End of Tenancy Cleaning in Cricklewood

A first-floor flat in a converted Victorian terrace on Chichele Road — one of the residential streets running between Cricklewood Lane and the Broadway, on the Barnet side of the boundary. The house was a standard NW2 three-storey terrace, split into three flats: ground floor, first floor (ours), and a top-floor studio. Our flat: two bedrooms, a living room at the front with a bay window, a kitchen at the rear, and a bathroom wedged into what had once been a large cupboard or a very small bedroom before the conversion carved it into a bathroom-shaped space. The tenants — a couple, both nurses at the Royal Free — had been there 16 months on an AST at £1,500/month. The landlord lived in Edgware and was coming to do the walkthrough himself on Tuesday morning.

Parked on Chichele Road — Barnet CPZ, RingGo paid. Found a space three doors down. Carried the kit through the shared front door (not in scope — confirmed at booking), up the communal staircase (also not in scope), and into the flat through the internal front door on the first-floor landing.

Kitchen first. A rear room, about 7 sqm — the smallest dimension of kitchen that qualifies as a room rather than a kitchenette. Worktops on two walls with a gap between them for the cooker, a window overlooking the back addition roofs and a sliver of garden that belonged to the ground-floor flat. A freestanding gas cooker — a New World, single oven, separate grill, 4-burner hob. Both tenants were nurses working shifts, which meant the oven had been used irregularly but intensely — batch cooking on days off, reheating on work nights, the kind of pattern that produces moderate but uneven grease. The back wall of the cavity had heavy splatter from roasting trays; the sides were lighter; the roof had a thin film from rising steam.

Door off. Glass out — single pane. Cavity sprayed. First dwell: 20 minutes. While it dwelled, we addressed the hob. Four burner caps and supports into the soak tray. The enamel surface had two baked-on spill rings — one dark (curry, based on the colour and the slight turmeric tinge to the enamel beneath), one amber (oil or butter). Targeted degreaser on each.

Back to the oven after 20 minutes. First pass: the sides and the steam film on the roof came clean. The back wall's roasting splatter needed a second spray — concentrated on the lower half where the worst accumulation sat. Another 10 minutes. Second pass: done. The grill pan had a thin layer of burnt cheese — soaked while we worked on the rest of the kitchen, then scrubbed. Grill cavity: one dwell, one pass. Reassembled. Hob rings: the curry stain came off in three passes with a scourer. The amber ring came off in two. The enamel beneath the curry ring had a faint yellow shadow — turmeric had stained the enamel's pores over repeated spills. Cleaned to the extent possible; the remaining tint was documented as residual staining. Total oven and hob: 35 minutes.

The rest of the kitchen. Laminate worktops: wiped. The gap between the worktop and the wall (present in every conversion kitchen where the fitter worked around existing plaster rather than tiling to the wall): cleaned with a cloth wrapped around a palette knife, extracting a compacted line of crumbs and dried sauce. Cupboard fronts: wiped — white melamine, the handles loose on two (noted). Inside all cupboards and drawers. Under the sink: cleared, descaled. The fridge-freezer: a small under-counter unit, the only size that fit the kitchen. Shelves removed and wiped. The freezer compartment: a solid block of ice filling the entire space — the tenants had clearly never defrosted it. This wasn't a sheet of ice on the back wall; this was an ice cube the size of the compartment. Door opened, towels arranged, and we left it to melt while we cleaned the rest of the flat. Total passive defrost: about 90 minutes, checked three times, towels swapped twice.

Sink — stainless steel, single bowl, so small that a dinner plate sat at an angle. Descaled. The single mixer tap: moderate limescale around the base. Descaler, one dwell. No extractor fan and no hood — the kitchen had no mechanical extraction at all. A window that opened about 4 inches on a restrictor was the only ventilation. The walls around the hob had a visible grease film extending about a metre in each direction — the unmistakable signature of a kitchen where every cooking session deposits a fine aerosol of fat onto every surface with no extraction to capture it. We degreased the walls around the hob, the section of ceiling above the cooking area, and the window frame (which had its own layer). This added 10 minutes but left the kitchen presentably clean rather than technically-oven-done-but-walls-still-greasy. Floor — vinyl — mopped. Kitchen total: 50 minutes of active work, plus the freezer running in the background.

Living room. Carpeted — a grey-brown that had been chosen to hide everything and had succeeded admirably. The bay window: three sash windows, 2-over-2 panes — 12 panes total. The lower sashes moved (both slightly stiff, one more so than the other). Glass cleaned pane by pane. Glazing bars wiped. Runners vacuumed on the two operable sashes. The meeting rail on each: wiped. Sills: wiped. 15 minutes for the bay.

A fireplace — a Victorian tiled surround in brown and cream with a cast-iron insert. The fireplace had been sealed (a board behind the grate, no draught) and was decorative only. Tiles wiped. Cast iron: dry cloth. The mantel shelf: dusted, wiped — a ring of dust marked where a clock or a photo frame had sat for 16 months without being moved. Hearth tiles: vacuumed and wiped. Alcove shelving in the chimney breast recesses: three shelves each side, every one wiped. 10 minutes.

Carpet vacuumed: full floor, edges, under the radiator. The radiator had a fine layer of dust between the fins — cleaned with a radiator brush. Skirting boards wiped. Picture rail: the top ledge wiped along its full length. Curtain pole dusted. Light switch, door handle. 15 minutes for the rest of the room.

Bathroom. The converted cupboard. About 3.5 sqm — enough for a bath (a short bath, not standard length), a pedestal basin, and a close-coupled toilet arranged in an L-shape that required a certain physical commitment to clean. The bath was against one wall, the toilet in the corner at the foot of the bath, the basin between them. The door opened inward and rested against the basin when fully open, which meant cleaning with the door half-closed and working in a space where every surface was within arm's reach without moving your feet.

The bath: a short acrylic tub, about 1500mm. The waterline was moderate — 16 months of two nurses' post-shift baths. Descaler along the full length, 10-minute dwell. One pass: clean. No shower — the bath had taps only, no mixer, no shower head. The tenants had been using a rubber push-on shower attachment (now removed). The tap spouts had limescale around each opening and on the hot tap handle. Descaler, dwell, cotton buds. Basin: pedestal, descaled. Behind the pedestal: dusted and wiped — the gap between the pedestal and the wall was about 3 inches, cleaned by reaching an arm behind and working blind with a damp cloth. We do this in every conversion bathroom and it never gets more elegant.

Toilet: inside the bowl, a calcium band below the waterline — moderate, 16 months of London water at ~250 ppm. Descaler, 10-minute dwell, one pass. Under the rim: scrubbed with a bent-handle brush. Around the base: the toilet sat tight against the bath on one side and the wall on the other — a microfibre cloth on a flat hand, worked into the gap between the toilet base and the bath panel. Behind the cistern: wiped.

The ceiling: a mould spot in the corner above the toilet, directly beneath the external wall of the floor above. About the size of a saucer. Anti-mould spray, 10-minute dwell. The surface mould lifted. The staining beneath was in the paint — a grey shadow that wouldn't shift. Documented. The window: a small frosted casement, single-glazed. Mould on the bottom of the frame — the condensation collection point. Treated with anti-mould spray. The surface mould came off. The paint beneath had started to peel where the damp had been persistent. Documented as requiring maintenance.

Tiles: half-height, white ceramic. Wiped. Grout: mostly clean, a few dark spots in the corners — anti-mould spray, treated. Sealant around the bath: yellowed but intact, no gaps. Cleaned the surface. Floor — vinyl — mopped. No heated towel rail, no extractor fan (the only ventilation was the frosted window). 25 minutes for a bathroom the size of a generous wardrobe. Every minute earned.

Two bedrooms. The front bedroom (the larger one, overlooking the street): carpeted, vacuumed. A sash window — single, not a bay. 2-over-2 panes, cleaned, runner vacuumed. A built-in cupboard in the alcove: wiped inside. The wall above the bed position had a slight darkening where the headboard had touched the paint — not a rub mark, more a difference in exposure where the paint behind the headboard hadn't been exposed to light. Documented. Radiator, skirting, light switch. 14 minutes.

The rear bedroom (smaller, overlooking the back addition roofs): carpeted, vacuumed. A single casement window — UPVC replacement, not original sash. Cleaned quickly. The window frame had condensation mould on the bottom corners — anti-mould spray, treated, paint staining beneath documented. No wardrobe — a curtained alcove with a rail. The curtain had been removed by the tenants; the rail wiped, the alcove interior wiped. 12 minutes.

Hallway. A short, narrow internal hallway connecting the bedrooms, the living room, the kitchen, and the bathroom. Carpeted — vacuumed. The internal front door (the flat's entrance): wiped inside. Coat hooks on the wall: wiped. The fuse box: opened, dusted. A smoke alarm in the hallway ceiling: wiped, checked (green LED flashing, working). 5 minutes.

By now the freezer had defrosted. Back to the kitchen: the ice block had melted into a pool of water contained (mostly) by the towels. Mopped up, the compartment wiped, the drainage channel cleared. The walls of the compartment had a thin layer of ice residue — wiped clean. Interior dry. 8 minutes.

Total time: 3 hours. Two people. A 2-bed first-floor conversion — not large, not premium, not complicated. The time went on the oven (35 minutes), the kitchen walls (the zero-extraction grease film added 10 minutes that wouldn't exist in a ventilated kitchen), the bay-window sash (15 minutes), the bathroom (25 minutes in a space where spatial awareness and flexibility mattered more than products), and the freezer defrost (running concurrently, dealt with in three check-ins). A modern 2-bed flat of the same floor area with an integrated oven and a proper extractor would have taken 2 hours. The Victorian conversion's quirks — the sash windows, the sealed fireplace, the cupboard bathroom, the extraction-free kitchen — added the third hour.

The landlord arrived on Tuesday morning. He was a man in his sixties who'd owned the house for 22 years, converted it himself in the early 2000s, and managed all three flats directly. He'd done this checkout dozens of times. He arrived at 10am, parked on a single yellow (it was Tuesday — the restrictions on Chichele Road are Mon, Wed, Fri on that section), and came up the stairs with his phone and a small plastic folder containing the tenancy agreement and his own check-in photos from 16 months ago.

He went room by room. Kitchen: opened the oven (phone torch, angled into the cavity from below — he'd been doing this long enough to know where the grease hides). Checked the hob. He saw the turmeric tint on the enamel. 'That's not coming off, is it?' We confirmed: the enamel had absorbed the spice pigment through repeated contact. He nodded. 'I'll note it but I'm not charging for it — it'll go when I replace the cooker next year.' He opened the freezer (now ice-free and clean), checked under the sink, looked at the walls around the hob. 'You degreased the walls.' It wasn't a question — it was a statement from someone who'd seen enough end-of-tenancy cleans to know when the walls had been done and when they hadn't. He appreciated it.

Bathroom: went straight to the ceiling mould. Looked at it, looked at the window frame, and said what every experienced Cricklewood landlord says about conversion bathrooms with no extraction: 'That's the building. I've been meaning to put a fan in since 2019.' The sealant: accepted. The grout: fine. He flushed the toilet and watched the bowl. Clean.

Living room: checked the bay sash (he opened one, closed it, checked the runner — this was his conversion, he knew how the sashes should move). Fireplace tiles: looked at them without touching. Satisfied. He glanced at the carpet — no concerns.

Bedrooms: opened the cupboard, checked the window in the rear bedroom, looked at the condensation mould on the frame. 'Same story as the bathroom — no extraction, no trickle vent. I need to sort the ventilation in this flat.' He said this out loud, to us, as if we were witnesses to a resolution he'd been deferring for years. Maybe we were.

He spent 15 minutes. His verdict: 'Clean. I'll paint the bathroom ceiling before the next lot. And maybe finally put that fan in.' He wrote 'property returned in clean condition — no deductions' on the back of an envelope, photographed it with his phone, and texted the photograph to both tenants. That was the checkout documentation.

Deposit returned via the DPS within 7 days. No deductions. The tenants had already started their new shifts at the Royal Free from their new flat in Kilburn — ten minutes closer to the hospital, five minutes further from anything you'd call a garden, and £200/month more expensive. The NW2-to-NW6 move that half of Cricklewood's departing young professionals seem to make: trading space for proximity, upgrading the postcode at the expense of the square footage.

That's Cricklewood. A flat in a converted terrace where the kitchen has no extraction, the bathroom was once a cupboard, the freezer was a solid block of ice, and the landlord has been meaning to install a ventilation fan since 2019. The cleaning cost £209 and took 3 hours. The deposit was £1,731 (five weeks at £1,500/month). The maths doesn't need explaining. What does need explaining — and what our documentation provided — is the distinction between what was cleaning (the oven, the grease film, the limescale, the surface mould) and what was building (the absent extraction, the condensation, the peeling paint, the ventilation that never arrived). That distinction is what got the deposit back in full. Not the oven. Not the sash windows. The documentation. In Cricklewood's rental market, where some tenants get charged for conditions that exist before they arrive and persist after they leave, that distinction is the service.