End of tenancy cleaning in Singapore: what gets checked at handover

What gets checked at key handover?

The landlord or agent walks through the unit with the check-in inventory, room by room, and compares what they see with what was there when you moved in. Clean surfaces matter. So do smells, stains and anything that has changed since day one.

Before you plan anything, read your tenancy agreement again. Some include a clause about professionally cleaning the curtains, or the whole unit, at the end of the lease. Others say nothing. If the wording is unclear, ask your agent to confirm in writing what they expect.

Kitchen grease, bathroom mould and grimy grout lines are the usual finds. Window grilles and tracks collect dust fast near a main road. Work through it with the list below.

Curtains, mattress and sofa: the tricky part

A floor is either clean or it is not. Fabric is harder to judge, because a mattress or sofa can look fine from across the room and still carry a sweat stain, a pet smell or a few mould spots. Singapore’s humid air keeps fabric slightly damp for longer, and damp fabric is where dust mites, mould and musty smells thrive.

Curtains

Curtains take in dust from open windows and smells from cooking, more so on a low floor, near a main road or next to the kitchen. Check the lining and hem for grey marks and mould spots. Taking long curtains down to wash is a big job, and some fabrics shrink. BRISC’s curtain cleaning is done on-site with steam: no taking down, no shrinkage, and the curtains are hung again the same day.

Mattress

Lift off the protector and look at both sides. Sweat marks, spills and yellowing are what people notice, along with any musty smell. Check your inventory too. If a stain was noted at check-in, you already have a record of it. Our guide to mattress stain removal covers what you can try yourself. For a deeper clean, BRISC’s mattress cleaning uses hot-steam extraction to flush dirt out of the fabric, then pulls most of the moisture back out.

Sofa

Take the cushions off first. Crumbs, coins, pet hair and greyish marks on the armrests and headrest are the usual finds. A damp rubber glove dragged across the fabric gathers pet hair well before you vacuum. If a smell lingers, our guide on removing sofa smells explains where it tends to come from. A fabric sofa that needs more than that can be booked for sofa cleaning, priced per piece.

One honest note: no one can promise every stain will come out. It depends on what the stain is and how long it has been there, which is one more reason to start early.

Photograph everything against the inventory

Photos record the condition you handed back. Take them after cleaning, on the last day, in daylight.

• Follow the order of your check-in inventory, so each photo matches a line on it.
• Shoot each room from the doorway, then close up on anything listed with a mark or defect.
• Photograph both sides of the mattress, the sofa with its cushions off, and the curtains open and closed.
• Keep the original files, which store the date, and back them up somewhere other than your phone.

If you took photos when you moved in, put the old and new shots side by side. That makes it easy to show a mark was already there.

When should you book the clean?

Not on the morning of handover. Book it a few days before, once your furniture and boxes are out. An empty unit is quicker to clean, and moving furniture uncovers dust and marks you missed.

Those spare days give you time to fix misses and walk through with the inventory yourself first. They also cover drying time. After hot-steam extraction, most fabric items are dry in 2–4 hours, damp rather than soaked. A shut-up unit in Singapore’s humidity dries more slowly, so keep the windows open or the fans on until the mattress and sofa are fully dry.

Whole-home handover clean or fabric items only?

If only the soft furnishings need attention, a per-piece clean of the curtains, mattress and sofa may be enough. If the kitchen, bathrooms and floors also need a proper going-over, a whole-home clean can save you a long weekend of scrubbing.

BRISC’s handover deep clean covers the whole home, with the floors deep cleaned and vinyl, tiles and stone scrubbed. It is a custom quote after a quick survey, and it takes from half a day to a full day depending on the home. Curtains, mattresses and sofas can be added per piece or booked on their own.

“Engaged them to do an end of tenancy cleaning, deep leather sofa cleaning and mattress cleaning as well. Superrr competitive prices and everyone is very friendly!!!” (a verified Carousell review)

Whichever route you pick, start with your tenancy agreement and your check-in inventory. Together they tell you what is expected.

Frequently asked questions