Hey guys, I’ve been cleaning windows for a couple weeks and still haven’t gotten the residential bidding down yet. I’m talking about just regular residential cleaning, not post construction. First off, should I clean the entire window in detail? By this I mean should I scrub all of the dirt off of the frames, glass, tracks and sills? I’m thinking not but I’m getting a lot of differing opinions here. Tell me what you guys do for normal window cleaning. If you could also tell me how much more you charge for detailing the frames, tracks and sills that would be nice too. Or should I just not do frames, tracks or sills at all? Thanks for any help here guys. I’m sure this question has been asked numerous times but I can’t find a straight answer on here.
I think it depends on the type of service you want to provide for your customers. Are you a window cleaner, or a glass cleaner?
I am getting better at reading my customers, and their needs. But basically my full service cleaning goes like this:
Interior/exterior glass, screens washed, tracks & sills wiped clean. What do I mean by clean? I explain that we will dust, or wet wipe sills and tracks. Any extensive cleaning is extra. If they have a lot of bugs I will hit them with our vac real quick. On the exterior if they are white vinyl windows I might hit them with my scrubber and a huck. It all depends on the scenario, if I am already next to a window on a ladder, and there is a black streak, or dirt, or a nasty cobweb I will usually take care of it while I am there.
In the end people usually want clean, spot and streak free glass. The rest in my opinion is secondary.
Good Luck.
+1 Dormatex
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
On jobs where I can use my wfp the frames are no problem. If it’s storms or badly maintained windows then I don’t bother trying to clean up the frames. Other than that we clean the glass, sills, and screens.
We provide track vacuuming/cleaning to almost every resi client. We charge a little more than the other guys but our customers have been sold on the track vacuum/cleaning so far. Sometimes, when I feel the customer thinks my price is a little high, I give them the option of no track vacuuming for 15% off.
Other than working with people’s budgets, we always clean tracks, sills, screens, and frames.
So I’m getting that window frames are really not even touched? Maybe only to wipe any excess water off if anything? So hitting the tracks with a small handheld vacuum cleaner and just a quick wipe through the track will be the best way to do the most time efficient job. Ok, that makes sense. Thanks a lot.
So are you saying that you detail all of the frames, tracks and sills, or just wipe them off? It took me 7 hours to detail every window on my last house and it was only a 1200 sq foot. I didn’t get paid much at all either. Detailing tracks and frames takes probably 10 times longer that just cleaning the glass and wiping off the sills. To me, this would not justify only a 15% addition in price. I would assume that the price should go up significantly. Like 2 or 3 times the price at least. I’m sure I’ll get better with time.
we set up different cleaning packages. 95% of our customers go with the premium package
-we go inside open all the windows take out all the screens the 2nd person follows with a tile grout brush and a shope vac. scrubbing and vacuuming all the tracks
-we wash all the screens
-knock out all the exterior windows
-knock out all the interior windows and put the 2nd story screens back in
-put all the 1st story screens back in.
Charge enough to where you make decent money. Get your routine down until you make as much as you really want!
PS we’re still getting our routine down 
I agree totally. Let the low balling fly by niters clean for the people that don’t want a professional job done. Most of the good customers want the job done right and are willing to pay for quality. Look at the cars in their drive ways. They are willing to pay for quality. ALL WINDOW CLEANERS ARE NOT THE SAME. We need to educate them, and show them the value in our service. It’s called salesmanship.
Kurt, don’t feel bad, but use your judgement
one time i had this house where every window had spider webs, dirt, bird crap, and other fun stuff. I gave the quote over the phone thinking it was going to be fun and easy job, I don’t change my prices when i come to the job that makes customers real mad. I should had charged double, since i never heard from the lady again.
the point is to look at the glass and say it looks excellent and look at the frame tracks and sills and say they look good enough.
customers like when the tracks are vacuumed
I clean everything. Makes for easy training when you need helpers. “Clean everything.” I wipe all frames down in side and outside. Where possible we even pull the top sash down and clean on top of it and the top of the frame. If I can tilt in the windows the sides of them are also cleaned. I’ll put it to you this way. If it takes you 30 minutes extra for the whole job and the other companies are not doing it. Your repeat business will build fast and your referals will build even faster. On 1/2 of my jobs I hear “Oh the last company did not do that.” You dont have to break your elbow off cleaning the stuff but in most cases the stuff just needs to be wet and wiped being 99% of the time it never has been. Cleaning the outside frames really makes a differance. If the entire window surrounding the glass cleaned and looks great the customer will notice more then just a shinny piece of glass.
Hey Juggernaut,
What do you use to clean the frames the fastest? Sponge, terry cloth, microfibre, etc. ? Do you use window cleaning soap or something stronger?
I use micro fiber rags. If I’m inside or outside don’t matter. I use a spray bottle for applying the solution. It’s just easy glide. I spray the entire frame 1st (when inside I spray close to the frame as to not get alot of over spray)( when outside I spray very heavy). Wipe everything down very very good and then the glass is cleaned last.
I’ve never thought of using a spray bottle to wet the frames. We either use the very wet terry cloth towel that we use to dry the frames/tracks/sills/floors, or we do what I call a ‘pre-wash’.
The ‘Pre-wash’ consists of using the same brush/soap mix/water hose that we used to clean the screens–to go around the entire house and clean the frames/tracks/windows of the large, sticky, muddy, bug-infested crap that I don’t want on me or my t-bar scrubber.
Most houses don’t always need a pre-wash. Mostly ones that are only yearly jobs or the ones that are on the lake or near big water. Spider webs and dirt daubers are our biggest nasty-makers that we contend with.
If we need to do the pre-wash, I tell the customer right up front. Our fee is usually 35 dollars extra for the pre-wash. Most customers understand and tell us that they had never thought of doing it (duh, isn’t that why we’re called the “professionals”, I mean you did hire us to clean, right?!?!?).
It really makes coming back to clean the windows a breeze and the frames just need to be wiped down then.
I have been using my sea sponge with window cleaning solution. The spray bottle is something I never thought of either. Sounds like a faster alternative. I’ll have to give your method a try, thanks.
Hey Kurt,
Like I said, I charge a bit for for most of my jobs so it works out. In answer to the 15% thing, it’s just my way of giving them a little discount. Sure, the tracks are worth more than 15%, but I’m not going to give them half off on the entire home! Especially since we’ll clean(brush and wipe) the sills anyways. Customers just like the idea of a vacuum.
We run into a lot of recessed tracks with a lot of junk in them that is pretty stuck. I found that a baseball umpire brush or a 2" stiff paint brush works best. Hit it hard with the brush, with the vacuum on( to suck in some of the dust) then suck up the loose dirt/bugs with the vacuum.
After that, scrub with a rag or a very wet scrubber to get the rest and the corners. Sometimes, I use my small plastic putty knife for some of the tight corners.
I can send some pics to your e-mail if you want. PM me.
Good luck!
Whatever you choose to do, make sure to keep it consistent. What people want just as much as quality, is a consistent experience.
If you just wipe the frames, just wipe them everytime. If you detail the tracks, detail the tracks everytime. A lot of people will stop using as service just because of an inconsistent experience.
This makes it easy to teach employees as well.
