End of Tenancy Cleaning in East Sheen

An Edwardian semi on Temple Sheen Road — three bedrooms, a front reception room, a rear reception room knocked through to a refitted kitchen extension with bifold doors, a family bathroom, an en-suite, a downstairs WC, an original encaustic-tiled hallway, and a 55-foot garden. The tenants — a young family with two children under seven — had been there 3 years at £3,100/month. Managed by Featherstone Leigh. Inventory checkout with an independent clerk three days later.

The hallway set the standard. Original Edwardian encaustic tiles — geometric pattern in terracotta, cream, black, and a dusty blue. A coir mat had protected the first metre, leaving a sharp line where the protected tiles met the exposed ones. We mopped the full hallway barely-damp with pH-neutral product. The colour difference evened out but a faint line remained — that's 3 years of differential wear. Documented. The stained-glass panel in the vestibule door: seven coloured panes wiped individually, no excess moisture near the leading.

The front reception room was where the period detail concentrated. A full bay window — three replacement double-glazed timber sashes, 2-over-2 panes, 12 panes across the bay. Each pane cleaned, glazing bars wiped, runners vacuumed. 18 minutes. The Art Nouveau fireplace was the centrepiece: twelve individually painted tube-lined tiles in green and cream depicting stylised flowers, original to the house, museum condition. Each tile wiped with water only — no product, because we couldn't know how the glazed surface would react. The cast-iron insert: elaborate Art Nouveau detailing, wiped dry. The timber mantel: stripped and waxed oak, barely-damp cloth. 15 minutes on the fireplace alone — a scratch on one of those tiles would be an insurance claim, not a checkout deduction.

The kitchen extension was the biggest room and the longest job. A Falcon 1092 range cooker — two oven cavities, a grill, a 5-burner hob, a warming plate. Three years of family cooking. The main oven needed a double dwell on the roof and back panel; the second oven was lighter. Total Falcon time: 50 minutes. The Carrara marble worktops — honed white with grey veining — were cleaned with pH-neutral only. We found three pre-existing etch marks (lemon, wine, and a hot pan without a trivet) and documented each one. The Belfast sink had 3 years of tea staining — three passes with non-abrasive cream cleaner brought it to 90%, with a shadow remaining in the bottom corners documented as ceramic-pore staining. The bifold door tracks had 3 years of garden debris packed into the runner. The roof lantern was cleaned to reachable height, with upper sections documented as inaccessible without scaffolding. Kitchen-diner total: 60 minutes.

The bathrooms were straightforward by East Sheen standards. The family bathroom had a freestanding composite-stone bath (cleaned all the way around, pH-neutral per the landlord's fitting notes), a walk-in rainfall shower with three glass surfaces, and wall-hung fixtures checked underneath. The en-suite was a smaller shower room. The downstairs WC had encaustic tiles matching the hallway. Three bathrooms combined: about 58 minutes.

The sash windows across the whole house — bay plus individual windows in three bedrooms — took about 55 minutes total. The second bedroom had a juice stain on the carpet (spot-treated, lightened but not fully removed, documented). The third bedroom had height-chart sticker adhesive on the window frame — scraped and cleaned in stages, frame clean, no paint damage. A boot-scraper set into the front path — a detail so Edwardian it might as well be wearing a straw boater — was cleaned around.

Total time: 5.5 hours. The Falcon, the sash windows, and the Art Nouveau fireplace were the three biggest items. Each detail is small individually; collectively they're the difference between a 3.5-hour modern-house clean and a 5.5-hour Edwardian-house clean.

The Featherstone Leigh clerk worked from a 12-page schedule. Hallway: encaustic tiles examined at floor level, mat-line differential accepted as normal. Front reception: each fireplace tile torch-tested individually — no new damage. Kitchen: Falcon cavities torched, marble etch marks checked against the check-in photos (not present at start — noted for landlord negotiation), Belfast sink shadow noted as ceramic staining, bifold tracks finger-tested. Bathrooms: freestanding bath checked behind, shower glass angle-tested. Bedrooms: juice stain noted, height-chart adhesive confirmed removed.

Deposit negotiations concluded within 14 days. The marble etching was accepted as wear (the AST had no marble-care clause — a gap the landlord acknowledged). The juice stain: £35 deducted for a carpet spot-clean. Deposit returned minus £35. The marble etch marks and the juice stain were life in a house with children — our documentation distinguished those from cleaning failures, and the deposit outcome reflected it.