Cleaning before a sale: what a buyer sees at the viewing

Photos and viewings need different things

A flat is cleaned twice before a sale, for two different reasons. Before the photo shoot what matters is what enters the frame: windows, floors, kitchen fronts, mirrors, bathroom. Before a viewing what matters is what a person senses on walking in: the smell, the state of the bathroom, the absence of dust on the surfaces they will touch.

The price is the same in both cases and is counted by rooms: one room UAH 1,550, two rooms 1,950, three rooms 2,350.

What moves the impression most

• Windows. Dirty glass darkens any room, and photographs show it more than anything else. UAH 320 per window including glass, frame and sill.
• The bathroom. Where buyers look hardest and draw conclusions about the whole flat fastest.
• Smell. It does not appear in photographs, but it decides the first seconds of a viewing.
• Kitchen appliances. An oven opened to show baked-on grease does more damage than dated wallpaper: wallpaper gets replaced, grease reads as neglect.

Where the smell comes from

The smell in a flat lives in the textiles rather than the air: curtains, carpets, upholstery, the mattress. Airing removes it for an hour, after which it returns from the same sources.

If the flat is sold furnished it is worth booking sofa cleaning at UAH 1,299 and a carpet at UAH 130 per m². The minimum dry-cleaning order is UAH 2,000, so the two are usually taken together.

Empty or furnished

An empty flat is simpler to clean and more of it is visible: skirting boards, the floor under furniture, the walls behind wardrobes. But the buyer also sees every flaw the furniture was hiding — which is not a cleaning question, and we will say plainly that a wardrobe's mark on parquet does not come out.

A furnished flat means less area but more surfaces: every shelf, every front, every mirror.

What it costs together

A typical package for a two-room flat before sale: the 1,950 base, four windows at 1,280, oven 499 and fridge 450 — around UAH 4,200 in total. If the flat is furnished, sofa cleaning at 1,299 goes on top.

For a one-room flat without appliances it starts at UAH 1,550 plus the windows.

What cleaning will not change

Yellow ceiling marks from an old leak, worn parquet, cracked tiles, limescale years into the enamel — that is the condition of the finish, and cleaning does not restore it. Photographs show these things, and it is better to know beforehand than to hear it from a buyer at the viewing.

Timing

Clean the day before the photographer rather than on the day: windows washed in the morning pick up streaks from the sun by lunchtime. Before a viewing a short visit is enough if less than a week has passed.

Build the order in the form and the total appears at once. The full list of items is in the price list.