If you own a rent roll, you’re busy.

“Thank you Captain Obvious” – I can hear you saying

I mean, when you start and own a rent roll, especially in the first couple of years it’s just crazy busy.

Between showing tenants through houses, receipting the rent, doing your CPD training (I’m doing mine this week!), chasing rent arrears, following up maintenance, and actually trying to grow your rent roll at the same time, you have a lot on your plate.

So, one of the first things I tell you to do in your business is…

Outsource!

Outsourcing is one of the most effective ways to get your productivity really nailed.

In fact, outsourcing is THE way I was able to go from working 60 hour weeks, to only working 4 days a week in my rent roll.

But there’s a little secret I want to share with you.

It’s the outsourcing strategy I have used over the years that cost me only $4.65 per day, and gave me back hours and hours each week!

So here it is…

I hired a house cleaner.

You know, it actually takes some bravery to share this with you, and I’ll tell you why.

I have a very supportive husband who does (at least) 50% of the housework (maybe more than 50%)…

We don’t have kids…

We both have the time to clean our own house.

And yet, we don’t.

So, I feel a bit uncomfortable telling you that we have someone who comes into our house once a fortnight to spend 2 hours cleaning.

I feel like I might be judged, for being a working, childless woman, with a supportive husband, who doesn’t clean her own home.

But I’m telling you about it, because, if there’s any chance that you feel the same way as I do, you deserve to know that it’s 100% okay to outsource this part of your life.

I want to tell you all the details about having a house cleaner, and then highlight what impact it has had on my business over the years.

So firstly, the basic details.

It cost me $65 a fortnight to have a 2 hour clean done.

That’s $4.65 a day.

(For the record, we’ve just moved to Sydney, so I think the 2 hour clean is now going to cost me $75 down here, so that’s $5.35 a day).

In 2 hours, my cleaner can:

• Clean 1 bathroom, plus an extra toilet
• Clean the kitchen (not the oven though – that happens every couple of months)
• Vacuum the lounge, dining, hall, 2 bedrooms
• And then, she usually has time to add something extra in, like pulling the fridge or dishwasher or washing machine out and cleaning behind it; or cleaning some windows; or cleaning the oven.

Now I want to tell you about what impact this type of outsourcing has had on my business over the years.

Before I outsourced my house cleaning, I was in the thick of growing my rent roll.

I was working from my home office, doing crazy long hours and I was stressed out.

And, while I definitely *could* find the time to clean my own house, and most weekends, Matt and I did spend an hour or two cleaning…

I found myself doing 2 things:

1. Stressing all week about how I needed to find time on the weekend to clean. Then feeling guilty on the weekend when I wasn’t cleaning!  Talk about wasting time feeling guilty!
2. Getting super distracted when it actually was time to clean the house. What *should* have taken 1 hour to clean the bathroom, ended up taking 2 hours because I’d get all distracted every time I walked out of the bathroom to “get something” or “put something away”

I found that, what takes my house cleaner 2 hours to complete, would take me 3, 4 or ever 5 hours!

And the truth is, I don’t do as good a job as her!

Once I hired a house cleaner, I didn’t have to find time on the weekends, I didn’t have to waste time feeling guilty for not cleaning, and I got to enjoy a clean house!

Win, Win, Win!!!

The reason I think this is important to share with you is…

In business, we’re constantly making decisions to hire people and outsource tasks.  But we often forget about outsourcing tasks at home, that can have a massive impact on our mental health and our overall well-being.

Sometimes, society praises us for hiring staff in our businesses…

But judges us for hiring help at home.

Sure, if you’re a rent roll owner, you’re probably a super woman (or super man).

But you don’t have to be responsible for everything in your business, and you certainly don’t have to be responsible for everything at home either.

So, when your business expands to a place where you’re looking to outsource or hire help…

This is officially your permission to hire help at home, if that’s an appropriate “next step” for you.

And if you’re anything like me, that 2 hour a fortnight house clean might very well turn into about 5-10 hours of new, productive, work time for your business.

Comment below, do you have a house cleaner already?  Or have you ever considered getting one?

And if you’re still figuring out where you could outsource inside your business, read my article on hiring a VA or local employee right here.

If you haven’t seen my last blog titled How To Grow Your Rent Roll When Landlords Are Selling be sure to check that out next!