Much of what we clean in Hudson County is inside a building rather than a house, and a good share of the Bergen work is in the condominium towers along the river. Apartment jobs are routine. When one goes badly, the cause is rarely the carpet. It is a building requirement that nobody mentioned until the technician arrived.
Our list of what to move before a visit is written for a house. This article covers what changes in a building: stairs, elevators, insurance certificates, parking and the apartment below yours.
Four things to tell us when you book
- The floor, and whether there is an elevator. Walk-ups are routine and the equipment is carried up by hand. A third floor with a turn at the landing adds setup time and nothing else.
- Whether the building requires anything from us: a certificate of insurance, a reserved service elevator, a form signed at the front desk, or set working hours. Give us the building name and we arrange it with management in advance.
- Where we can park, and how far that is from your door. In the dense towns this is where most of the extra time goes.
- Any deadline: a tenant arriving in the afternoon, an inspection, or a walkthrough with the landlord. Told at booking, a deadline sets the room order and tells us whether to bring air movers.
Walk-ups are routine, so tell us the floor
In Hoboken and downtown Jersey City the walk-up is usually an older brownstone or a converted house, with a narrow, steep, straight staircase. Newark, Paterson and Elizabeth have the same pattern in the multi-family houses, where the second and third floor apartments sit above a single interior stair.
The machine is a portable extractor. It is carried up the stairs, set up inside your apartment, and the hose and wand run from there across your own floor. Nothing is left standing in the stairwell. The floor number matters more than the street address, because carrying the equipment up takes time and we build that into the appointment. A fourth floor walk-up is a longer setup and still a routine job.
Certificates of insurance and building paperwork
Many buildings will not let a contractor past the desk without a certificate of insurance naming the building or the management company, and some require it several days ahead. Some also require the service elevator reserved for a set window, or work restricted to weekday hours.
All of that is ordinary. We carry liability insurance and provide the certificate on request, so tell us the building when you book and we arrange it with management directly. Hearing about it from the front desk on the morning of the visit is what costs you the appointment, because the paperwork takes the same few days either way.
Towers with a service elevator and set hours
Along the Hudson at Fort Lee, Edgewater and Cliffside Park, and on the Jersey City and Weehawken waterfront at Newport, Exchange Place and Port Imperial, most high-rise buildings run on the same pattern: a service elevator that has to be booked, hours the building permits work in, and a loading dock or rear entrance that everything comes through.
Those appointments are scheduled around the building rules, so give us the building and the floor when you book.
| Your building | What we need to know | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Walk-up with no elevator | Floor number, and whether the stair turns at the landing | Carrying time, so the appointment is sized correctly |
| Elevator building with no rules for contractors | Floor and apartment number | Very little |
| Building that requires a certificate of insurance | Building name and the management office | A few days of lead time before the date can be confirmed |
| Tower with a reserved service elevator | Building, floor, and the hours the building allows | The appointment is booked inside the building window |
| Loading dock or rear entrance only | Where we should pull in | The route in and the setup time |
| Move-out with a hard handover time | The deadline | Air movers are brought and the room order changes |
Parking and the route in
Hudson is the most densely populated county in New Jersey, and in Hoboken, Union City and West New York a legal space near your door is not guaranteed. Tell us about a driveway, a permit space, a visitor bay in the garage, or a loading zone that can be used at certain hours. Parking is often the largest variable in how long the visit takes.
If there is nothing, tell us that as well. We plan for a longer carry and size the appointment for it.
Noise and the neighbors
This comes up often in converted buildings with old, thin floors. The extractor sounds like a vacuum. It runs while a room is being cleaned and is off in between. There is no drilling and no hammering, and the machine runs only for the part of the visit that cleans.
If the building has quiet hours, we work inside them. If somebody below you works nights, tell us and we start at the far end of the apartment and finish over their side. We use the shared hallway twice, carrying the equipment in at the start and out at the end. The rest of the visit happens inside your apartment.
Furniture in a small apartment
In an apartment the furniture is usually against every wall because there is nowhere else for it. We move what two people can safely lift, clean underneath, and put it back with protective tabs under the feet so nothing marks the damp pile. Beds, large dressers and anything holding electronics or glass are better cleared before we arrive, which in a small unit means the next room rather than the other side of the same one. Tell us at the start which pieces to leave in place.
Drying in a small apartment
Carpet is dry within hours in warm weather and takes longer in winter. A fabric sofa usually takes four to eight hours. In a studio or a one bedroom there is nowhere to wait out the drying, so the order the rooms are cleaned in matters more than the total time.
Tell us which room you need back first and we work toward it. The bedroom first if you are sleeping there that night, the living room last. If the whole apartment has to be usable that evening, say so when you book and we bring air movers, which shortens the drying time.
Move-outs and rental turnovers
A move-out clean comes with a fixed deadline and usually a key handover or an inspection behind it. An empty unit is the simplest version of an apartment job, since there is no furniture to move and the air moves freely. The building requirements are the same, and the elevator reservation is the item most often forgotten on a moving day, when the elevator is already booked for the truck.
If the unit is already cleared when you book, tell us. It shortens the visit and makes a same-day handover easier to schedule.
Send a photograph of the worst patch
Old pet urine, a bleach mark near a radiator and a traffic lane a shade darker than the carpet on either side all look like stains from across the room. The outcomes differ. A bleach mark does not come out, because the fiber has lost its own color. Send a photograph with your inquiry and we give you the answer before anything is booked.
When to call us
If you are in an apartment, a walk-up or a condominium anywhere in North Jersey and Central Jersey and the carpet, the stairs or the sofa needs cleaning, call (908) 545-9387 with your floor and your building. Carpet work is on the <a href="Carpet cleaning">carpet cleaning page</a> and sofas and chairs on the <a href="Sofa and upholstery cleaning">upholstery cleaning page</a>. For what buildings in each area tend to ask for, see <a href="Hudson County">Hudson County</a> and <a href="Bergen County">Bergen County</a>.
All services are performed at your home or business. Everything is cleaned inside the apartment, including area rugs and the floor beneath them. We book at any hour, which makes a building's permitted work window easy to fit. There is more on preparation in the <a href="What to move before the cleaner arrives: a ten-minute list">ten minute list</a> and more on drying in <a href="How long carpet really takes to dry after a professional clean">how long carpet takes to dry</a>.
