Cleaning Service Project Budget Template

Start by setting up the Labor Calculator with your actual hourly wages and the productivity rates your crew achieves. Most residential cleaners cover 800–1,200 square feet per hour for a standard clean; commercial crews on routine maintenance cleans often do more. Enter a few recent jobs where you know the actual hours, calibrate the rates until the output matches reality, and the calculator becomes your quoting baseline going forward. This initial setup takes about 30 minutes and pays for itself on the first job you quote accurately.

Cleaning businesses lose money in two predictable ways: underestimating labor hours when quoting and failing to account for supply and equipment costs on a per-job basis. Labor is the dominant cost — typically 50–65% of revenue for residential services and 40–55% for commercial — and a single hour of underestimated time per visit, multiplied across a recurring weekly account, turns a profitable contract into one that loses money over the year. Without a project budget that forces you to estimate hours before you quote, underpricing becomes invisible until you check the bank balance.

Key Performance Indicators