Short-Term Rentals: Maintenance Between Guests

In short-term letting it is not the decor that earns good reviews — it is consistency. A property that is immaculate every other time is a poorly rated property. So the job is to have a simple, repeatable routine carried out between every guest by someone reliable, plus two or three craftsmen you can actually reach when something fails. Here is how to organise that without spending your days on it.

A turnover clean is not an ordinary clean

Routine cleaning aims to make a home pleasant for the people already living in it. A turnover clean aims to make it neutral: no trace of whoever was there before. Hair in the shower, crumbs in a drawer, a smell in the fridge — those are exactly the details that trigger a bad review, far more than the age of the furniture. It takes a fixed checklist and a little more time than routine cleaning, and it should be paid accordingly.

• Sheets and towels changed every time, never "they look clean"
• Shower, seals and drain — the most scrutinised spots
• Fridge emptied and wiped, bin taken out
• Floors, under the beds, behind the doors
• Crockery put away and checked, not just washed
• A quick sweep: bulbs, remotes, wifi, hot water

The failures that cost you a bad review

There are few of them and they are always the same: no hot water, air conditioning down in summer, wifi off, a temperamental lock, a blocked drain. None is serious in itself; all of them wreck a stay if they last two days. Which is why the real preparation of a rental is not aesthetic but logistical: knowing who to call, and having already called them once.

Build a team of three

For one or two properties, three contacts cover almost everything: someone for the turnover clean, a plumber, an electrician. Add an appliance engineer if you have air conditioning and a washing machine. The point is not to have many, but that these three know you, know the property, and answer quickly. Test them first on non-urgent jobs: you discover whether someone is reliable when nothing is on fire, not at 10pm on a Sunday.

Budgeting maintenance honestly

Plenty of owners calculate their yield while forgetting maintenance, then wonder where the money went. Budget the turnover clean at every departure, a recurring small-repairs allowance, and a replacement line: linen wears fast, crockery breaks, bulbs blow. A frequently let property ages several times faster than a lived-in one — that is normal, and it should be provisioned for. A yield calculated without those lines is not a yield, it is an optimistic estimate.

Replace it before it breaks

Some things cost far less to replace in advance than to repair in an emergency with a guest in the property. A water heater near the end of its life will fail at the worst possible moment, and changing it calmly costs less than a call-out on a Saturday night. The same logic applies to a lock that has started sticking, linen that has lost its colour, mismatched crockery. The rule is simple: anything you find yourself apologising to a guest for is something to replace, not something to explain.

When you do not live locally

This is the most common situation and the one that demands the most method. You need somebody who can go in, look, and send you a photo — without that you are flying blind. Agree a simple working arrangement: a photo after each turnover, an immediate message if something is broken, and authority to spend up to a small amount without asking you. That last point changes everything: it stops a blown bulb waiting three days for your approval.

Frequently asked questions

To build your team: find someone for cleaning and a plumber in your city. If you are preparing a property to let, also read how to plan the work, and how to recognise a reliable craftsman.