The deposit argument is almost never about the obvious things. Nobody forgets to vacuum. What gets held back is the oven, the inside of the cabinets, the blinds, and the tops of things nobody looks at until an inspection.
Here is the list we work to on a move-out clean, and it doubles as a decent checklist if you are doing it yourself.
A move-out bathroom is a deep clean of every area, including the hard-to-reach spots and the tile. We clean bathroom floors by hand on every job, and on a move-out it matters more than usual — grout is exactly where an inspection lingers.
If you are on the other side of it, the job is about the surfaces someone else lived on: baseboards, window sills, patio doors, kitchen and bathroom cabinetry interiors, appliance interiors, closet shelving, windows, and the garage.
It is worth doing before the furniture arrives. Everything is reachable exactly once.
A move-out clean has a deadline attached, and usually a deposit. If you are not satisfied with an area, call within 24 hours and we re-clean it free. On a job where someone else is about to inspect the work, that is the part worth having.
