What should a new Louisiana house cleaner know first?
Three things. Secretary of State fees went up on October 1, 2026. Sales tax depends on what you clean, not who you clean for: a home is untaxed, a sofa or a rug is taxed. And local occupational licenses, run by parishes and cities, are the license most cleaners actually need.
This guide covers what is specific to Louisiana. For the parts that are the same in every state, such as choosing services and buying supplies, read our general guide on how to start a cleaning business. For the federal registrations every new business deals with, see what licenses are needed to start a cleaning business.
| Step | Where | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Form an LLC, or register a trade name (optional for sole proprietors) | Louisiana Secretary of State, online through geauxBIZ | $125 (LLC) or $95 (trade name) |
| Occupational license | Your parish or city, for example New Orleans Bureau of Revenue or Baton Rouge Finance Department | From about $25 to $50 to start, then based on gross receipts |
| Sales tax registration, only if you clean carpets, rugs, furniture or linens | Louisiana Department of Revenue and your parish collector | 5% state tax plus local tax, collected from clients |
| When you hire: workers’ comp, unemployment account, new-hire reports | Private insurer, Louisiana Workforce Commission | Premiums, your industry’s average UI rate, no fee to report |
Choosing a name? The cleaning business name generator gives you options to check against the Secretary of State’s records before you pay any filing fee.
Louisiana LLC or trade name: what the Secretary of State charges now
An LLC now costs $125 to form and $35 a year to keep. A trade name registration costs $95 and lasts ten years. Both went up on October 1, 2026, so older articles and templates quoting $100 and $30 are out of date.
The October 2026 fee increase
The Secretary of State’s fee schedule effective October 1, 2026 raised Commercial Division fees under Act 921 of the 2026 Regular Session. For a small cleaning company, the lines that matter are:
- Articles of Organization for a Louisiana LLC: $125.
- Annual report: $35.
- Trade name, trademark or service mark registration: $95.
- Name reservation: $25.
- Credit card payments: an added $5 statutory convenience fee.
Keeping the LLC alive
Louisiana’s LLC law, R.S. 12:1308.1, requires an annual report on or before the anniversary of the date the LLC was organized, listing the registered office, registered agent and members or managers. So an LLC formed on March 12 reports by March 12 every year after. The Secretary of State’s business filings FAQ says that if you get a notice of intent to revoke, you have 30 days to file the report or your charter is revoked. The same FAQ says every registration needs a registered agent with a physical Louisiana address, and that the Secretary of State does not issue business licenses.
Trade names
A trade name registration protects a name like “Bayou Bright Cleaning” on the state’s records. The FAQ says the applicant can be a person, corporation, LLC or partnership, so a sole proprietor can register one. Under R.S. 51:216, the registration lasts ten years and can be renewed for another ten in the six months before it expires. At $95 for a decade, it is one of the cheaper ways to stake out a brand, though forming an LLC protects the LLC’s own name as well.
An LLC keeps business debts away from your house and car. It won’t pay for a scratched hardwood floor; liability insurance does that. If you are unsure whether you need the LLC at all, our LLC guide for cleaning businesses lays out when it helps.
Is house cleaning taxable in Louisiana?
No, but some cleaning is. Louisiana taxes only the services its law lists, and cleaning a home isn’t one of them. Cleaning carpets, rugs, furniture and linens is, so the answer changes the moment you add upholstery shampooing or laundry to your menu.
The list that decides it
The Department of Revenue’s page on which services are subject to sales tax names about ten categories, such as sleeping rooms, admissions, parking, printing, repairs to tangible personal property, telecommunications and, since 2025, software access and information services. One category is “laundry, cleaning, pressing, alteration, repair and dyeing services”.
The statute behind it, R.S. 47:301.3, says the tax levied by any taxing authority applies to the listed services, and it defines that cleaning category as including “the cleaning and renovation of clothing, furs, linens, furniture, carpets, and rugs”. Those are things you clean, not buildings. Dusting, mopping, scrubbing a bathroom and wiping down a kitchen are not on the list, at the state or the parish level.
Where cleaners get caught
- Upholstery and rug cleaning. Shampooing a sofa or an area rug falls in the taxable category. So does carpet cleaning, since carpets are named.
- Linens for short-term rentals. If you wash and fold sheets and towels for an Airbnb host as a separate service, that is laundering linens.
- Bundled prices. If one flat price covers a house clean and a rug shampoo, ask your accountant how to split it. Listing the taxable work on its own line makes the tax easy to see.
Rates and registration if you do taxable work
The state rate is 5% since January 1, 2025, up from 4.45%, and the Department of Revenue’s rate page marks it as temporary through December 31, 2029. Parishes and cities add their own local sales taxes, which you report to the local collectors. The Department’s free Parish E-File service lets you file state and local returns in one place instead of on paper in every parish. Its general sales tax page says anyone furnishing taxable services is a dealer who needs a sales tax certificate. If you only clean homes, you can skip all of this and keep your prices simple.
If you also take jobs across the line, read our Texas and Mississippi guides. Each state draws its own line between taxable and untaxed services, so a clean that is untaxed in Slidell may not be untaxed next door.
Do New Orleans and Baton Rouge make cleaners buy an occupational license?
Yes. In Louisiana the business license is local: parishes and cities charge an annual occupational license tax, usually tied to your gross receipts. New Orleans starts at $50 a year for small businesses. East Baton Rouge Parish wants the license a month before you open.
New Orleans
The Bureau of Revenue’s occupational license tax tables set the license by gross sales. Table 1, for retail dealers in merchandise, services and rentals, starts at $50 a year for gross sales under $50,000, then $60 up to $75,000, $90 up to $100,000 and $120 up to $150,000. The table cites state law (R.S. 47:354) and City Code Chapter 150. The Bureau decides which table fits your business when you apply, so confirm it then. The city’s renewal page says occupational licenses expire every December 31 and are renewed through the Bureau of Revenue, online or in person.
Baton Rouge and East Baton Rouge Parish
The city-parish occupational license tax page says businesses located in East Baton Rouge Parish need the license and that new businesses must get it one month before opening. The first license costs $50 if you open between January 1 and June 30, or $25 from July 1 to December 31. Renewals are due January 1 and delinquent after March 1, with a penalty of 5% for each 30 days late (up to 25%) and 15% a year interest.
Elsewhere in Louisiana
Outside these two, call the parish or city tax office where your business is based and ask what it levies and when. Ask too whether you need a license in other parishes you clean in, and check home-occupation zoning if you will run the business from home.
Workers’ comp in Louisiana starts with the first employee
Louisiana requires workers’ comp even if you have one employee, and that includes part-time, temporary and seasonal help. Only a business owned by one person with nobody else working for it is exempt.
The Louisiana Workforce Commission’s employer coverage FAQ spells out the narrow exemption: a business owned by one individual, with no employees of any kind (leased, borrowed, part-time), no unpaid volunteers including family, no subcontractors, and not a corporation. Bring on a cousin to help with Saturday move-outs and the exemption is gone.
Two other rules on the same page matter for cleaning companies:
- You can’t pass the cost to workers. Employers may not withhold workers’ comp premiums from pay, and that includes workers misclassified as independent contractors. Violations can bring civil and criminal penalties.
- Fines add up fast. Up to $250 per employee for a first violation and $500 per employee after that, up to $10,000.
For general liability, bonds and commercial auto, see our guide to cleaning business insurance. A janitorial bond is worth a look if clients will give you keys or alarm codes.
Paying and reporting Louisiana cleaners
Pay at least the federal $7.25 an hour, open an unemployment insurance account with the Workforce Commission, and report every new hire within 20 days.
No state minimum wage
The U.S. Department of Labor’s state minimum wage table lists Louisiana as having no state minimum wage law, so employers covered by the federal Fair Labor Standards Act pay $7.25 an hour, with overtime at time and a half over 40 hours. In practice you will compete with restaurants and hotels for workers, so price your cleans to pay well above the floor.
Unemployment insurance
The Workforce Commission’s employer tax FAQ says every business operating in Louisiana should apply for an employer account number so the agency can determine whether it is liable, and that a new employer’s rate is the average rate for employers in the same industry classification (NAICS code). Quarterly wage reports are due by the last day of the month after each quarter. Its 2026 rate page puts the taxable wage base at $7,000, the same as the federal unemployment (FUTA) wage base, so the yearly cost per worker stays small.
New-hire reports
Per the Commission’s new hire registry page, all employers report new hires and rehires within 20 days, with the employee’s name, address, occupation and Social Security number and your federal employer identification number.
Employee or contractor?
If your cleaners follow your schedule, your checklist and your supplies, they look like employees, whatever the paperwork says. The workers’ comp rule above makes the stakes higher in Louisiana. Our guide on contractor versus employee cleaners covers the tests, and the hiring guide covers finding and keeping good people.
What does it cost to open a cleaning company in Louisiana?
Filing fees run $95 to $125 for a name or an LLC, and a first-year occupational license in New Orleans or Baton Rouge is $25 to $50. Insurance and supplies are the bigger items.
Government fees below were checked on official Louisiana pages on October 10, 2026, after the October 1 fee change. Rows marked “estimate” are our rough ranges, not quotes.
| Cost item | Cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| LLC Articles of Organization | $125 | Optional. Add $5 if you pay by card. |
| Annual report | $35 a year | Due by the anniversary of formation. |
| Trade name registration | $95 | Optional. Ten-year term. |
| Occupational license (first year) | $25 to $50 in Baton Rouge, $50 minimum in New Orleans | Renewed every year based on gross receipts. |
| Sales tax | Only on carpet, rug, furniture or linen cleaning | 5% state plus local tax, collected from clients. |
| General liability insurance | Get quotes | Compare two or three quotes for the same limits. |
| Starter supply kit | $200 to $500 (estimate) | Less if you already own a good vacuum. |
| Booking, scheduling and payment software | Your choice | BroomBook is $29 a month for up to 2 cleaners, with a 14-day free trial. |
A lean New Orleans start as a sole proprietor could be the $50 occupational license, $200 to $500 of supplies and a first insurance payment, with no state filing fee at all if you work under your own name. Run your numbers through the cleaning business plan template to see what you need to charge.
How do you win your first Louisiana clients and keep the calendar full?
Start with people who already trust you, a free Google Business Profile naming your parishes, and a booking link so clients don’t have to call. Short-term rental hosts can be steady turnover work, as long as you keep track of which linen services are taxable.
Our guide on how to get clients for a cleaning business covers referrals, partnerships and reviews. If you want to go after rental hosts, read the Airbnb cleaning business guide too.
Running it with BroomBook
We make BroomBook, a booking, scheduling and crew app for residential cleaning businesses. How it fits Louisiana, limits included:
- Sales tax setting. Off by default. When you turn it on, you enter one rate for the whole business and it is added to each clean. It can’t tax only the upholstery add-on, so if most of your work is untaxed house cleaning, bill taxable work separately and ask your accountant how to handle it.
- Online booking with instant prices. Clients pick home size, type of clean and extras, see the price and choose an open slot. You can restrict bookings to chosen ZIP codes so you stay inside the parishes where you hold a license.
- Card on file, charged after the clean. Through your own Stripe account, with tips. BroomBook takes no cut of payments.
- Crew links and payroll export. Each cleaner gets a private link with the day’s jobs, checklists and clock in and out. Hours and tips export to CSV for your payroll service; BroomBook doesn’t calculate withholding or workers’ comp.
Plans are $29 a month on Solo (up to 2 cleaners) or $59 a month on Team (unlimited cleaners), with a 14-day free trial and no credit card. See how booking works on the cleaning booking software page. If you need QuickBooks sync, net-terms invoicing or a native app-store app, look elsewhere.