A practical way to allow for it is to book the first visit an hour longer than the table and shorten it once the home is under control.
The same visits on a regular plan
A home cleaned every week or two costs less per visit as well as taking less effort to keep up. Regular visits cost less: 10% off every two weeks, 15% off weekly and 20% off for two or more visits a week (5% monthly). The discount is taken off every visit and rounded down to a whole dirham, with no contract and nothing paid ahead. The table shows the regular clean with your own products.
How often your home needs a visit is a separate question, answered in how often a home in Abu Dhabi should be cleaned.
| Home | Single visit | Every two weeks | Weekly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Studio | AED 65 | AED 58 | AED 55 |
| One-bedroom apartment | AED 90 | AED 81 | AED 76 |
| Two-bedroom apartment | AED 120 | AED 108 | AED 102 |
| Three-bedroom apartment | AED 145 | AED 130 | AED 123 |
| Villa, four or five bedrooms | AED 240 | AED 216 | AED 204 |
A deep clean: hours and charges by home size
A deep clean is a reset. It gives time to what a routine visit passes over: grease on the hood and the cabinet fronts, limescale on taps and shower glass, grout, skirting boards, door frames, switches and the dust behind and under furniture. It is slower work, and it is done by a team.
That is why it has a floor. A deep clean, a move-in or move-out clean and a post-construction clean are never booked with fewer than 2 cleaners for 3 hours each. The smallest deep clean is therefore 6 cleaner-hours, at AED 180 with your own products or AED 210 with ours.
| Home | Team and hours | Your products | Our materials |
|---|---|---|---|
| Studio | 2 cleaners × 3 hours | AED 180 | AED 210 |
| One-bedroom apartment | 2 cleaners × 3 hours | AED 180 | AED 210 |
| Two-bedroom apartment | 2 cleaners × 4 hours | AED 240 | AED 280 |
| Three-bedroom apartment | 2 cleaners × 5 hours | AED 290 | AED 340 |
| Villa, four or five bedrooms | 4 cleaners × 5 hours | AED 580 | AED 680 |
How to read the deep-clean table
A studio and a one-bedroom apartment share the same figures because both sit at the minimum team. From there each bedroom adds an hour for every cleaner, and the villa takes 4 cleaners for 5 hours each: 20 cleaner-hours in a single day.
Compare the two tables row by row and the deep clean is at least twice the cleaner-hours of the regular one in every row. That is the right way to think about the charge. A deep clean is not a regular clean at a higher rate. It is the same price list applied to at least twice the work.
What a deep clean adds to the checklist, and how to tell which of the two your home needs, is set out in regular cleaning compared with deep cleaning and on the deep cleaning page.
Move-in, move-out and after builders
The price list heads this column 'Deep / move-out', and the same team and hours apply to a move-in or move-out clean. An empty home is quicker to work around, but more of it is on show: at a handover every cupboard, drawer and wardrobe can be opened.
Post-construction cleaning has the same minimum team and is offered only with our materials, because builders' dust needs our equipment and not household supplies. Which of the three a new home needs is worked out in move-in clean, deep clean or post-construction clean.
What to settle before a deep clean is booked
Two things are worth settling when you book, because both take time. If you want the insides of cupboards, wardrobes, the fridge or the oven done, say so, so that the scope and the hours are confirmed first. Our deep cleaning page asks for this, since inside-cabinet and inside-appliance cleaning is not automatically included.
The second is fabric. Sofas, carpets, mattresses and curtains are washed with separate equipment and priced by the item, not by the hour. Booked on the same visit as a deep or a move-in or move-out clean they are 10% off, and the team only comes once. The item prices are explained in sofa, carpet, mattress and curtain cleaning prices.
What pushes a home above its row
The tables assume an ordinary home in ordinary condition. The things below add time. None of them carries a surcharge on our price list. They change the hours, and the hours set the price, so the honest way to deal with them is to mention them when you book.
Time since the last proper clean
This is the largest single factor. Dirt does not build up evenly. Limescale that is a week old wipes off with a bathroom cleaner. After a month it has hardened into a crust that needs a descaler and time to soak before it will move. Kitchen grease behaves the same way: fresh, it wipes off; left, it turns sticky, holds dust and needs several passes.
So a home cleaned last week needs the hours in the table. A home last cleaned two months ago needs more, and a home that has gone several months needs a deep clean first and regular hours after that. Say when the last thorough clean was. It is the most useful sentence you can put in a booking.
Extra bathrooms and a kitchen that works hard
Each bathroom is a fixed block of work: toilet, basin, shower or bath, glass, tiles and floor. Abu Dhabi's hard water leaves scale on all of it, so a bathroom cannot be hurried the way a bedroom can. If your home has more bathrooms than bedrooms, or a guest toilet and a maid's bathroom on top of the main ones, count them when you describe the home.
A kitchen where meals are cooked with oil every day needs degreasing on the hob, the splashback and the cabinet doors near the cooker at every visit. A villa kitchen, with more worktop and more cabinets, takes longer again.
Pets
Hair gathers along skirting boards, under furniture and on upholstery, and it has to be vacuumed up before a surface is wiped, or the cloth only moves it about. Feeding corners and litter trays add a little more. None of this is difficult, but it is time, and a home with a long-haired cat or dog rarely fits the lowest figure for its size.
Say that there are pets and where they will be during the visit. The booking form has a 'Pets at home' note for this, and our service pages ask that pets are kept in a room that is not on the day's list. Hair and odour inside sofas and carpets are a different job, covered in pets at home: hair, odour and accidents.
Balconies, terraces and sand
A balcony is swept and wiped as part of a visit where it is safe to do so: the floor, the rail and the furniture. After a windy spell the sliding-door track is packed with sand, and the floor has to be swept before any water touches it. A large terrace or a villa's outdoor sitting area is closer to an extra room than to an extra task. Glass on the outside is cleaned only where it can be reached safely from inside. The method is in how to clean an apartment balcony.
A majlis, staff rooms and stairs
Villas have rooms that an apartment guide never counts. Our villa cleaning page gives the majlis and any separate guest entrance their own line on the checklist. A maid's or driver's room is included in the same visit on request, provided it is mentioned at booking so that time is set aside for it. A staircase adds every tread, the handrail and the landings.
Rooms that are rarely used still collect dust, and nobody notices it building. If the majlis has floor seating, carpets and heavy curtains, read cleaning a majlis before guests arrive before deciding how much of it belongs in a routine visit.
How full the rooms are
An empty flat cleans faster than a furnished one, and a tidy one faster than a cluttered one. Open shelving, ornaments, framed photographs and toys all have to be lifted, dusted under and put back. The cleaner tidies surfaces along the way, but the hours go further if laundry and personal items are put away before the visit.
Jobs added to the list
Some jobs are not on the default checklist and need time of their own: the inside of the fridge, the insides of cupboards, the interior windows, ironing or folding. The cleaner can iron or fold within the hours you booked if you ask on the day, for instance, but it comes off the same clock as the cleaning. Decide before you book which of these you want, and add the time.
What an extra hour costs
We do not publish a number of extra hours for each of these, because it depends on the home. As a rule of thumb for planning, and not a published rule, allow one more hour when one of them applies strongly. When three or more apply, look at the next row down, or at a deep clean.
An added hour is the cheapest part of any visit. The first hour on the list costs AED 55, and each hour after it costs far less.
| One cleaner's visit grows from | Extra, your products | Extra, our materials |
|---|---|---|
| 2 to 3 hours | AED 25 | AED 30 |
| 3 to 4 hours | AED 30 | AED 35 |
| 4 to 5 hours | AED 25 | AED 30 |
| 5 to 6 hours | AED 25 | AED 30 |
One cleaner for longer, or two for a shorter visit
Once you know the cleaner-hours, you choose the shape of the visit. The work done is the same. Three things differ: the price, the time your home is occupied, and what two people can do that one cannot.
| Work | One cleaner | Two cleaners | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4 cleaner-hours | 4 hours: AED 120 | 2 hours each: AED 130 | AED 10 |
| 6 cleaner-hours | 6 hours: AED 170 | 3 hours each: AED 180 | AED 10 |
| 8 cleaner-hours | 8 hours: AED 220 | 4 hours each: AED 240 | AED 20 |
Which shape to choose
One cleaner costs a little less and suits a home where nobody is waiting for the rooms. Two cleaners halve the time on the clock, which matters before guests, on a moving day or around a child's nap. Two people can also shift a sofa or a bed to clean behind it, and can split the work so that the bathrooms soak while the kitchen is done.
Our pricing FAQ notes that most customers put two cleaners in a two-bedroom apartment so that the home is done by lunchtime, even though one cleaner for longer costs slightly less. For anything in the deep-clean table the choice is made for you, since the minimum team is two.
If the hours turn out wrong on the day
An estimate made from a description will sometimes miss. What matters then is who decides what happens next, and under our terms it is you.
The walk-through at the start
On arrival the cleaner or the team leader confirms which rooms matter most, anything fragile and what to skip, so that the hours go where you want them. Use that minute well. If the hours look tight, name the rooms that come first. A visit that finishes the kitchen and the bathrooms properly and leaves the spare room for next time is a better visit than one that hurries through everything.
If the home needs longer
The team leader asks you first. If you agree, the visit is extended in steps of 30 minutes, and the extra time is charged as the difference to the longer visit on the price list. For a full hour that is the figure in the table of extra hours above. Nothing is added to the bill without your approval. You can also decline, and have the team stop at the booked time with the priority rooms done.
An extension is easier to fit in the morning than at the end of the day, since all work has to finish by closing time. If you already suspect that the home needs more than its row, book the longer visit to begin with.
If the team finishes early
You pay for the hours you booked. If the agreed work is finished early, the team stays for the remaining time and spends it on anything else you would like done, such as the windows, the balcony or the inside of the fridge. Keep a short list of 'if there is time' jobs ready, so that the spare half hour is not spent deciding.
Before the team leaves
The work is checked with you against the agreed list before the team goes. That is the moment to point at anything missed. If you find something later, tell us within 24 hours and that point is re-cleaned at no charge. Work that was never on the list is quoted as a new job.
Villas of six bedrooms or more, and offices
The published guide stops at a villa of four or five bedrooms. For anything larger, and for offices, there is no row. The booking form lets you choose those sizes and says what happens next: we confirm the hours with you before the visit. The team size is confirmed with you in the same way when you book. It is not read off a table.
What can be said in advance is the ceiling. One visit holds at most 4 cleaners for 8 hours each, which is 32 cleaner-hours and AED 880 with your own products. A property that needs more work than that needs more than one visit.
For a large villa, send what the estimate depends on: the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, whether there is a majlis, a maid's or driver's room, the approximate floor area and when the villa was last cleaned thoroughly. How to get the home ready for the team is covered in preparing a villa for a professional clean. An office is sized by its desks, washrooms and pantry more than by its floor area, and is often cleaned outside working hours: see the office cleaning schedule.
From the row to the booking: a worked example
The routine is short: choose regular or deep, find the row for the size of your home, adjust it for what the row cannot see, decide who brings the products, and choose one cleaner or two. Here it is applied to one home.
Take a two-bedroom apartment with three bathrooms, last cleaned thoroughly six weeks ago, in a household that owns no vacuum cleaner.
The regular table gives 1 cleaner for 4 hours. The third bathroom and the six weeks both add time, so allow one more hour: 5 hours, which is AED 170 with our materials. If the home has to be ready by midday, two cleaners for three hours each do six cleaner-hours of work in three hours on the clock, for AED 210 with materials.
Had the six weeks been six months, the right booking would be the deep-clean row: 2 cleaners for 4 hours each, AED 280 with our materials, followed by regular visits. The extra hour in this example is our reasoning, not a published figure, and the hours are confirmed with you before the visit either way.
One choice in that example could go the other way. If the household owned a good vacuum cleaner and mop, its own products would save AED 5 per cleaner-hour, and when each option makes sense is covered in cleaning with or without materials. Whatever you book, write what the team needs to know in the notes: the priority rooms, pets, fragile surfaces and how to get into the building.
Common questions
How much does a deep clean of a one-bedroom (1 BHK) apartment cost?
It is booked as 2 cleaners for 3 hours each, the minimum team for any deep clean. That is AED 180 with your own products and equipment, or AED 210 with ours, VAT included. In Al Wathba, Al Shahama, Al Rahba and Al Samha a flat AED 20 is added per visit. Sofa, carpet, mattress or curtain cleaning on the same visit is priced by the item, less 10%. A flat that is heavily scaled or greasy may need longer than the minimum, and that is confirmed with you before the visit.
Is two hours enough for a studio?
For a routine clean of a studio in ordinary condition, yes: it covers the kitchen, the bathroom, the living space and the floors. It is not enough for a first visit to a studio that has been neglected, or for a list that includes the inside of the fridge and the balcony as well. One hour can be booked, at AED 55, and it suits a single job such as a kitchen or a bathroom, not a whole home.
Can I book one cleaner for a deep clean to keep the cost down?
No. A deep clean is never fewer than 2 cleaners for 3 hours each. If the home is in fair condition and simply needs more time than usual, a long regular visit may be what you are looking for: one cleaner for six hours is AED 170. Be clear about the difference, though. That visit follows the regular checklist for longer. It does not turn into a deep clean.
Is the visit cheaper if the team finishes early?
No. You pay for the hours you booked, and the team uses the remaining time on other jobs you choose. If this happens on every visit, the booking is too long for the home. Shorten it by an hour for the next visit, or keep the hours and add a job from your 'if there is time' list each time.
Why is my total different from the table?
Usually for one of four reasons. Our materials add AED 5 per cleaner-hour. A home in one of the far areas (Al Wathba, Al Shahama, Al Rahba and Al Samha) carries the AED 20 travel fee. A regular plan takes its discount off the visit. Or the hours or the number of cleaners were changed from the suggestion. The booking page lists each of these as its own line in the price summary, so you can see which one applies.
Can I change the hours after the first visit?
Yes. Our hourly cleaning page says there is no penalty for changing the hours on a recurring booking, and suggests starting with a shorter visit and adjusting once you see how far the cleaner gets. Any change made more than 6 hours before the start time is free.
Does the price change on a Friday, a public holiday or at short notice?
No. The same list applies every day of the week, on public holidays and for same-day bookings, and there is no call-out fee. A same-day visit needs about 2 hours of notice and a free team.
Check your figure, then book
The price list has the hours guide and a calculator. Choose the property, the service and the materials, and it shows the team, the hours and the total before you give any contact details.
When the figure looks right, book online or in the IHR Dream app. Choose your home's size and the form suggests the team and the hours from the same guide. Change either one, pick a day and add anything the estimate cannot see. The price is shown before you confirm, and payment is by card online once we confirm your booking. If you are still comparing companies, how to compare cleaning quotes shows how to put two prices on the same footing.
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