On moving day the flat is full of boxes, the removal crew is on the stairs and the phone keeps ringing about utilities. Cleaning drops to the bottom of the list and usually stays there: the furniture goes in, and the dust stays underneath. Yet a lot depends on the order. An empty flat can be cleaned faster and more thoroughly than a furnished one, and what is missed at move-in often stays out of reach for years.
Why the empty flat?
Without furniture, every surface is accessible: the floor right into the corners, the lower strip of the walls, the area behind the radiators, the inside of built-in wardrobes. When moving in, you also have to deal with traces left by the previous occupant: grease in the kitchen cupboards, limescale in the bathroom, dust behind the radiator. What gets missed in a furnished flat, or can only be reached by moving furniture, can be put right in one go when the space is empty.
The difference shows not only in thoroughness but in how the work proceeds. Among furniture, much of the cleaning is manoeuvring: the machine and the bucket have to be moved around the rug, the sofa and the boxes, and the cupboards have to be emptied first. In an empty space, the work moves from top to bottom, room by room, without interruption.
| Surface | In an empty flat | In a furnished flat |
|---|---|---|
| Floor | right into the corners and along the skirting boards, in one pass | around furniture; underneath only by moving it |
| Inside cupboards | emptied, shelf by shelf | after emptying and putting everything back |
| Radiators, including behind them | freely accessible | often hidden behind a sofa or bed |
| Lower section of walls | full length | missed behind furniture |
| Kitchen appliances | empty fridge, inside too | only partly with a full fridge |
Whatever we shut away under the furniture when moving in, until the next move no one will see.
Moving in: the recommended order
- Completion of renovation or repair work: painting, installation, floor and wall surface repairs.
- Move-out cleaning in the empty flat.
- Bringing in and assembling the large furniture.
- Bringing in and unpacking the boxes.
- A short refresh clean after the dust from set-up and unpacking.
The logic of the order is simple: every step leaves something behind for the next. Painting leaves dust and drips, furniture assembly leaves sawdust and packaging, unpacking leaves cardboard dust. If the cleaning happens after the repairs but before the furniture, the heavy work is done once, and at the end only the top layer needs removing.
If there was also a renovation
After a renovation, fine construction dust settles everywhere, so the second step involves several rounds, from the rough clean to the final handover. We cover the stages in detail in in the article on post-construction cleaning in detail.
If the flat is furnished
The same principle applies to a furnished flat, only it concerns your own belongings: cleaning is most effective before your own boxes are moved in. In this case we clean the furniture inside and out, and underneath and behind it too, wherever it can be reached.
When moving out, it is the other way round
When you move out, cleaning is the last step, once all your belongings have gone. If anything is brought back in after cleaning, or the removers carry the last pieces of furniture out through the finished flat, part of the job has to start again. Done this way, the flat can be handed over to the landlord or buyer in the condition the parties agreed, and your deposit is not put at risk by haste. We have collected the points most often checked at handover in this guide brings this together.
Before the cleaning starts
- water and electricity should stay on until the cleaning is finished
- the fridge, freezer and cupboards should be emptied
- clutter and rubbish should be removed from the apartment
- access must be clear: keys, gate code, parking
When time is tight between two moves
It is common for the handover of the old flat and the move into the new one to fall in the same week, sometimes on the same day. The cleaning needed at move-out and at move-in then compete with each other, and usually one of them gets skipped. It is worth arranging both cleans together when planning the move, timed to the key handover dates, so that neither is squeezed into whatever time is left after the removal.
What does move-out cleaning include?
The work covers everything that can be reached in an empty apartment, from high points down to the floor:
- kitchen and built-in cupboards, drawers, shelves inside and out
- kitchen appliances inside too: fridge, oven, microwave, dishwasher, cooker hood
- bathroom and WC: limescale, grout, silicone, taps, mirror
- windows: glass, frames and sills, inside and out
- behind radiators too; switches, sockets, door leaves and frames
- floors right into the corners, including where furniture used to stand
- on request, the balcony, the terrace and the flat’s storage room
At the end of the job, we hand over the apartment with room-by-room photos, to the tenant, the owner or the new occupant. Office moves follow the same logic: on move-out we hand over the old office clean, and before move-in we prepare the new one.
In the calendar, ahead of the boxes
Most moving tasks happen once and then no longer matter: transport, key handover, change-of-address registrations. Cleaning is the only one whose effect — or absence — is still visible in the years that follow. That is why it belongs in the calendar before the boxes, not after them. When you request a quote simply give the size of the flat, its condition and the moving date; we will send an itemised quote based on photos or a walk-through.