Guides
How much should your Airbnb cleaning fee be? A host’s guide
There is no single right number for an Airbnb cleaning fee, and a figure from someone else’s market won’t fit your listing. What works is a method: work out what one turnover really costs you, adjust for how your place is booked, then check it against similar listings near you. This guide walks through it and answers what hosts search most.
How much should an Airbnb cleaning fee be?
Set it to cover what a turnover actually costs you, then adjust for your listing and for what comparable listings nearby are doing. Start from your own costs and keep the market as a check.
Step one: work out what one turnover costs you
Add up the real cost of a single turnover, from checkout to guest-ready. Use your last few turnovers, not a guess.
- The cleaner’s price. If you hire it out, this is the quoted price for one turnover. If you clean yourself, price your hours as if you were paying someone, because your time is the cost whether or not you write a check.
- Linens and laundry. Washing and drying, detergent, and the slow wear on sheets and towels. If you send laundry out, that bill belongs here too.
- Restocking. Paper goods, soap, trash liners, coffee and the other things guests use up. Spread bulk purchases across turnovers.
- Your own time. Coordinating, checking photos, a late checkout, a restocking run. It is easy to forget.
If you hire a cleaner, ask how the price is built; our pricing page explains how ours is. An exact quote for your unit beats an average from a blog.
Step two: adjust for your listing
Your turnover cost is the floor. These factors move the fee from there.
- Length of stay and minimum nights. A turnover costs the same after a one-night stay as after a week. If your guests mostly book short stays, the fee is spread over fewer nights, so it feels larger against the nightly rate. A longer minimum stay means fewer turnovers.
- Listing size. A studio and a three-bedroom house do not turn over the same way. More bedrooms and bathrooms mean more time, so price each listing from its own turnover.
- Pets. Pet hair and extra floor work take longer, so build that into the turnover cost you measure.
- Competitive listings nearby. Compare similar listings in your area: same size, same kind of stay, same part of town. If yours is much higher for the same thing, guests will notice. If it is much lower, check you have not left costs out.
Why guests notice your cleaning fee, and what to do about it
Guests compare the total, and the fee lands on top of a short stay. A fee that is fair against a week-long booking looks heavy against one night.
The fee and the nightly rate are two ways of recovering the same costs, so you can move between them. Airbnb’s own help pages say additional fees you set, cleaning included, are separate from the nightly price you set, and that guests will notice the increase in their total price. Some hosts keep the fee modest and raise the nightly rate; others do the reverse. What matters is that the total, for the stays you get, is competitive and covers your costs.
Airbnb also lets you set a separate cleaning fee for stays of one or two nights and a standard fee for longer ones, which deals with the short-stay problem without raising what a week-long guest pays.
What does the Airbnb cleaning fee cover?
It covers getting the listing ready between guests: cleaning, laundry, restocking and the time it takes. Airbnb’s help center says it typically pays for the housekeeping you expect to do after hosting guests.
In practice that means the work on our Airbnb turnover checklist: kitchen reset, bathrooms, beds made, floors, trash, restocking and a walk-through for anything left behind or damaged. It is not a damage deposit. Airbnb states that cleaning fees are not returned to guests once a trip is completed.
Who sets the cleaning fee, and what do guests see?
You set it, as the host. Airbnb’s help center says the cleaning fee is set by the host, and it is yours to use for getting the place ready. How Airbnb’s own service fees apply to a booking is a separate question, so read Airbnb’s current fee pages for that.
Guests see it as a separate charge from your nightly rate, added to the total they pay, so say plainly in your listing what it covers.
Can a host charge an extra cleaning fee later?
Not unilaterally. Airbnb says you need the guest’s approval to add a cleaning fee to a confirmed reservation or an active trip, and that mandatory charges belong in the price breakdown at checkout, not as a surprise afterwards.
So the place to get the fee right is before the booking, in your listing. If a guest leaves a real mess or damage, that is a different matter: photograph it and use the platform’s own claim process, which has its own time limits and rules. Check the current ones in Airbnb’s help center, and keep your turnover photos to back up the claim. Vrbo has its own rules, so check those if you list there too.
How to keep your turnover cost predictable
Predictable cost comes from doing the turnover the same way every time. When the routine varies, so does the time. Three habits keep it steady.
- One documented routine. Write down the order of work and the standard for each room, then use it every time. It is also easier to price and to hand to a co-host.
- Photos after every turnover. A wide shot of each room, from the same spots each time. They tell you the unit is ready without driving over, and they are your record if a guest disputes the condition or if you need to support a damage claim.
- Scheduling off the booking calendar. Plan each turnover from the check-in time backwards, with slack for a late checkout.
Do these for a month and your per-turnover cost stops being an estimate.
How Cheerful does Airbnb and Vrbo turnovers
We do turnovers for hosts in Portland, Beaverton, Hillsboro and Vancouver, WA. It is the same routine every time, written down for your unit and put into the quote, so the third turnover of the week is done like the first. We schedule around your bookings, and we send photos of each room after every turnover, so you know it’s ready and have a record.
The quote is an exact price, not a range that moves later, and the rate is a flat hourly one. We don’t publish a number here, because it depends on your unit; see how our pricing works, or request a quote for your listing. Tell us within 24 hours of a problem and we’ll come back and make it right — free.
More on our Airbnb and Vrbo turnover cleaning, or the rest of our commercial work.
Common questions
How much should an Airbnb cleaning fee be?
Enough to cover what one turnover costs you: the cleaner’s price, linens and laundry, restocking and your own time. Then adjust for stay length, listing size and pets, and compare with similar listings near you.
What does the Airbnb cleaning fee include?
It pays for getting the listing ready between guests: cleaning, laundry, restocking and the time involved. It is not a security deposit and it is not returned to guests after the trip.
Why do guests notice my Airbnb cleaning fee, and what can I do about it?
Often because the fee is spread over a short stay, so it looks large next to the nightly rate. It still covers real costs: the cleaner, laundry, supplies and your time. You can keep the fee modest and raise the nightly rate, which recovers the same costs in a different place, or set a separate fee for one- and two-night stays.
Who sets the Airbnb cleaning fee, and what is it for?
You set it, as the host, and it is meant to help you cover the cost of getting the listing ready. How Airbnb’s own service fees apply to a booking is covered in Airbnb’s help center.
Can a host charge an extra cleaning fee after the stay?
Not on their own say-so. Airbnb says adding a cleaning fee to a confirmed reservation needs the guest’s approval, and mandatory charges belong in the price at booking. For damage, use the platform’s claim process and check its current time limits.