Hire your own cleaners to come in after you close and before you move in. Your standards are just not the same as the seller's.

How would you request this?

I wouldn’t make any such change to an offer that has been accepted.

Hire your own cleaner to clean after closing before you move in.

We wouldn't change our offer. Our agent suggested adding that request AFTER the home inspection as part of our "requests".

And, I do have pretty high standards, but this was pretty grungy. I'll discuss it with our agent again, and see what it looks like at the time of the home inspection.

I don't mind hiring someone to clean it, but I just feel it should be clean when we take posession

Anyway, thanks for your opinions--I appreciate it!

I lwys clean when moving into a new place, regardless of how clean it might look on the surface.

I would agree that you should hire your own cleaners.

As the seller, I would be likely tell you no to your request for a professional cleaning. You saw the house and the state it was in. If you wanted a cleaning, you should have considered that beforehand.

The seller is usually only required to leave the house "broom clean" anyway in most areas. Your agent should have known this.

It wouldn't hurt a thing to ask. All they can do is decline.

I would wait until after you own the home. Who will define “professional”? Who will decide if it is to your standards? We have remained very cordial with the couple who sold us our house and I think it would be awkward if we had told them their house was dirty. Just contract with your professional cleaners to be ready the day you close. You can be there with them so your standards are met. Not every cleaner does what I, personally, feel to be the most important cleaning. You will be much happier.

Get the sale closed. Then clean clean clean to your heart’s content.

Your standards of clean are clearly higher than the seller’s. Or it might simply be that the sellers literally can’t SEE that it’s not clean. I can’t think of a non-rude way to call this to their attention.

"The home is in an over 55 community, and one never knows their reason for selling--severe illness, etc."

For all you know, perhaps the current owners are selling because maintenance has become too much for them.

We requested a professional cleaning along with some other things discovered in the inspection. We expected both "yes" and "no" responses and the cleaning was an easy "yes". Makes everyone feel like they negotiated a good deal. The place REEKED of pot smoke. Of course, I did my own thorough cleaning after some minor remodel work was completed prior to moving in. Past under sink leaks prompted us to change all the shut-offs including laundry area. New floors made me paranoid about water leaks. Asking for a professional cleaning and then hiring your own as well might be a good plan.

As others said, do it yourself after closing. You said: "I really think it should be clean when we take possesion" "I just feel it should be clean when we take posession" Your thoughts and feelling are not important in this real estate transaction.

I doubt you'll be pleased with the cleaning done. When I moved into a very clean house I wanted to have the house cleaned myself to KNOW every room was cleaned after my one brief meeting with the seller.

>> Your thoughts and feelling are not important in this real estate transaction.

I don't agree with that. Of course your thoughts and feeling are important. You're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars - feelings are very real.

I'd go ahead and ask. Heck, if you don't ask, the answer is no. So take a chance on a "yes".

If the sellers are willing to live in a grungy house, I wouldn’t trust that they would hire someone who would really deep clean. It won’t cost that much money. I would just book someone for after you close.

I tried that once....the answer was no.

The traditional standard of a home transfer would be "broom clean". This means that all furniture and trash has been removed, all cabinets and closets empty and the floors swept. Anything beyond that would either be negotiated or entirely at the pleasure of the seller.

I have had cleaners come in after I have moved out of a home. I knew that I would be too tired to clean to my standard and my cleaning implements would be packed away on a truck. But, that was because I wanted to do it.

Many people selling in an over 55 community have gotten to the advanced age where they simply can't take care of a home or are even capable of seeing or smelling dirt. We don't know why they are selling. One of them could be very ill or a recent death. A little empathy would be a good thing.

If you want sanitary, consider anything beyond broom clean as part of your responsibility. Your realtor will have the name of a service that they can recommend. If you want grout cleaning, do it before you move in. This would be a good time to paint the interior, too. All part of new home ownership.

Congratulations on your new home.

Consider that the home can only really get professionally deep cleaned once the previous owners have left. Otherwise, moving boxes etc would make it difficult. So by asking for this, you are asking them to leave the premises potentially several days before they may have scheduled their move. If I was the seller, I would not agree to that. And even if they did, you will likely be disappointed and still have to redo

You can ask, but I wouldn't expect it. We just sold and had our house cleaned after we moved. The buyers didn't ask, but we felt like it was a nice gesture. Our realtor told us no one does that, so it was purely our own good will. So, go ahead and ask but understand that it's definitely not something that's expected.

Go a head and ask. What could it hurt. They could say no but then again they just might agree to it. When we purchased our last home, the previous owners did have a professional cleaning service come and clean the home. They were supposed to be there when we went through the final walk through. They weren't so we let the sellers know at the closing that day. They were thankful we let them know. They paid for the service, the cleaning company showed up soon afterwards.

You can ask for anything you want, but that doesn’t mean you should. I cannot imagine how this doesnt come off rude or embarassing to the sellers.

You knew the condition of the home when you made an offer.

That sounds kind of ridiculous to me. You want a professional cleaning, you have it done after you close at your expense.

You're going to ask this as part of the inspection response? That's ridiculous. As someone said above, you knew the condition when you made the offer. Inspections are for unseen and unknown conditions.

The time to do it was when you made the offer. I imagine your agent didn't want to put it in the offer for several reasons. Most contracts contain some kind of clause about the level of cleanliness-usually broom clean or something like that.

THANK YOU ALL for your feedback and opinions. Even though I was surprised by some of the "harsh" responses, I definitely learned from them all and respect your opinions. I do agree that we knew the house was grungy when we made the offer, so we will NOT request a proffessional cleaning prior to closing. We will hire someone clean after closing and prior to our move in.

And--as a side note: after our home inspection, there are "bigger fish to fry" than the overall cleanliness of the home, so we will concentrate on those issues.

That always seems to be the case. The fact that the house was grungy probably indicates other deferred maintenance. Good luck with resolving the issues.

Maybe it’s a geographical thing , but where I live it’s common ( more often than not) for the seller to have the house ”deep cleaned” prior to closing. i live in coastal So Cal.

tvq1 …. we just sold a home & puchased another a few months ago. Even though we’re both a little OCD we hired a professional cleaning service prior to closing., we also had our window cleaners. Our agent hired a professional service to deep clean ( even though it looked clean ) prior to us taking possession of the home we purchased. . It’s considered pretty standard practice in our area so I was really surpised at the responses you were given.

It probably is a regional thing. I’m in Missouri and I’ve never heard of requesting a deep cleaning at closing.

DH and I have bought and sold 7 houses. So far. 😁

I learned the hard way request a professional cleaning before I move into a new house. It may not be up to your standards but at least the worst grime will be removed. I always make it part of the contract though.

This must be a regional market thing. I've bought and sold multiple houses in N.Y. and Delaware, its never come up in any of my 6 transactions.

You ask for that in this market, you may find yourself with no house. I sold a cute little beach house that was disgusting when we bought it, and could not believe the variety of offers I had from which to choose. If anyone came across as that picky to me, I'd move on to the next offer. Granted this is a blazing hot market too though.

Let the sellers do what is expected for the sale...broom clean.

Hire your own cleaners. Been there....

It is preferable to employ a professional who can clean your house from top to bottom and keep you safe.

I’ve always been very disappointed in the professional cleaning, a waste of money.

When I moved into my previous house, it was spotless. I still re-cleaned the bathrooms and anything in the kitchen where I'd be putting dishes. When I moved out of there after 25 years, since the walls were getting re-painted the main bath was being renovated, and some of the floors were getting refinished (for the market) I also had them deep clean. But I had already moved all my stuff out before going on-market. Sellers don't always have that option. (The new house was truly new - yes, there was some residual sawdust and all - but... it was clean.) To take possession, broom clean should be expected. Anything else is gravy. DO enjoy your new home!!!

Owners maintain property to their own standards. The seller will leave it however they decide. If I were selling a property and a buyer asked me to pay for a cleaning, I'd tell them I will tidy up to be polite and they can do as they wish after closing.

We use house cleaners on a regular basis and have no problems. They're all different. When we have a specific need, we communicate it and all will do as we've requested. Without specific requests or oversight, they do things their way. For a one-off job, the team needs to be told if there are areas for special attention or tasks to be done a certain way. For an ongoing relationship, each side learns about the other and mutual understandings are reached.

Deep cleaning to your standards equates to your personal ethics? So the people with the grungy house aren’t as ethical as you are?

We were told "broom clean" was the standard the first time we purchased a home. My Mom, driving a station wagon of more breakable stuff got to the house first on moving day. She found the 70-something seller scrubbing the oven and told her she could stop, because "It won't kill my daughter to clean an oven." Mom told me this herself.

We had moved into another house several months before this one sold. We left it clean so the realtor could show it. A few weeks after our moving out, my husband said he was going to hire a local cleaning woman to give it the once-over. Turns out, husband felt sorry for her and hired her because she was having a hard time getting enough clients. We discovered later why: she was an alcoholic. No idea if she did anything or not. But someone moving out may rationalize "X makes a living cleaning, therefore she's a professional."

What if the sellers had two big dogs that were not disclosed on the SPD (in Colorado this is an SPD specific question), and the buyers had an air quality/mold test conducted that came back with high levels of pet dander/skin? At face value, the house looked fine, but as part of the inspection objection, my clients have every right to put this request in.

'... and keep you safe.'

And keep you safe? Marketing. Who needs it? Anyhow, been a little interesting reading this thread again.

It reads as a bit of an insult to the seller (your house is gross and dirty). The housing market has been so crazy the past couple decades I would just smile and get it cleaned after closing.