By the Unity Stays directors, Marcus Chong & Gadir Al-Khatib · Last updated 12 August 2026
In short: Manage short-let cleaners with a written per-property checklist covering each room, linen counts, restocking and damage reporting, and require photographs of the finished property — they cost nothing and settle most damage disputes. Arrange a second cleaner who knows the property before you need cover, because one cleaner is not a system.
Why this is the hardest part of self-managing
A cleaner who is reliable, available at short notice, and willing to work the awkward gap between an 11am check-out and a 3pm check-in is genuinely hard to find. Domestic cleaners are used to fixed weekly slots; short lets need someone who can move.
One property does not generate enough work to keep that person's goodwill, which is the structural problem. You need them badly, occasionally, at short notice — which is the weakest possible position to be in.
It is also unforgiving. Almost every other failure can be apologised for. A guest walking into an unclean property is an immediate refund conversation and the review that costs you the next five bookings.
Brief with a checklist, not a conversation
"Give it a clean" produces a different result every time and no basis for saying anything went wrong. A written checklist, per property, is the difference between a service and a favour.
- Room by room, in order, so nothing is skipped when they are rushed
- Linen and towels changed, with the count expected on each bed
- Consumables restocked, with the list and the levels
- Photograph the finished property — the single most useful thing on the list, and it is free
- Report damage or anything left behind before the next guest finds it
- Check the heating and the wifi are on, which sounds trivial until a guest arrives to a cold flat
Photographs are the quality control
Asking for photographs of the finished property changes behaviour more than any amount of supervision, and it costs nothing.
It gives you a dated record of the state the property was left in, which settles most damage disputes immediately. It tells you whether the linen was actually changed rather than straightened. And it means you know before the guest does when something has been missed.
It also protects a good cleaner. When a guest complains about something that was clearly fine four hours earlier, the photographs are the answer.
Cover is the thing people forget
One cleaner is not a system. People get ill, take holidays, and occasionally stop answering.
You need a second person who knows the property, has access, and can be called. That relationship has to exist before you need it, which means paying them for real work occasionally rather than only ringing in a crisis.
This is the specific reason cleaning companies exist in this sector. They cost more per changeover than an individual and they turn up, which on a property with forward bookings is worth the difference.
What we do
We schedule and supervise the cleaning, hold the relationships and carry the cover. The cleaner is paid by us and the cost is recharged to you at what it cost — it is not inside the management fee, and we say so plainly.
Where an owner already has a cleaner they trust, that usually works. What matters is reliability at short notice and someone checking the work, which is the part that breaks when a changeover is arranged informally between two busy people.
Cleaning is charged per changeover rather than per week, which is why our income calculator asks for your average stay length. On a short-stay property it is the largest line after the management fee.