Basement seeks cleaner

January 14, 2010 7:38 PM

AlasPoorBasementFilter: My basement...could be cleaner. Unfortunately, I'm not strong enough to budge the appliances to clean behind them (or get to the stuff over them). Googling and Craigslisting are, so far, not turning up individuals/businesses who would be happy to clean a dirty basement, as opposed to a dirty rest of the house. Are there any fellow Monroe County, NY area Mefites with suggestions? If you'd prefer to contact me privately, feel free to use the e-mail address in my profile, or memail.
posted by thomas j wise to home & garden (4 answers total)

I'm sure you could find someone willing to clean a basement, or at least move furniture around so you can get to it - a large number of these people aren't rigid companies, and demonstrate a pretty good degree of flexibility for money.

I've recently done this when I needed a back yard cleaned of debris. In my case I looked for a 'starving student' style ad, and called them with the 'you want to make some money?' approach.
posted by Rendus at 10:49 PM on January 14, 2010

If you're having problems moving heavy appliances, you might consider getting some forearm forklift straps to make life easier..
posted by MuffinMan at 4:00 AM on January 15, 2010

I am not in your area, but I have approached problems like this in two ways. One is that where i live, I was able to find a cleaning company that specializes in cleaning empty houses; they are more willing than other companies to do things like basements (they've done mine) and to do one-time cleaning. I know you're already checked your Yellow pages etc, but if you have a realtor you've worked with she or he might be able to give you a lead.

The other thing I've done for odd jobs is post my own ad on craigslist. For something like a basement cleaning, I might end up with, say, a couple of college students interested in making a little extra money, who would work under my direction and help with the heavy lifting. I've had good luck with this kind of thing.
posted by not that girl at 6:30 AM on January 15, 2010

For finding this kind of help, perhaps the old ways are best. You might look for flyers/business cards on supermarket bulletin boards (the old-fashioned kind with pushpins and paper), or in your local paper's classified section. People who offer man-and-truck hauling services might be interested too. At the risk of being piled on for stereotyping, I'll just suggest that people in this line of work may not be well represented online. Ask around at the local non-big-box hardware store. Ask the person who plows your driveway for suggestions. You're bound to turn up something eventually.
posted by scratch at 8:53 AM on January 15, 2010