How do I convince my roommate that we need a maid?

August 5, 2006 9:29 AM

Jimmy (my friend/roommate/landlord) and I both like to have a sparkling clean apartment. He thinks it's lazy and morally objectionable to hire a maid. I think my free time is valuable so I don't want to spend it cleaning bathrooms. Since cost isn't a concern, how do I convince my roommate that we should just leave the cleaning to the professionals and hire a maid?

I live in an apartment with 2 other guys and we're all in our very late 20s. One roommate (let's call him Jimmy) is my best friend from college. He also owns the (whole) house. We'll call the other roommate Bradington.

None of us are very good about cleaning. The place isn't a sty, but real cleaning (vacuuming, dusting, washing the hardwood floors, etc.) happens only every couple of months. The kitchen stays pretty clean since we use it all the time. I'll admit that I'm the worst about cleaning. I don't enjoy it, so I 'm the last one to do it.

I've found a maid who will come for 3 hours every two weeks and, for $75 per visit, will make the place cleaner than it ever has been. She came once as a sort of trial visit and we all agreed the results were fantastic. Much better than we could ever do.

Jimmy (the friend/roommate/landlord) has a moral objection to hiring a cleaning service. He thinks it means we're lazy good for nothings and that we should just do the cleaning ourselves. The money isn't the issue. He also says that he enjoys cleaning, and that, for him, it's a good stress reliever.

My philosophy is that my time away from work is valuable and so spending hours out of every month vacuuming and cleaning bathrooms has a huge opportunity cost (i.e., I could be doing things that I enjoy, working on new projects, etc.). Couple that with the fact that professionals do a *much* better job and I think the maid service is a pretty compelling option.

Bradington, our other roommate, is on "my" side and thinks we should hire the maid.

So how do I convince Jimmy? Is there no convincing him? Since he enjoys it so much, should we work out some deal where he does some portion of the cleaning himself, and the maids do the rest?

posted by santry to human relations (50 comments total)

Can you pay Jimmy to do it?
posted by handful of rain at 9:37 AM on August 5, 2006 [1 favorite]

So how do I convince Jimmy?

Offer to pay for it yourselves (you+Bradington) if your free time is so important to you. You say the money isn't the issue, but when people here "free" and "less work" in the same sentence, their ears will usually perk up.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 9:38 AM on August 5, 2006

Tell Jimmy he can either do it himself (to everyone's satisfaction) or go along with the maid idea.
posted by languagehat at 9:41 AM on August 5, 2006

It only seems fair that, if he enjoys cleaning, he should then do some of it. Otherwise, his moral objection is creating work for you that you have no problem paying someone else to do.

Also, in an attempt to persuade him, you should remind him that modern civilization and commerce is basically founded upon the concept of opportunity costs, like you said. Self-sufficiency is impractical when professionals who specialize in a service are available to do tasks for you for less cost than you would "pay" were you to do this for yourself. Put in such a large context, maybe he'll come around. :p

You might talk to him also about the fact that, since you have the money, you're really helping her out too, because she obviously wants the work. There's no reason to pass on a win-win deal.

If you do compromise on splitting the work, it might be better for him to do his part of the cleaning some time before the maid is scheduled to come every week. You never know if the maid might take the situation the wrong way, as in, "they want to clean that part themselves because they don't trust me." That's just a thought, though.
posted by invitapriore at 9:52 AM on August 5, 2006

Actually, that may be an underlying reason, invitapriore. Perhaps Jimmy is actually afraid of theft? Maybe you could work out an agreement with the maid in question where she wouldn't clean his room (he could lock the door if he liked).
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 9:59 AM on August 5, 2006

Tell Jimmy that by hiring the maid he's providing emplyment for someone who may very well need the job. Think of it as a job program or economic development.

That seems like a moral justification that trumps his concerns over laziness implications.
posted by bim at 10:05 AM on August 5, 2006

Divvy it up? Ask Jimmy what his favorite cleaning tasks are and have him do those regularly, and the maid does the rest of the place.

By the way, having a cleaning service might actually get you guys to do more tidying on your own, thus calming Jimmy's "lazy good-for-nothing" qualms. It kind of keeps the pressure on you to keep things on order so that the cleaner can do his/her work more efficiently. I want the cleaner to do the heavy work like vacuuming, washing the kitchen floor, etc, but s/he won't get to that if there's laundry all over the couch and random junk lying around.
posted by Quietgal at 10:08 AM on August 5, 2006

As long as you are not using a cleaning service like Merry Maids, there is nothing morally objectionable about getting a maid to help clean up. In fact, having a nasty house is more morally objectionable than giving a hardworking person some much-needed employment.

I think I'd work the "we will pick up more so that the maid can do the stuff no one really likes to do" angle.

And then, of course, actually pick up junk more than you do now, but think of it as maximizing your investment in the service you're paying for.
posted by Medieval Maven at 11:01 AM on August 5, 2006

Can you pay Jimmy to do it?

Part of the problem from my perspective is that the maids simply do a much better job. Seeing the place after just one cleaning made me realize how half-assed our typical cleaning is.

Paying him to do it wouldn't get that same level of cleanliness.
posted by santry at 11:14 AM on August 5, 2006

Fundamentally, invitaphore's comment says it best. If you aren't an efficient or effective cleaner and you don't enjoy doing it, it absolutely makes sense to contract it out to a specialist who's better, faster, and more experienced than you, just as you would any other specialized task. As a few people pointed out, if Jimmy prefers to do some of the cleaning himself, that's fine, as long as it's getting done to everyone's satisfaction.

Since Jimmy is your landlord, you'll have to present this strategically. I think there are a couple of subtleties worth mentioning:

Some people feel that it is lazy or exploitative to hire people to clean for historical reasons, since in the past cleaning was often handled by slaves or servants. Obviously Jimmy feels a whiff of this unease.

For this reason, I'd avoid using word "maid" henceforth. The woman you're thinking of hiring isn't a servant, she's a professional cleaner.

For similar reasons, I'd drop all talk of "helping the cleaner out" by hiring her. That may be strictly true, but it's a tad disrespectful to her expertise. Are you helping out a plumber when you hire him to fix your bathtub?
posted by tangerine at 11:15 AM on August 5, 2006

i love my new cleaning lady. my wife and i both work, $60 per week and she cranks out in 3 hours on thursday what takes us an hour a day plus 3 on sautrday to complete. i make my cash in i.t., she makes it cleaning houses, theres no shame in that. its one of lifes simple pleasures coming home to a clean house. (actually, she hinted to me that she has a cleaning lady herself, go figure)..
posted by fumbducker at 11:15 AM on August 5, 2006

It's possible there's something else going on, and that Jimmy's objection isn't subject to rational argument.

I hired a maid, once, when I was getting my old house ready to sell. I had to have it really clean for an open house, and I really didn't have the time. So I called a friend who does housecleaning. It felt very weird—doubly so because it was a friend. There's a guilty feeling when you pay someone else to do something for you that you can do yourself, and at some level you think you should do yourself.

You're not going to overcome this, at least not directly. What you could do is this: You, Jimmy, and Bradenton all agree to take care of the housework once/week on a rotation (which wouldn't be a bad plan anyhow). When it's your turn, you hire the maid. Bradenton can do likewise. Jimmy, unless he's also got an objection to letting the maid into his house at all, shouldn't object, and he can do the housework his way when his week rolls around. If he makes an issue of you hiring a maid to cover for your share, say "yes, I freely admit to being a lazy, morally suspect, slovenly individual who spends his way out of inconvenience. But I am making sure the house gets clean, and how I do it is my responsibility."
posted by adamrice at 11:16 AM on August 5, 2006

I should have been more clear on the "moral objection" bit. The moral objection isn't that we're making someone clean our mess.

He sees cleaning as some sort of virtuous task and a good person does his own cleaning. If we pay someone else to do the cleaning, then we're not living up to our moral obligation to do the cleaning ourselves (or some shit like that).

Also, I'll point out that people leaving stuff around isn't the problem. When I say I'm loathe to clean, I mean the vacuuming, dusting, mopping, etc. We all keep our personal belongings well organized and out of each others way already.
posted by santry at 11:18 AM on August 5, 2006

Offer to pay for it yourselves (you+Bradington) if your free time is so important to you.

I'm afraid of resentment building up over time. If Bradington and I pay for a maid to come every two weeks, the place will be sparkling and Jimmy will not have made any contribution.

When I wrote that money isn't a concern I meant to express that being able to afford the maid isn't part of Jimmy's objection to hiring a maid.
posted by santry at 11:24 AM on August 5, 2006

Personally, I tend to side with Jimmy, although that is not what you want to hear, santry. But if you've got a minute, reading this comment may at least provide some insight into Jimmy's thinking, and if you are ever to succeed in changing anyone's mind, understanding the thinking of others is step one.

I tend to think that people should make an effort to keep their living quarters clean for the same the reasons the military thinks that's a good idea. Keeping your quarters neat is a way of caring for yourself, and keeping discipline. People that can't or won't keep their quarters straight have no discipline, and the state of their quarters is visible evidence of their mental disorganization. So, in the military, when an inspection is done, the goal is only superficially to discover the relative level of sanitation, it's really to examine the mental discipline of the unit, and ascertain its readiness. A unit that is "squared away," look like it is; a unit living in squalor is a liability to itself and others.

Jimmy and I think that hiring out cleaning is tantamount to lying about your willingness to care for yourself and those about you. He and I would value you much more as a housemate, if we could see your discipline and concern for our mutual well being reflected in your quiet care of the living quarters you share. That care says "I value being here, and I will take responsibility to see that this living situation works, above doing things that are primarily self-centered and recreational, because the well being of the people I live with is more important to me than my hobbies and personal interests."

Hiring a maid so you don't have to learn to clean, not only flies in the face of that ethic, it makes it clear you don't understand it at all. If you tried this in a military unit, you wouldn't get the idea out of your mouth before the unit let you know they didn't like you, and they didn't trust you. Maybe after 10 or 15 years in, if you were stationed somewhere you were billeted with other non-coms or fellow officers, you might together hire cleaning help, but you'd still be expected to be willing and able to drop it, and do your own cleaning whenever it became necessary for the welfare of your fellows. A shirker in the military is always evident by his unwillingness to police his work area and his living quarters.

Try it Jimmy's way for a couple of months. Step up, without discussion, and show him you care, and learn how to clean. Demonstrate initiative in doing tasks without being asked, just because you see they need to be done, and you can do them. Mop the kitchen floor without being asked, vacuum and change the vacuum cleaner bag (maybe even buy some spare bags!!!) Dust, thoroughly. Once that's established, he'll listen to what you have to say, and may even gladly pitch in, if he knows you can and will step up whenever there is a problem with a maid. In fact, doing this is about the only way you're going to be able to keep a maid, because unresolved, Jimmy can make a maid's job so difficult, you won't be able to keep one.

And if/when you get married, you'll have a life lesson under your belt that may go along way to keeping you married. A lot of women think like Jimmy and me.
posted by paulsc at 11:51 AM on August 5, 2006 [3 favorites]

Does Jimmy think "it's lazy and morally objectionable" to eat meals prepared by others? If so, he can forget about ordering in pizza or Chinese food. No more trips to restaurants either.
posted by ericb at 11:57 AM on August 5, 2006

Prepared by others? Jimmy should be growing his own food, by his logic.
posted by Kwantsar at 12:03 PM on August 5, 2006

Maybe if you stop referring to this person as a "maid" and call them a "cleaning lady" (or cleaning person) instead, the whole thing will sound a lot less objectionable to him? A cleaning person does different things than a maid... and all you're looking for is someone to clean. My cleaning lady would slap me in the face if I dared call her a maid!
posted by RoseovSharon at 12:04 PM on August 5, 2006

It's been my experience that when someone says it's not about the money, it's usually about the money.
posted by sexymofo at 12:05 PM on August 5, 2006

As long as you are paying the maid a proper wage, I don't see how hiring one could be morally objectionable.

If Jimmy is worried about the maid getting into his stuff, just be careful to define what the maid should and should not clean. Maids often deal with a room or two being "off limits," so that shouldn't be a problem.

A few years ago, I was in a similar situation. We got a maid that was a local college student and neat-freak. She absolutely loved the job because she got to listen to her music, get her neat-freak on (she seemed to get a lot of joy out of making things clean), and we were happy to work with her school schedule.

And what everyone else has said. Opportunity cost is the key issue here. Assuming your work is an honest value-add to the economy (you aren't a bank robber or jewl thief) then choosing to spend your time on a lower-value activity (cleaning) actually harms the community. You should be doing your high-value work, and hiring others who are better suited to the low value work in order to maximize economic efficiency and community benefit.
posted by b1tr0t at 12:07 PM on August 5, 2006

paulsc, all i can say is...wow. i (and some people like me, the dirty lazy maid hirers all-lowercase typers that were never in the military) are neither dirty or lazy, nor lacking the knowledge and ability to clean. im in the position to hire someone to clean, to get back some of my own time for myself. after waking up at 6:30, working all day, getting home from work at 5:30, preparing and eating dinner and taking out the trash, and reading the mail and brushing my teeth, etc. im lucky to have time for myself between 8 pm & 11 pm before i start packing it in. when saturday rolls around, the last thing i want to do is spend 3-4 hours disciplining myself through the lessons of vacuuming and dusting. and to be perfectly honest i learned how to clean at home growing up with my family, not by being a nonshirker in the military..... wow.
posted by fumbducker at 12:16 PM on August 5, 2006

Well, fumbducker, if you live alone, or with like minded folk, go for the maid service. Some people like hotel living.

Me, I live with a schizophrenic relative, and the military intuition about the mental health value of a personal responsibility for cleanliness is vital here. Apparently, it was vital for you growing up as member of a family, too. That's the difference, to people like santry's friend Jimmy, and me & my brother, and maybe your Mom. We'll stay in a hotel, but we live at home, and our care of the latter is a defining measure of the difference between the two.
posted by paulsc at 12:38 PM on August 5, 2006

Hire a maid service and do one thorough big-ass cleaning. Make him see the difference with his own eyes.
posted by frogan at 12:49 PM on August 5, 2006

You just applied your logic about shunning cleaning services to all women (well, rational ones of course) everywhere. Awesome.

Me, I'm glad I live in a tent made from deer I skinned myself and that I only eat sticks and rocks I've gathered with my own hands, since I wouldn't want to profit from other folks' work.. like general contractors, garbage men, the water and power utilities, and so on. Being self-reliant is really the difference between a house and a tent you call home, you know.
posted by kcm at 12:55 PM on August 5, 2006

Why not set it up so that each of you has a two-week portion where you're responsible for the cleaning? You and Bradington can employ the cleaning lady (don't refer to her as a maid) when it's your turn, and Jimmy can use whatever method he wants when it's his turn. That way the house gets cleaned fairly frequently and Jimmy doesn't have the moral weight of hiring cleaning help on his shoulders.
posted by needs more cowbell at 1:23 PM on August 5, 2006

"...Being self-reliant is really the difference between a house and a tent you call home, you know."
posted by kcm at 3:55 PM EST on August 5

Just so it's a clean, squared away tent, kcm. :-)

Actually, I don't get any of your comment, if it's directed towards mine. Where did I apply any logic about shunning cleaning services to all women? What has maintenance of one's quarters to do with building trades, except some specious "specialization of labor" notion, which I never made a grounds of my argument, and which, as far as I can see, has nothing to do with what is bothering Jimmy. Unless you have a job which requires 168 hour a week attendance or practical equivalent, hiring a cleaning surrogate is a choice that results from any number of ethical and moral choices. Do or don't, and be judged on your actions, until questioned about your thoughts and motives.

Jimmy is reacting to santry's action of hiring a maid, which is ethically offensive to Jimmy, for the fairly common reasons that I've elucidated (which may or may not be Jimmy's). They're apparently having problems with the ethical argument, if they've actually had that at all. santry has asked how he can effectively recast the argument, and perhaps convince his friend to his way of thinking, and I've made some suggestions about that.

How has your comment helped him do that?
posted by paulsc at 1:32 PM on August 5, 2006

Oh good grief. Cleaning is not a moral issue.

All these guys have day jobs. Cleaning-that is, deep cleaning, is the equvalent of another job. It's fine if they wanna do it themselves, in which case I recommend flylady.com for a system that works. Otherwise, hire the cleaning lady.

I do not work outside the home and I don't mind cleaning. When I did work outside the home I was exhausted and the house was a sty-I couldn't keep up with it. If a maid had been an option I'd have taken it.

As to the military analogy-I have a son at the Air Force Academy and he is subject to periodic inspections. The reason that works is that these guys have little to no extraneous clutter, and they are told exactly where to put items. Most people do not want to declutter their homes to that extent. Not to mention my son and his buds do their really deep cleaning right before an inspection as there is no freaking way anyone can live in a room that is THAT squared away.

Let me throw in that doing cleaning as mental health rehab has nothing to do with the average Joe or Jolene that works for a living and then is still stuck with dust bunnies to round up. We work and we clean so we can have a life-it shouldn't BE our life.
posted by konolia at 1:34 PM on August 5, 2006

I honestly don't understand the whole "cleanliness is next to godliness" concept. I mean yes, effort to keep your space relatively tidy shows a certain level of maturity. If some of that effort is money paid to someone else to help in that endevour, it shows you care about keeping your space clean.

I would have a really hard time living with someone who felt it necessary to impose arbitrary moral standards on me. You're an adult, tell him cleaning the house yourself is not a priority over spending your time doing things you want, you want to hire someone to do it for you, and you'll worry about your own morality and virtue.

Now, if money is an issue for you in that you can't afford it without his help or if you'd be more bitter about paying part of his share than about having to do the spic and span cleaning, then you're pretty much out of luck. There's no way to push your priorities (convienance/money over work) on him, and as someone else said--he may be claiming morality when in fact he doesn't want to spend the money on it.
posted by Kimberly at 1:34 PM on August 5, 2006

Whatever the reasons, moral, sociological, financial, whatever, your main problem is that Jimmy is in the minority, but because he's the landlord, he has a disproportionate vote.

A majority of the population of your house vote "cleaning service" but he has the veto.

So, is that fair? If you think it isn't, look him in the eye and say "Dude, me and Brad vote 'cleaning service' so that's two against one". Or move out.

If you think it's fair then you have to suck it up.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 2:24 PM on August 5, 2006

"Oh good grief. Cleaning is not a moral issue."

Actually, if you look at this definition of moral, it kinda is, under the 3rd sense of the word. But let that go.

Again, I suspect that what's making Jimmy stick on the issue, hasn't anything to do with cleanliness, or how it might be accomplished, but is more deeply rooted in his core values. Santay's approach, and the arguments advanced here about the relative value of a maid's time, the superiority of professionals to disinterested amateurs in the doing of regular tasks, etc. all fail to address this, but the vehemence of some comments in this thread show that the point isn't missed.

Santay will get an opportunity to change Jimmy's mind, when and if he shows Jimmy, by action and not argument, that he understands Jimmy's views about what the military thinks of as unit cohesion issues. When santay shows Jimmy that he'll do what is required to keep the joint clean in a way that meets Jimmy's sensibilities, he'll get a fair hearing from Jimmy, and a good chance of changing Jimmy's stand on the subject of cleaning services. But not likely, before.

Pushing the argument on his own terms is likely to result in santay finding other living arrangements. Jimmy, as the landlord, is probably prepared to find other tenants with sensibilities closer to his own, and may conclude that's what he wants to do, since if this wasn't a core issue for Jimmy, he'd have already hired a cleaning service, and upped the rent to cover it.
posted by paulsc at 2:37 PM on August 5, 2006

Let Jimmy know that he can continue to do his own cleaning, but that you are not as virtuous as he, will never be as virtuous as he, and since you are labouring hard at your job in the time that you would otherwise spend cleaning, you will be using the tokens of that labour to have a professional do your part of the cleaning.
posted by -harlequin- at 3:06 PM on August 5, 2006

You know, I came into this thread on Jimmy's side, but I've changed my mind. It's one thing to hire a maid so that you don't have to do any work—so that you can throw shit on the floor, not clean up after yourself, and generally live like a teenager. I think that shows childishness and irresponsibility, and probably Jimmy agrees with me. But if you're basically cleaning up the place already, and you just want it to be extra-special clean, then that's a harmless luxury in my opinion, and if you're paying the cleaning person a reasonable wage, everybody wins.

Maybe Jimmy needs to see it from that perspective?
posted by Hildago at 3:17 PM on August 5, 2006

Explain it in simple math. If it takes you 4 hours to do the cleaning that takes the maid 3 hours, and you make $25/hr (the value of your time) and pay the maid $25/hr, you're saving $25/week by not doing it, AND helping someone who needs the work.
posted by blue_beetle at 4:40 PM on August 5, 2006 [1 favorite]

I know someone with similar issues regarding maids. I mean everything else is outsourced, except cleaning. I think the issue has to do with personal space and having someone go through it. I don't think there is necessarily a moral, ethical or whatever argument that can really be valid. I'm sorry but I don't see steam cleaning a carpet a reflection of my personal dignity or discipline. That is besides the point. Does he have a problem with someone coming and going through his personal space? Does he feel he'll be judged? I am guessing that this is more at play here.
posted by geoff. at 5:00 PM on August 5, 2006

Set it up like this.
One week Jimmy, one week you, one week your other roomate.

It shouldn't matter how you get your week done. If Jimmy slacks (or your other roomate slacks) compared to the way you get it done (a fair exchange for service), he has to agree to invest more time to get it to your level.

Realistically, this is a money/goods exchange of services. It's why you get your hair cut, get an accountant, get a mechanic. Some people make their livings doing things other people can't do well/don't like to do.
posted by filmgeek at 6:11 PM on August 5, 2006

I don't think there is necessarily a moral, ethical or whatever argument that can really be valid

I think there definitely could be ethical questions. It's not hard to imagine a situation (not necessarily this situation) where someone with limited job options is financially exploited, paid poverty wages, but desperate enough that they're afraid or unable to quit. What if the maid is only getting $10 of that $75 santry is paying, and the rest goes to her employer? Not saying this is happening here, but I guarantee it happens.
posted by Hildago at 6:15 PM on August 5, 2006

What if the maid is only getting $10 of that $75 santry is paying, and the rest goes to her employer? Not saying this is happening here, but I guarantee it happens.

For the record, the cleaning person I hired is the sole proprietor of her business. She brings one other person with her as a helper. I have no reason to believe she does not pay her helper a fair wage.
posted by santry at 6:35 PM on August 5, 2006

What if the maid is only getting $10 of that $75 santry is paying, and the rest goes to her employer? Not saying this is happening here, but I guarantee it happens.

Then don't go through a service. Find an individual through referrals from friends. That's how I found my "cleaning person."

Off-topic, but related -- interesting reading:

Other People's Dirt: A Housecleaner's Curious Adventures by Louise Rafkin.

True Dirt- Confessions Of A Male Housecleaner by Danny Praz.

posted by ericb at 6:42 PM on August 5, 2006

One week Jimmy, one week you, one week your other roomate.

A few people have made this suggestion (or other suggestions similar in spirit). The problem is with the way our square footage is divided. I occupy the entire third floor (it's essentially the master bedroom) and share the second floor kitchen, living room and dining room with the other guys.

The cleaning service will clean every room of both floors. Jimmy shouldn't be expected to come upstairs and clean my bathroom, bedroom and music room.

"Well," someone might suggest "why not have the cleaning service clean the whole apartment one week, and just your floor the next week." I think that gets a bit too complicated, and isn't fair to the cleaning service since they're coming out to my house, but only getting half the work (and half the pay) on those odd weeks.
posted by santry at 6:42 PM on August 5, 2006

Sorry, santry, about misspelling your nic, above.

One constructive thought for multi-level houses, in case the discussion with Jimmy doesn't go your way:

Equip each floor with minimum cleaning equipment. It beats lugging a vac or mops or buckets up and down stairs, and makes cleaning chores a 10 minute thing you can work into daily routines, rather than blow off, on the excuse the needed equipment isn't handy.

Lotsa luck, really. Whatever happens, don't let living differences screw up a friendship.
posted by paulsc at 7:40 PM on August 5, 2006

This is funny:

In fact, doing this is about the only way you're going to be able to keep a maid, because unresolved, Jimmy can make a maid's job so difficult, you won't be able to keep one.

paulsc's worldview is interesting.
posted by jayder at 8:57 PM on August 5, 2006

Yah. Go, Paulsc.

Personally, I am a total slob -- if I have the place picked up, that is the exception rather than the rule. I'm OK with this. It works for me.

But what a fascinating way of looking at cleaning Paulsc has. People are dumb to react as if he were personally accusing them of moral turpitude or something. Consider a new point of view -- reject it if you want, but consider it.

Take the bait, spit out the hook.
posted by Methylviolet at 10:07 PM on August 5, 2006

We have a maid come every other week at home. (She is independent, not an employee of a cleaning service.) She's cleaned for years and is generally trustworthy. (Except for a large hole behind our couch that she denies causing.) I find her to be a major inconvenience—we have to clean before she comes to clean, which is probably at least half the work.

Back at college, my suitemates and I discussed hiring a maid. Splitting the cost six ways would bring the price way down to under $10 every other week for us. But, in addition to not trusting a stranger, we decided that there was too much time 'overhead'—we'd have to arrange a guest parking pass for her (or him), let them into the building, and pick up before they came. We decided that we'd already be doing half the work, so we might as well just do it all ourselves.

And at work, we fired the people we'd hired for cleaning about a year ago, after one too many times of them doing a really bad job. Now the 'normal' staff does some of the cleaning when we close at night, and the rest when they open in the morning. This ends up being more cost-effective than hiring someone else to do it.

I have nothing against maids—one of my friends is one, in fact—I just thought I'd share some anecdotes of how maids can ultimately be more of a burden than a help.
posted by fogster at 10:25 PM on August 5, 2006

I am sure that any landlord I have had would have loved it if I had a cleaning service. From his point of view, it should be seen as an investment in the property - clean rugs (vacuumed regularly) last longer. Likewise with other flooring. Clean houses mean furnace and AC filters stay clean and last longer. Bathrooms that are properly cleaned do not have film on the shower doors, or mildew in the grout. You could say that you really appreciate where you are living, but don't feel that you are able to give it the cleaning it deserves to make things last the length of time that they should. You understand that he has an investment in the property and you want to make certain that he is happy with how you are using the facilities so that they will last longer and protect his investment. And, if you were living elsewhere on your own, you would pay for this service as what you are currently doing is not working for you or the roommates. Ask him to think about the many options that people above have suggested - cleaning on a rotating schedule, locking his room, etc., and see if he is willing to let the cleaning person come into the house.

wife of 445supermag
posted by 445supermag at 10:29 PM on August 5, 2006

For the record, the cleaning person I hired is the sole proprietor of her business. She brings one other person with her as a helper. I have no reason to believe she does not pay her helper a fair wage.

This is what my mom does for a living, and I've been that helper for a time. The work sucks, but my mom chose to do this because she's really good at it and is her own boss, so I would say a moral objection shouldn't stand. Also, you'd be supporting a local business whose work you're more than satisfied with.
posted by bitpart at 10:57 PM on August 5, 2006

I would use this argument: If Jimmy were vegan, or kept kosher, for instance, then he would have moral objections about certain sorts of foods. Would it be fair for him to insist that the two of you also adopt his eating habits because you share the kitchen? If he were a Christian Scientist would it be okay to insist that you don't keep medicine in the house? Or no alcohol, if he were Muslim? What if he believed music was a tool of the devil, or the color red was evil?

In all these things, it would be fair for him to set out certain house rules before renting to tenants, but not fair to begin imposing his rules and values afterwards. As a landlord, it is his obligation to inform prospective tenants of restrictions before they begin renting. As a roommate, it is his obligation to agree to compromises to facilitate pleasant living conditions among the three of you. It is fine for him to do as much of the cleaning as he wishes to feel good about himself, but it's not right for him to insist that you do that cleaning so that he can feel good about himself.

It would be fair to pick certain tasks that the cleaning person will not do, that Jimmy can do so that he feels okay with it. She doesn't clean his room, plus... windows, or the bathroom, or the kitchen, or whatever he chooses to do on his own.
posted by taz at 11:15 PM on August 5, 2006

"Jimmy and I think that hiring out cleaning is tantamount to lying about your willingness to care for yourself and those about you."

I don't understand this even in the slightest.

santry is perfectly willing to care for himself and those around him. He is so willing to do so, in fact, that he wants to spend some of his hard-earned money to be certain that it gets done.

If he wasn't willing, as you seem to suggest, then he simply would take no initiative at all, and either be a slob, or force a sub-par cleaning effort on his roommates.

Hiring out work doesn't mean you have no concern for it. Only that you know you either can't or won't do an acceptable job yourself. To me, this means that you have to recognize and admit that fact to others, which I think it quite the responsible course of action.

He's not in the military, paulsc. To compare civilian life to military life in any aspect is simply absurd.
posted by CrayDrygu at 12:00 AM on August 6, 2006

Clean the place up to the standards of your potential cleaning lady. Take note of how much time it takes you. Show Jimmy just how long it took to get the place that clean, and show him how much free time you have after work and vital obligations.

Once he realizes how much of your time that will take, he might back down. It doesn't hurt to reassure him that you have no intentions on living sloppily, just that you'd rather have a professional handle the time-consuming parts of cleaning.
posted by Saydur at 1:26 AM on August 6, 2006

which is ethically offensive to Jimmy, for the fairly common reasons that I've elucidated

"Fairly common"? For obsessed military types who think all of life should be just like the military, maybe. For the rest of us, it sounds nuts. As CrayDrygu said:

He's not in the military, paulsc. To compare civilian life to military life in any aspect is simply absurd.
posted by languagehat at 7:24 AM on August 6, 2006

Slightly off-topic.

I was in the military, so now I pride myself in not making my bed every morning. The constant slight mess in my room makes it my own. It has personality.

Also, there's a difference between clean and tidy. My room is the former, just not the latter.
posted by slimepuppy at 4:37 AM on August 7, 2006