You have just finished a renovation and the trades have gone, but the house is coated in a fine grey film that keeps coming back no matter how often you wipe it. That is where a builders clean comes in. Here is what it actually involves, what it should cost in London, and how to tell whether it has been done properly.
A builders clean is a specialist deep clean carried out once construction or renovation work has finished. Its job is to remove the debris and dust that building work leaves behind, most of which an ordinary domestic clean simply cannot shift. Plaster dust, brick dust and silica from cutting tiles or concrete are far finer than household dust, and they settle into every gap, hinge and air vent in the property.
In the trade it is usually split into stages. A rough clean happens during or just after the build, clearing rubble, offcuts and packaging. The sparkle clean, sometimes called the final clean, is what most homeowners mean when they search for a builders clean. It is the detailed pass that makes the property ready to live in, with paint spots scraped off glass, labels removed from new sanitaryware and every surface wiped down.
Fine construction dust behaves differently from everyday dirt. Particles hang in the air for days and resettle after each clean, which is why a room can look spotless in the evening and dusty again by morning. A proper builders clean deals with this by working top to bottom, using vacuums with HEPA filtration rather than a standard hoover, which would blow the finest particles straight back into the room.
There is also a fair amount of careful scraping involved. Paint splashes and plaster snots on glass, dried grout haze on new tiles and adhesive residue on floors all need the right blades and solutions. Done wrongly, you can scratch glass, dull a lacquered floor or etch natural stone, so this stage takes experience as much as elbow grease.
Most companies price by floor area or by the day. For a typical London property, a full builders clean tends to fall somewhere between £3 and £6 per square metre, or roughly £250 to £450 for a two bedroom flat and £450 to £900 for a three or four bedroom house. The final figure depends on how much dust the trades left behind, the number of windows, whether protective coverings are still down and how much scraping the glass and floors need.
Timings vary in a similar way. A flat that had a single room replastered might take two cleaners half a day, while a whole-house refurbishment can easily need a team of three for one to two full days. If you are getting quotes, a walk-round or a set of photos will get you a far more accurate price than a phone estimate.
Book the clean for after every trade has genuinely finished, including snagging. There is little point paying for a sparkle clean if the decorator is coming back to touch up a wall, as sanding even one patch will re-dust the room. Ideally the clean happens two or three days after the last dusty job, giving airborne particles time to settle so they can be removed rather than stirred up.
When the cleaners are done, check the places dust hides rather than just the obvious surfaces. Run a finger along the top of door frames, look inside kitchen cupboards and drawers, check window tracks and hinges, and view glass in low sunlight to spot smears or missed paint flecks. A good company will return to sort anything you find, so raise it straight away rather than weeks later.
No. An end of tenancy clean deals with ordinary household dirt like limescale, grease and carpet marks. A builders clean tackles construction residue such as plaster dust, paint splashes and adhesive, which needs different equipment and techniques.
You can for a small job like a single replastered room, if you have patience and a vacuum with a fine dust filter. For a full renovation it is rarely worth it, as the dust resettles repeatedly and scraping paint from glass or new floors without damage takes practice.
Usually straight away, as a proper final clean leaves the property ready to live in. Expect a light film of dust to reappear over the first week as particles settle out of cavities and vents, which a quick wipe will handle.
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