5 easy ways to free yourself from household chores

I’m all about making my life easier. Ain’t no martyring going on in my house so if there is a way I can pay someone to do the household chores I hate to do, then I will. I’d like to go down the path of how much my time is worth, compared with how much I’m paying someone to do it – coupled with the idea of how I’m helping stimulate the local economy blah blah blah. But in reality, I just freaking hate doing household chores, so I like someone else to do it. And until my children are older and I can pay them 1950s wages to do it all, I have to pay a stranger.

Here are my five favourite chores to outsource.

1. Cleaning

Cleaning has always been the source of – ahem – tension in our house. Then we got a cleaner, and that took away the arguments and expectations about whose job it was to vacuum the carpet, get the hair out of the sink or dust the fireplace. The change in the dynamic of our relationship was astounding. We used to have someone come in once a week, then once a fortnight, then once a month. It’s on hiatus at the moment until we are slightly more financial, but let me tell you, it will be the first thing that comes back when we do. Our marriage depends on it! Until then, I am pretending that I am okay living in a 19 year old’s bachelor pad.

Here are some great options for outsourcing your cleaning:

  • Absolute Domestics (I used them for a few years and had the greatest cleaner I’ve ever had, and the worst cleaner I’ve ever had. And Husby swears one of them stole his wedding ring but I think he may be just trying to cover his arse on that one. The great thing is, if you’re not happy with one, they will happily replace them for you.)
  • Housework heroes
  • James Home Services 

140421 cleaning

2. Shopping

Getting set up to have your shopping delivered can be a giant pain in the behind, but once you’ve done it a few times, the major sites remember what you’ve bought before and it’s super easy to go in and do it again. Then they bring stuff to your house. No dragging reluctant toddlers past the lolly aisle and holding the baby in one arm while you unload the trolley with the other. Fabulous!

Easy options for outsourcing your trolley work:

3. Ironing

Hahahahahahahahaha! Anyone that knows me will tell you this doesn’t apply to me because I don’t own an iron – nor any clothes that might need ironing (I do own a couple of garments that only come out of the cupboard every two months or so because that’s how long it takes to hang the wrinkles out – but I’m really okay with that arrangement). But the great thing about outsourcing ironing is that you can usually find a local advertising around your neighbourhood who will do it for not very much – some will even pick up and deliver. Turns out some people like ironing. Weirdos.

4. Organising

This is my great fantasy. That I will some day be able to pay someone to come into my house, organise everything so its own neat little place to go, and make me feel sane and balanced. These people exist. They are angels here on earth. You can find them wandering around Howard’s Storage World just for fun. And Pinterest is full of them too.

Check out these organisers for a start:

5. Child rearing

Children are cute for photos and Christmas cards but the idea we have to spend all our time with them is just abhorrent. You cannot hang with your children 24/7 and feel like a healthy, balanced individual: fact. So please, please, please get someone to watch them occasionally (once a week is my fantasy but we are closer to once a month at the moment) and just go out. Be yourself – not Mum. It’s fun, I promise!

The best option for childcare is grandparents or the staff at your childcare centre. Those gorgeous people don’t get paid nearly enough and often supplement their income by babysitting – just ask them (bonus: your kids already know them). Otherwise, try these:

* All resources listed here are in Australia. If you are overseas and have a great resource to share (or even if you’re in Australia), please tell everyone below.

Do you outsource? What tips do you have? Or, if you don’t, what chore would you most like to outsource?

 

Written By

Carolyn is the editorial director of Champagne Cartel and a freelance writer. In her spare time she is a long-distance runner, peanut butter enthusiast, and single mum to three incredible humans.

11 Comments

  • Sadly at the moment I can’t afford a cleaner but I used to have one and loved him. I get my shopping delivered each week. And my parents are great at having the kids when we want some couple time 🙂

  • The genius who developed Coles Online should be sainted. I started using them when internet access was still dial up (2001 I think I started) and haven’t wavered in my devotion. I despise grocery shopping and the option to have it delivered to my door is my idea of heaven. Currently I have a fortnightly cleaning lady who is adequate, not the best but does the job adequately. Ironing I am actually OK with doing in front of the TV. Pity there has been mostly rubbish on TV, I think I have lost a couch and a small dog under the ironing pile………..

  • So we have a cleaner and it’s the best thing EVER! My stress levels are half what they used to be – seriously I can’t live without them, once a fortnight and I’m willing to sacrifice my husband’s lunch and give him baked beans every day so we have a clean house – WORTH IT! xx

    • Hahahahaha, love that you’re willing to sacrifice the big stuff! Yeah, we need to get a new one – there is only so long I can survive in this substandard – possibly hazardous environment. And I’ll be buggered if I’m going to clean it.

  • I’ve had a cleaner almost my entire adult life – well, there was one year I didn’t – and I could not do without it. I have also recently discovered a new trick. The night before the cleaner comes, I tell the preschooler that he’d better pick up all his toys of the ground because the cleaner doesn’t know what toys are and she’ll put anything she finds on the ground in the bin. You’ve never seen a pair of legs move so fast around a living room! Alas, it only works one day a week. No ironing here. I got “ironing” as a punishment at school once – as a detention, the upside was that learned how to iron a shirt, though have never ironed one since. If I won lotto tomorrow, I’d have a housekeeper come in every morning to tidy up and prepare dinner.

  • Okay – here is my fantasy life – one day when I am older and have bags of money.
    Lovely lady who needs cash and looks like Alice from the Brady Bunch comes in 5 mornings from 9am – 12noon to make beds, unstack dishwasher, sweep breakfast crap off floor, do laundry and wipe down anything hairy or sticky. Also change binliners. And pick up shoes, footy cards and chewed pigs ears from floor of living room.
    House is cleaned weekly from top to bottom.
    I have my hair blow dried at salon twice weekly, manicure fortnightly.
    And I always drink French champagne.
    That is my fantasy life.

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