Would you hire a friend for housecleaning?

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Eleanor61

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The other thread reminded me of this and I didn’t want to hijack. I have several friends who clean houses for extra money. I badly need a housekeeper. Does it ever work out to hire a close friend? If I did would it be appropriate to work alongside her or just leave her alone?

It seems silly to pay someone else when I know people who could use the money, but I don’t want to endanger our friendship. My housekeeping standards are pretty low, so I wouldn’t be very demanding and I can afford to pay more than they are making at some current jobs.

It is mostly kitchen, bathrooms, accumulated dirt under things. Things are sliding and I added a new puppy.
 
I wouldn’t. Money has the power to ruin friendships.

If you want stuff done then you have to give instructions. For example, ask the cleaner to go back to something she missed, or ask her to pay extra attention to x. That kind of thing. A friend could assume that you will let her work without asking her to do things the way you like. How would she respond to criticism? What if you change your mind after a few months and decide you’d rather hire a stranger, in order to avoid these situations? That could go badly, and your friend could be quite hurt and offended.

I’m not sure it is worth it. Unless you know for certain that they would be ok with a more professional relationship and would not be offended by it.
 
The short answer is no.

The long answer is noooooooooo. 😛

Situation like that almost always have problems.
 
I agree with the fact it’s not a good idea’ it’s not worth a friendship. There are bound most likely to be some issues.

Mary.
 
No!

The easiest way to ruin a friendship! The person who pays you for services IS NOW YOUR BOSS, not your friend.
 
Thank you for the responses. I can’t say I am surprised at the consensus, I just wish it were different!
 
If your friend need extra money and are too proud to ask you for a loan, yes, if not, no.
 
Eleanor61 said:
The other thread reminded me of this and I didn’t want to hijack. I have several friends who clean houses for extra money. I badly need a housekeeper. Does it ever work out to hire a close friend? If I did would it be appropriate to work alongside her or just leave her alone?

It seems silly to pay someone else when I know people who could use the money, but I don’t want to endanger our friendship. My housekeeping standards are pretty low, so I wouldn’t be very demanding and I can afford to pay more than they are making at some current jobs.

It is mostly kitchen, bathrooms, accumulated dirt under things. Things are sliding and I added a new puppy.
Click to expand...
Never.

From multiple, painful experiences, I can tell you it never works out to ‘hire’ a friend for anything.

Just go to an agency, place an ad in the church bulletin, ask around, hire a kid down the block as ,mother’s helper,’ and good luck.
 
I had the experience of having my cleaner get arrested for threatening somebody with a weapon and then going to jail for several months, so I think there is something to be said for hiring somebody you know, or a company. (I’ve had cleaners for the past 11 years (since my oldest was born, and I’ve generally used Merry Maids or another chain, but sometimes had really good private cleaners.) Also, I remember seeing that some of the immigrant cleaners were wiping the baby’s high chair tray with a dirty rag. At least with a friend, that sort of thing is very unlikely to happen.

I would listen carefully to how your friends talk about their clients. Are they judgy? Are they intrusive? Are they gossipy? If you notice that one of them is particularly discreet, that might be your gal.

My main concern that you will be embarrassed by your mess and will knock yourself out cleaning before the cleaner comes. We’re trying to ease your load, not make you feel worse.

You can clean side by side or not–I suggest sticking to tidying up, which is a big enough task. You can also start introducing something I do the night before the cleaners come, which is to tell everybody very impressively that the cleaners are coming, they need to tidy up their rooms and they need to not make any new messes. I also tend to change sheets around that time.
 
To clarify, I think it was an English language comprehension issue when I found the cleaner wiping my baby’s food tray with a dirty rag. She probably didn’t understand that part of her training. I told that story to some American-born company cleaners years later and they were absolutely horrified–learning not to do that sort of thing was heavily emphasized in their training.
 
I you own a business, you hope secretly your friends will hire you.
Did you ever ear the phrase: “I know someone who dose this”.
Or: “He hired one of his friend”
well you will be more comfortable with making business with your friend than with someone else. Anyway.
If I was your friend and you would choose someone else, I would have great doubh about our relationship.
It’s like a insult to not hire your friend or at least ask what he think about it.
I would hire your friend if I where you or at least talk about it.

Sorry I am different.
 
RayonGama said:
I you own a business, you hope secretly your friends will hire you.
Did you ever ear the phrase: “I know someone who dose this”.
Or: “He hired one of his friend”
well you will be more comfortable with making business with your friend than with someone else. Anyway.
If I was your friend and you would choose someone else, I would have great doubh about our relationship.
It’s like a insult to not hire your friend or at least ask what he think about it.
I would hire your friend if I where you or at least talk about it.

Sorry I am different.
Click to expand...
Though if there are multiple friends who clean houses, that might also be something to consider…it could be easier to explain choosing a stranger than why you chose one friend over another.
 
“Though if there are multiple friends who clean houses, that might also be something to consider…it could be easier to explain choosing a stranger than why you chose one friend over another.”

Yes. Especially if the reason is, “Because I think you can’t keep your mouth shut.”
 
I’m going to be the lone person on the other side of this issue. 🙂

When I was in college, a friend hired me to clean her house. We were still perfectly good friends after that. I genuinely enjoy housework and needed the money badly, while she hated housework and could afford to pay me very generously.

It worked for a number of reasons:

–I was a much, MUCH pickier person than she was about cleanliness. I knew walking into the job that she’d never have a problem with the standard to which I cleaned–if anything, she’d probably come home and think her house was almost obsessively clean!

–Before I started cleaning on a certain day, I would always clarify with her if there was any task/s she particularly wanted done. Sometimes there were; most of the time, she just wanted the house to be cleaner. If she did want certain tasks done, I’d write them down and make sure we were on the same page about standards. I.e., if she asked for me to clean the kitchen, I’d see if she just meant put away the dishes/wash the dirty dishes/wipe down the counters or if she also meant scrub the floor, cupboards and baseboards and clean out the refrigerator. Because we communicated very thoroughly, we never had a misunderstanding.

–We were both very pragmatic people. We were friends, but she had a lot more money than I did. I needed money, and liked cleaning, and she hated cleaning. This didn’t make her “better” than me; it meant that we each had a commodity that the other could use. We traded the one for the other, just as some people might trade a handbag for a pair of shoes. Neither of us believed for a second that cleaning for money was “degrading.” Taking government help while I had any other option would have been degrading to me, and she would have agreed with that statement. After I finished cleaning, we’d often go out for a coffee or something, and it didn’t feel at all weird.

I admit that this would not have worked out as well for many people, but it did in our case. I think if you both go into it with the perspective I outlined above, it would work. If not, then don’t even suggest it; you’re likely to lose a friend.
 
Guess I’ll be the contrarian.

I have done things like that many times. However, a person has to be careful to get an understanding going in that the relationship will have to shift in the project to one of employer-employee with all that entails; that the particularities of that relationship will terminate when the job is done and that it will present difficulties for both parties.

It is also vital that clarity in instruction be given. The tasks must be specific and limited in scope. The employer must also realize there will be failures, as there always are in any task, and that his/her expectations of the end result must be reasonable.

I have never had it fail to work out.
 
I would be more inclined to spread the word amongst the people I know who did not also know my friend that (s)he was looking for housecleaning work than I would be to hire my friend myself. :o
 
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