Cleaning rental houses during Tet holiday to earn millions every day

Having just hung up after constantly answering phone calls and Facebook messages, Mr. Trong, an employee at a domestic help center in Thanh Xuan (Hanoi), lamented that it has been difficult to find workers for the past few days despite the constant stream of orders.

"Normally, whenever a customer signs up to find an hourly maid, they can post on Facebook for just half an hour and find someone, but these past few days, we've waited half a day and still haven't found anyone, mostly because most of the students have gone back to their hometowns.The middle-aged maids also returned to their hometowns on the 26th of the lunar month because they live far away and want to prepare early for Tet.", Mr. Trong explained.

Therefore, domestic workers who are willing to return home late or stay all Tet to work are paid very well. According to him, the hourly rate for domestic workers, which can include cooking, cleaning, tidying up... is only about 40,000-50,000 VND on normal days, but on days close to Tet (from the 23rd onwards), it increases to 60,000-70,000 VND. "On the 27th and 28th of Tet alone, many homeowners have to pay 80,000 VND, even 90,000 VND (for families with multi-storey houses or far from the city center), to find someone to work," he said.

Ms. Hang (from Yen Phong, Bac Ninh) is one of thePeople who accept to stay in Hanoi to work extra days at the end of the year to increase their income. Ms. Hang boasted that if she took advantage of the "show", working all afternoon and a little later in the afternoon like on the 27th of Tet, she could earn more than 900,000. "In the morning, I cleaned 3 houses in the same apartment building, from 7:30 to 12:30 and finished, they paid 70,000 VND an hour. In the afternoon, I took on a house in Minh Khai, it took me more than 4 hours to clean, I was paid 90,000 VND an hour because their house had many floors and a lot of furniture," Ms. Hang said.

According to Ms. Thuy (Lang Street, Hanoi), who used to hire hourly helpers through an app that negotiates prices between the two parties, she had to continuously increase the price to get someone to work near Tet. "On normal days, I just need to send information to the app, the price is around 50,000 VND per hour. But last Sunday, I waited forever without being able to connect until the price increased to 70,000 VND before a student agreed to work," Ms. Thuy said.

A representative of a maid search center on Cau Giay Street (Hanoi) also said that these days there are very few people working, so if there is a need, customers need to proactively book early so that the centers can find and coordinate in time. "But even if they pay a high price, by the afternoon of the 30th of Tet, most people will have gone home, especially students - the key human resource for hourly maid services today - who will definitely not stay," he said.

Therefore, if there is a need to hire a maid during Tet (from the 1st to the 5th), according to brokerage centers, customers must accept a high price, about 600,000 - 700,000 VND per day. Thus, if hiring for all 10 days of Tet, from December 27 to the 5th, the total price is also 6-7 million VND.

"If you book too late, the price may increase a bit. Or if you only rent for 3 days instead of from the 30th to the 5th, you still have to pay for all days because the maid will not be able to return home for the whole Tet holiday anyway," said the owner of a maid center.