Cleaning & janitorial
Cleaning Overhead Calculator
Total what the business costs to run before any property is cleaned.
Result
Overhead is what the business costs whether or not you work. Wages for people who are on jobs belong in job cost instead, and counting them here overstates overhead and underprices everything.
Get a Free Business AuditWhat moves the number
- Vehicles and insurance.
- Management and scheduling time, which grows faster than cleaner count.
- Recruitment, which in this trade is a continuous rather than occasional cost.
Where this one goes wrong
Leaving recruitment out of overhead. Cleaner turnover in this sector is high, and advertising, interviewing, vetting and training new cleaners is a recurring cost that should be budgeted rather than absorbed.
Questions
About this calculator
Why is recruitment an overhead?
Because it recurs continuously at typical turnover rates. Treating each hire as an exception hides what is actually a predictable annual cost.
How does management scale?
Faster than headcount, because scheduling, quality checking and covering absence all grow with cleaner numbers. It is the cost that surprises growing cleaning businesses.
Should vetting be included?
Yes. Background checks are a genuine cost and, for domestic work, a genuine requirement that customers expect.
The formula
overhead rate = monthly overhead / monthly revenue
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How to use this calculator
- Premises per month ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $1,800.
- Office and management wages ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $5,200.
- Vehicles, fuel and maintenance ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $2,400.
- Insurance and licensing ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $900.
- Software, phones and internet ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $450.
- Marketing and advertising ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $1,500.
The result updates as you type, so you can try a figure, see what it does to overhead per month, and change it back. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere or saved.
A worked example
These are the figures the calculator opens with. Every number in the results column below is produced by the same calculation the page runs, so you can follow it through before putting your own figures in.
What goes in
| Input | Value |
|---|---|
| Premises per month | $1,800 |
| Office and management wages | $5,200 |
| Vehicles, fuel and maintenance | $2,400 |
| Insurance and licensing | $900 |
| Software, phones and internet | $450 |
| Marketing and advertising | $1,500 |
| Everything else | $700 |
| Monthly revenue | $51,000 |
What comes out
| Result | Value |
|---|---|
| Overhead per month main result | $12,950 |
| Overhead per year | $155,400 |
| Overhead rate | 25.4% |
| Cost of opening the doors | $588.64 |
Overhead runs $12,950 a month, 25.4% of revenue. Every working day costs $588.64 before anybody turns a wheel.
How sensitive the answer is
Holding everything else steady and changing only premises per month, this is what happens to overhead per month. It is worth knowing which of your inputs the answer actually hinges on, and which barely move it.
| Premises per month ($) | Overhead per month |
|---|---|
| $900 | $12,050 |
| $1,350 | $12,500 |
| $1,800 example above | $12,950 |
| $2,700 | $13,850 |
| $3,600 | $14,750 |
Every other input is held at the example value while this one changes, which is not how a real job behaves. Treat it as a guide to which number matters most, not as five separate quotes.
What each figure means
- Premises per month ($)
- A money amount, starting at $1,800.
- Office and management wages ($)
- A money amount, starting at $5,200.
- Vehicles, fuel and maintenance ($)
- A money amount, starting at $2,400.
- Insurance and licensing ($)
- A money amount, starting at $900.
- Software, phones and internet ($)
- A money amount, starting at $450.
- Marketing and advertising ($)
- A money amount, starting at $1,500.
- Everything else ($)
- A money amount, starting at $700.
- Monthly revenue ($)
- A money amount, starting at $51,000.
What the results tell you
| Result | What it is |
|---|---|
| Overhead per month | The headline result. A money figure. |
| Overhead per year | A money figure. |
| Overhead rate | A percentage. |
| Cost of opening the doors | A money figure. |
Time is the variable that bites
Pricing that works out on paper fails when the job takes longer than quoted. First cleans, heavily soiled sites and access problems all run over, so it is worth pricing the first visit separately from the recurring one.
Estimating is the easy part
The jobs you never hear about cost more than the ones you mis-measure. BDEVY builds the marketing, systems and automation that bring them in.