End of tenancy cleaning in Brighton: what to check
Five things worth checking before an end of tenancy check-out in Brighton, what counts as fair wear and tear, and when a professional clean is worth it.
End of tenancy cleaning in Brighton is easiest to get right if you clean to the check-in inventory, not to your own idea of tidy. Most tenants spend a Saturday on the visible surfaces, such as hoovering, wiping worktops and cleaning the bath, and then lose money over an oven door or a fridge seal. The five things below are the ones worth checking before the check-out.
These are the items that tend to be looked at, not a statistic. For how deposit disputes are actually decided, see the official tenancy deposit protection guidance on GOV.UK.
What happens at an end of tenancy check-out?
A check-out inspection compares the property against the check-in inventory, usually with photographs. The inspector is not judging whether the place looks tidy. They are comparing it with how it was at the start, allowing for fair wear and tear.
That is why the check-in inventory is the most useful document you have. Read it before you start cleaning.
The five things worth checking
1. The oven
A common place for a deduction. The door glass, racks and the sides and roof of the cavity are all easy to see.
Oven cleaning takes a couple of hours to do properly with a caustic product and a lot of patience. It is also the item most worth paying someone else to handle (professional oven cleaning exists for exactly this), because a half-cleaned oven reads as a failed clean.
2. Fridge and freezer
They should be emptied, defrosted, cleaned inside, and left switched off with the doors propped open. A freezer switched off and closed with water inside can grow mould within days, which is a much bigger problem than a cleaning charge.
Clean the seals as well. Black mould in a door gasket shows clearly in a photograph.
3. Extractor filters
The metal mesh filters above the hob rarely get cleaned during a tenancy and can be saturated with grease. Most can go in a dishwasher or a sink of very hot water with washing-up liquid. It is ten minutes of work.
4. Limescale
Brighton and Hove is generally described as a hard water area, and limescale builds up on shower screens, taps, shower heads and around toilet waterlines. It can be removed, so it tends to be treated as a cleaning issue rather than as wear and tear.
White vinegar or a proper descaler, left to dwell rather than scrubbed straight away, does the work. Our guide to limescale explains the method.
5. Window tracks, sills and skirting
The runners at the bottom of window frames collect grit and debris, and skirting boards collect dust that a vacuum never reaches. Both photograph badly and both are quick to deal with.
What is not a cleaning issue?
Worth knowing, because deductions are sometimes overstated:
- Fair wear and tear should not be charged for. Carpet that has thinned over a three-year tenancy is wear. Carpet with a wine stain is damage.
- Pre-existing conditions recorded at check-in are not your responsibility.
- Betterment. A landlord should not charge you for a full replacement because of one damaged section, or for a professional clean of something that was not professionally clean when you arrived.
If you disagree with a deduction, the deposit protection schemes have a free dispute process. The GOV.UK guidance explains how it works.
Does the carpet need professional cleaning?
Check your tenancy agreement. Some agreements require carpets to be professionally cleaned at the end of the tenancy, with a receipt as evidence. Where that clause exists, vacuuming will not satisfy it. Where it does not, you can normally be asked only to return the carpets as clean as they were at check-in. If you are unsure whether a clause is enforceable, ask the agent or the deposit scheme rather than assuming.
If you do need it, see carpet cleaning.
Should you clean it yourself or pay for it?
A one-bedroom flat is a full day's work to do properly yourself, if you have a caustic oven cleaner, a limescale product, a decent vacuum and somewhere to put the furniture. A three-bedroom house is realistically a weekend.
Weigh that against the deposit at risk. If you use a company that guarantees its work, a failed check-out becomes their problem to fix rather than yours to argue about.
If you would rather hand it over, our end of tenancy cleaning works from an inventory-style checklist, includes the oven, and comes with a free re-clean if your agent raises a cleaning issue within 72 hours of the clean. For a longer clean before a move, see deep cleaning and how it differs from a regular clean in our comparison.