Residential cleaning franchise: Molly Maid, Merry Maids, Two Maids, MaidPro and The Cleaning Authority compared

How does a residential cleaning franchise work?

A residential cleaning franchise sells you the right to run a house cleaning company under its name, in a territory it defines, using its training, pricing, software and marketing. You hire the cleaners, lease the office, buy the vehicles and find the clients. The franchisor takes an upfront fee and then a share of every dollar you bill, usually for a ten-year term.

All five brands compared here run a team model. The owner is a manager and seller, not a cleaner. A typical week is hiring, scheduling two-person crews, quoting in-home estimates, chasing reviews and checking quality. That is why the investment is six figures: you are funding an office, a few vehicles, insurance and three months of payroll before the business pays for itself.

Where the brands differ is not the cleaning. It is the fee structure, the territory size, what the royalty buys and who owns the franchisor:

• Molly Maid is sold through Neighborly, a group of home service brands, and posts a licensing fee that slides with sales (Molly Maid investment page).
• Merry Maids posts a full Item 7 table on its site, line by line, which makes it the easiest brand to budget from (Merry Maids investment page).
• Two Maids positions itself as a lower-cost entry with in-house financing (Two Maids investment page).
• MaidPro sells in the US and Canada and posts both currencies (MaidPro cost page).
• The Cleaning Authority is the only one of the five that posts its royalty and brand fund as plain percentages (The Cleaning Authority investment page).

If you want the general mechanics of royalties, the disclosure document and a 5-year franchise versus independent example, read our guide to cleaning business franchises first. This page goes brand by brand.

Which home cleaning franchise opportunities are open, and what do they cost?

All five brands were selling territories when we checked on October 28, 2026. Posted franchise fees run from $45,000 to $59,950 and total initial investments from $93,440 to $203,950. Every number below comes from the franchisor’s own site; where a brand does not post a figure, the cell says so.

Three things to notice before you rank them by price:

• The cheapest fee is not the cheapest franchise. MaidPro has the lowest fee, but Two Maids has the lowest total investment at the bottom of its range. The total is what you have to fund.
• Three brands post no royalty at all. Merry Maids, Two Maids and MaidPro leave the percentage to the disclosure document. You will not know the real cost of the brand until you have Item 6 in hand.
• The ranges are wide for a reason. Molly Maid’s high end is $59,800 above its low end. Territory size, rent, how many vehicles you start with and how fast you hire move the number. Budget for the top of the range, not the bottom.

What is inside the total investment, line by line?

The franchise fee is usually only a third to a half of the total. The rest is training travel, an office, software, supplies, insurance, professional fees and three months of operating cash. Merry Maids posts its full Item 7 table on its franchise site, so it is the best public example of where the money goes (Merry Maids investment page):

Read it the way a lender would:

• The fee is 33% to 43% of the total. Everything else is a cost an independent maid service also faces, in some form.
• Working capital is the second biggest line. The federal rule requires Item 7 to include additional funds for an initial period, and the table does not include your own salary. Three months of payroll for crews you are still filling with clients comes from this line, and when it runs out, from your savings.
• Software is a line you pay again every month. The $1,700 to $4,400 is the setup. Item 6 lists the recurring technology fee.
• Professional fees are not optional. $5,000 to $15,000 for a franchise lawyer and an accountant to review the disclosure document and the agreement is money well spent on a ten-year contract.

For the independent version of this table (an LLC filing, insurance, supplies and software, usually a few thousand dollars), see how to start a cleaning business.

What do the royalties cost once you are open?

Posted ongoing fees run from 3% to 8% of gross sales. Molly Maid posts a licensing fee of 3% to 6.5% of annual gross sales (Molly Maid), and The Cleaning Authority posts a 6% royalty plus a 2% national brand fund (The Cleaning Authority). The other three brands leave the figure to the disclosure document.

Percentages hide the size of the bill, so here is a hypothetical example. Suppose your franchise bills $30,000 a month, which is roughly 150 cleans at $200. The royalty is charged on that revenue, not on your profit:

The ten-year column assumes flat revenue, which is unrealistic in both directions: a growing business pays more, and a brand with a sliding scale charges a lower rate as sales climb. The point is the order of magnitude. At this revenue, the royalty is the cost of a full-time office manager, every year.

Ask for these in Item 6 before you compare brands on the royalty alone:

• The base. Gross sales usually means every dollar billed, before refunds, discounts and payment processing.
• Minimums. Some agreements set a minimum monthly royalty, so a slow month still costs the full amount.
• Technology, call center and brand fund fees on top of the royalty, and whether any of them can rise during the term.
• Renewal and transfer fees for when you renew at year ten or sell the territory.

What do the earnings figures on franchise websites really mean?

They are Item 19 financial performance representations, and they are nearly always gross sales for a selected group, not the profit of a typical new owner. Merry Maids, for example, shows $1,261,533 average gross sales for the top quartile of single-unit groups, based on the 12 months ending December 31, 2022 as stated in its 2023 FDD (Merry Maids investment page). That is real, audited-adjacent data, and it tells you very little about year one in your town.

The federal Franchise Rule sets the ground rules. Under 16 CFR 436.5(s), a franchisor may make a financial performance representation only if it has a reasonable basis and written substantiation at the time it is made, and the representation must be stated in Item 19 of the disclosure document. A franchisor that makes none must say in Item 19 that it does not make any representations about a franchisee’s future financial performance or the past performance of company-owned or franchised outlets (16 CFR 436.5). The rule also allows different figures to be given only in two cases: the actual records of an existing outlet you are considering buying, or a supplement to Item 19 about a particular location or circumstances.

So when a brand site shows a big average, ask the franchisor for the rest of Item 19 and look for:

• The group. Top quartile, top third, or all outlets? How many outlets were counted and how many were excluded?
• The age of the outlets. A ten-year-old territory with 1,000 recurring clients is not a benchmark for your first year.
• Revenue versus profit. Gross sales before wages, royalties, vehicles, insurance and your own pay. A maid service running 40% labor and 8% fees keeps far less than the headline.
• The median and the bottom quartile. If the franchisor will not show them, call owners from Item 20 and ask.

Put the figure through the cleaning business profit calculator with your local wages, then subtract the royalty and brand fund at the brand’s rates. What is left is the number to compare with the salary you are giving up.

How do you qualify, and how long does it take to open?

You need the liquid capital the brand posts, a net worth it will check, and the patience for a process that takes months: inquiry, discovery calls, the disclosure document, a 14-day waiting period, a visit to headquarters, signing, training and a launch. Most residential brands expect you to open within a few months of signing.

The capital test

• Molly Maid: at least $60,000 liquid and a $250,000 minimum net worth.
• Merry Maids: about $50,000 in cash for the initial investment.
• Two Maids: $51,000 required liquid capital, with in-house financing of up to $32,000 for qualified candidates.
• MaidPro: $45,000 US or $55,000 CAD minimum liquid cash.
• The Cleaning Authority: not posted; ask during the discovery process.

Liquid means cash or assets you can sell quickly, not home equity. Brands accept SBA loans, retirement rollovers (ROBS) and home equity lines for the balance, and Two Maids mentions 401(k) funding on its site. Each of those has tax or risk consequences, so talk to an accountant before you touch retirement money.

The 14-day clock

Under 16 CFR 436, the franchisor must give you its current disclosure document at least 14 calendar days before you sign a binding agreement or make any payment (16 CFR Part 436). Use the time to call franchisees from Item 20 and to have a franchise lawyer read Items 5, 6, 7, 12, 17 and 19 with you.

Discounts

Molly Maid posts 20% off the initial franchise fee for qualifying veterans through VetFran. Merry Maids posts 20% off for military veterans and 10% off for minorities and women. The Cleaning Authority posts 30% off the franchise fee for qualifying veterans through VetFran and a $5,000 diversity discount for minority-, women- and LGBTQ+-owned businesses. Ask every brand; discounts usually apply to the fee, rarely to the royalty.

Should you buy a house cleaning franchise or build an independent maid service?

Buy the franchise if you want to skip two years of figuring out hiring, pricing and sales, and you can afford $93,440 to $203,950 plus 3% to 8% of revenue for ten years. Build independently if you already know the trade or have a referral network, want to start with a few thousand dollars, and would rather spend the royalty on your own marketing.

Here is what the franchise fee and royalty actually buy, and what the independent equivalent costs:

We make Broombook, so the limit is worth stating: software replaces the systems a franchisor provides, not the brand, the territory or the person who answers when you have a hiring crisis. Those are the real reasons people pay the fee. If you need QuickBooks sync, a native app-store app or one system for several trades, Broombook is not the right tool; see the software comparison for others.

A third route sits between the two: buying an existing maid service, franchised or independent, with clients and crews already in place. Our guide to buying a cleaning business covers valuation and due diligence.

Which residential cleaning franchise fits which owner?

Based only on what the brands post, the fit comes down to how much cash you have, whether you want a sliding royalty, and whether you are in Canada. None of this is a recommendation; the disclosure documents and the owners you call decide it.

• Least cash to open: Two Maids, with a $93,440 low end, $51,000 liquid requirement and up to $32,000 of in-house financing.
• Lowest posted fee: MaidPro at $45,000, and the only one of the five posting Canadian figures.
• Most transparent fee structure: The Cleaning Authority, which posts the royalty and brand fund, and Merry Maids, which posts the whole Item 7 table.
• Sliding royalty as you grow: Molly Maid’s 3% to 6.5% band. Ask which sales levels trigger each rate.
• Part of a larger home-services group: Molly Maid through Neighborly, which matters if you plan to add a second brand later.

Whichever brand you shortlist, request the FDD from at least two of them. Reading two side by side shows you what is standard and what is one brand’s choice. Then call five current and five former owners from each Item 20 list, including ones the franchisor did not suggest. This is general information, not legal or financial advice; a franchise lawyer and an accountant should review any agreement before you sign.