Unikum mai 2018

Text and photo: Sofie Klit
Moving out soon? Then you’re most likely also expected to be
cleaning your place soon. SiAs’ housekeeper in Kristiansand gives
you her best tips and tricks for cleaning the apartment before you
move out.
Lis Hvitstein (62) is the housekeeper for SiA in Kristiansand. She is among other things responsible for
checking the cleaning when people move out of SiAs’ student accommodation. In Kristiansand around
500 of SiAs’ student accommodations will get a new inhabitant during the summer, which makes it the
high season for students moving. SiA is known for being very thorough in their control of the cleaning on
departure. When I mention this to Hvitstein, she nods.
– As you might imagine, it’s not always fun to be strict about the cleaning. We know that it can be stressful
for students to move, but we also have to think about the next student that will be moving in. That next
person moving in shouldn’t feel like the first thing that has to be done is cleaning. But generally, the students
are good at cleaning, they really are.
Think ahead and save money
– What is your best tip for the students?
– A lot of people asks us if we have any tips for them when they move out – and we do. But the easiest
thing for them would have been to ask us back when they moved in. If you do the cleaning regularly, then
it won’t be a huge task when you’re moving out.
Hvitstein also encourages the students to go onto SiAs’ website. There you will find to do lists for both the
weekly cleaning and the cleaning on departure.
– It might not be the most exciting thing to read, but it’s useful.
One of the biggest challenges for students moving out, is that they underestimate how long it takes to
move out and clean, says Hvitstein. She recommends that you start to think about it a month before
moving out. Check your freezer, maybe it’s filled with food and you can save some money by emptying it
during the last weeks? If there’s something you don’t want to keep, should you throw it out or could it be
useful for someone else if you left it in one of SiAs’ swap rooms? Hvitstein recommends scheduling at least
an entire day for cleaning and to make time for a doublecheck at the end of the day.
– Just start from one end of the room and walk your way through it all. Often, you’ll notice that you forgot
to clean something. Course it’s not an exam, but you would still like to pass, she says and smiles.
Make time for a cup of coffee
If you live in a SiA apartment and you can’t bother with cleaning the entire place, then you have the
option of paying for cleaning on departure. Or if you’d like to save some money, you could split the cleaning
between yourself and SiA. You could clean the bedroom and the hallway yourself and then leave the
bathroom and the kitchen for the cleaning company. Course that’s what takes a long time to clean, adds
Hvitstein. Maybe your friends are moving too. Wouldn’t it be nice to have time to grab a cup of coffee
together and say goodbye, asks Hvitstein.
– How good are you at cleaning at home?
– At home I’m probably not a super cleaner. After an entire day at work where I’ve been checking the
cleaning, it’s not that exciting to clean when I get home. But for me, cleaning is about the results. And I
still want the results even though I might not always want to do the work.
you would still like to pass
mai 2018 unikum nr 5 37