How to Price Airbnb Turnover Cleaning (Flat Rates by Beds and Baths)

Most cleaners start out charging by the hour. Then they get good at turnovers, cut a three-hour clean down to ninety minutes, and take a pay cut for the privilege.

That is the core problem with hourly pricing on short-term rentals. The host does not want hours. The host wants the unit guest-ready before the 4pm check-in. Sell that, and price it flat.

Here is how to build the number.

Why turnovers get priced flat

A turnover is not an open-ended job. It has a fixed scope and a hard deadline, and both sides know roughly what it involves before anyone shows up.

Flat pricing works better for everyone:

• The host can forecast. They set their guest-facing cleaning fee once and stop guessing.
• You get paid for skill, not slowness. Every minute you shave is margin, not lost revenue.
• You can quote in thirty seconds. Beds, baths, done. No walkthrough, no callback, no "let me work something up and get back to you."

That last one matters more than people expect. On short-term rentals the host is often calling three cleaners the week their old one quits, and they are booking the first one who gives them a straight number. The gap between an instant quote and a callback is where most of these accounts are won and lost.

What the market actually pays in 2026

Two numbers get confused constantly, and you need to keep them apart.

The guest-facing cleaning fee is what the host charges the guest on the listing. Published 2026 benchmarks from listing-data analysts put the US averages roughly here:

The overall US average across all sizes lands near $161, which is the highest of any country.

What the cleaner gets paid is a different number. Industry surveys of vacation-rental cleaners put the typical per-turnover pay at $50 to $150, with something like $75 common for a straightforward two-bedroom. Full-service turnovers that include laundry, restocking, and an inspection report run higher, often $150 to $300 depending on size and market.

So the host is charging their guest $156 for a two-bedroom and paying somewhere between $75 and $150 for it. The spread is where your pricing conversation lives. If you are at the bottom of that band, you are leaving money on the table, and the host is not going to volunteer that.

Build your rate from the bottom up

Market averages tell you whether your number is sane. They do not tell you what your number should be. Build it yourself.

Start with a two-bedroom, two-bathroom unit as your anchor and add up what it actually costs you:

1. Labor. Realistic time on site, not your best-ever time. If a 2/2 takes one cleaner two and a half hours, and your loaded cost per cleaner-hour is $28, that is $70.
2. Drive time and fuel. Turnovers cluster in vacation zones, which are often not where your cleaners live. Twenty minutes each way is real money.
3. Consumables. Paper, soap, trash liners, cleaning product. Small per unit, but it is not zero.
4. Laundry. This is the one people underestimate. On-site laundry means dead time waiting on a dryer. Off-site means pickup, wash, fold, and delivery.
5. Inspection and reporting. Photos, damage notes, restock counts. Ten minutes, every time.
6. Margin. Whatever you actually need to run a business rather than a job.

Add it up. That is your floor for a 2/2. Now build the rest of the book off it.

The beds-and-baths grid

Bedrooms drive linens and surfaces. Bathrooms drive the slowest, most detailed work in the unit. Price both.

A structure that holds up in most markets:

• Base rate for a studio or one bedroom, one bath.
• Add per additional bedroom. Commonly $25 to $50, because each one means a bed strip, a remake, and another round of surfaces.
• Add per additional bathroom. Commonly $20 to $40, because bathrooms are the highest-scrutiny room in a guest review.

Run that grid against the market table above. If your calculated four-bedroom lands at $310 and the market tops out near $285, you are either premium-positioned and need to say why, or your time estimate is off. Either answer is useful.

Charge a premium over residential, and be able to say why

A turnover is harder than a recurring house clean of the same square footage. A reasonable working rule is 20% to 40% over your residential rate for a comparable property. That is a rule of thumb rather than a published statistic, but the reasons behind it are concrete:

• The deadline is real. Check-out at 11am, check-in at 4pm. There is no "we will finish it Tuesday."
• The standard is hotel, not tidy. Guests photograph what they do not like and publish it.
• Linens are part of the job. Stripping, laundering, and making beds is work a residential client does themselves.
• You are restocking inventory. Coffee, paper, soap, and someone has to notice when it runs out.
• You are the host's eyes. Damage, missing items, a broken lamp. You find it or nobody does until the next guest complains.
• Your work is reviewed in public. A bad turnover costs the host a star rating, which costs them bookings.

Say those things out loud when you quote. Hosts who have been burned by a cheap cleaner understand every one of them.

Extras that should never be baked in

The fastest way to lose money on turnovers is a flat rate that quietly absorbs jobs that are not turnovers. Put these on their own lines:

• Off-site laundry. Per load or per set.
• Same-day turn. Check-out and check-in on the same day, with a tight window. Surcharge it.
• Late check-out or early check-in. They compress your window and you should be paid for the disruption.
• Deep clean. Quarterly or seasonal resets are a different scope entirely.
• Post-party or heavy soil. Have a stated policy and a price. You will need it.
• Restock inventory. Either you bill supplies at cost plus a handling fee, or the host stocks a closet. Decide before it comes up.
• Trip fee for a cancelled turn. If the guest extends and you are already in the car, that is your time.

Put it on one page

The whole point of flat pricing is speed, and you only get speed if the rate card is written down. One page. Beds across, baths down, add-ons listed underneath with prices.

Then anyone answering your phone can quote from it. That is the actual test. If a host calls and the only person who can give them a number is you, then your pricing is not a rate card, it is a habit that lives in your head, and it is one of the four things that have to leave your head before the business can grow. Hosts call around, and the cleaner who answers with a real number usually gets the property.

Two things worth adding once the grid exists:

• A minimum. Below a certain number, a turnover is not worth the drive.
• A per-property override. Some units are just harder. A steep staircase, a hot tub, a dog that lives there. Note it once so nobody has to rediscover it.

Where Comura fits

Comura is an AI receptionist and booking system built for cleaning businesses. You load your rate card once, and it quotes from your prices on the call or on your booking page. It does not invent a number that is not on your card.

So when a host calls at 8pm asking what a three-bed, two-bath turnover costs, they get your real price and a link to book it, instead of voicemail and a callback tomorrow. It books the job, assigns the cleaner, and invoices it when it is done.

Pricing is yours. The part Comura takes over is repeating it, accurately, every time somebody asks.