End of tenancy cleaning in Woolwich Dockyard

On a Mast Quay handover the clerk does not glance round the flat. They prop the move-in report on a tablet, lift a daylight lamp flat against the wet-room glass, and look for the milky bloom the hard water leaves on the screen and the chrome. That low-angle light is the standard your end-of-tenancy clean on the old Woolwich dockyard has to clear. I founded Monster Cleaning Ltd (Companies House 9919639) and we have cleaned rented homes across SE18 since 2014, to the line the check-out report is marked against rather than a domestic wipe-round. By the hour it is £30 per cleaner, with a 48-hour re-clean guarantee on every job. Ring 0333 555 2076 for a fixed price.

Last updated June 2026. We cover the riverside blocks on the former Woolwich Dockyard and the streets around Woolwich Dockyard station in SE18, west of Woolwich town centre. This page sits inside the borough directory at End of Tenancy Cleaning Greenwich.

New flats on a 500-year-old dockyard

Henry VIII founded a naval dockyard here in 1512 and it built warships for the Crown until 1869. What is left of it sits between Woolwich Church Street and the Thames, west of the town centre and well to the west of the much larger Royal Arsenal Riverside development that Berkeley has been building on the other side of Woolwich. Mixing the two up is the easiest mistake to make about this stretch of SE18, and it matters, because the stock is different and so is the clean.

The dockyard itself is now mostly housing. The landmark blocks are the Mast Quay towers, built by Comer Homes Group: a first pair went up around 2005, and a much larger second phase of towers, 23, 11, nine and six storeys, finished in late 2022. These are high-spec flats with induction hobs, floor-to-ceiling glass, balconies over the river and concierge cover, let mostly to professionals and commuters who walk to the station. The check-outs run accordingly, methodical and documented.

Two things about Mast Quay Phase 2 are worth knowing if you live there, because both have followed residents around. The council ordered it demolished in September 2023 over 26 deviations from the planning permission, an inquiry ran through 2024, and in January 2025 the Planning Inspectorate revoked the demolition order on conditions, including replacing the orange cladding and a programme of fire-safety work. None of that touches your tenancy clean. It does mean the managing arrangements here are tightly run, and a tightly run block hands back to a written standard.

Around the towers the heritage survives in plain sight. The Clock House on the old yard, built between 1778 and 1784, is now the Clockhouse Community Centre. The late-eighteenth-century guard house, the police office and the old dockyard gates still stand on Woolwich Church Street. Two shipbuilding slips remain, one either side of the first Mast Quay block, and a couple of the old docks have been kept and partly rebuilt. There is the Mast Pond too, where the yard once floated the great masts, up to 120 feet of them, before two of the nearby ponds were turned into steam basins in the 1830s. You clean a brand-new kitchen fifty yards from a 250-year-old clock tower. That is the texture of the place.

Woolwich Dockyard station sits just south of the river on the Church Street side, its platforms sunk below street level between two tunnel mouths, on the North Kent line run by Southeastern, in fare zone 3. Most of our work here is within a short walk of it: the riverside flats on the dockyard, and the older terraces and ex-council maisonettes on the streets behind.

How the check-in report quietly settles the deposit

Start with the mechanism, because most people skip it and it is the whole game. When you moved in, a clerk walked the flat and wrote a report describing every surface, almost always with photographs, and on a newer Mast Quay flat the kitchen and bathroom were logged as new or as new because they had just been professionally cleaned. Your deposit is held in a government-approved scheme, and the money only moves on evidence. A flat that looks tidy to the person who lived in it is not evidence. Dated photographs set against that check-in inventory are.

On the riverside blocks this is sharper than on an ordinary let. The hand-back goes through a concierge desk or a managing agent with the original report open on screen, so nobody is guessing what the wet room looked like in 2023; they can see it. On the older terraces and the ex-council flats off Woolwich Church Street the check-out is more often a high-street agent, but the bar has crept up there too, because the same firms now manage stock on both sides of the railway cutting.

The deductions we are called in to head off land in a familiar order around here: appliance interiors first, then hard-water scale on glass and chrome, then the kitchen grease film you stop seeing after a year, then dust on the high edges a lamp picks out. None of it is dramatic. All of it photographs.

A flat that looks tidy to the person who lived in it is not evidence.

Two pieces of law sit behind this. The deposit-protection duty and the requirement that disputed cleaning charges be evidenced come from the Housing Act 2004. And nobody can force you to book a professional clean, because the Tenant Fees Act 2019 stops a landlord writing it in as a condition. You choose to book one because the benchmark was a professional clean, and matching that without the kit is hard.

What the chalk does to a riverside bathroom

Thames Water supplies SE18 and the water is hard, drawn off the chalk that the whole region’s supply runs through. In a flat lived in for a year or more that hardness shows up exactly where a clerk looks first: a misty film on the wet-room glass, a white bloom on chrome taps and the shower riser, a chalky tide line in the kettle. Tenants stop registering it because it arrives slowly and evenly across every surface at once.

A clerk angling a daylight lamp across the screen sees it instantly, and on a new-build check-out in SE18 it is one of the most common single-line deductions there is. We descale these surfaces with a proper scale remover and a controlled dwell time, screen face by screen face and tap by tap, rather than a quick wipe that leaves the outline of it behind under a low light. Thames Water publishes the hardness for any SE18 postcode if you want to check your own address.

Grout and silicone are the other scale traps. The wet rooms in these blocks carry a lot of glass and a lot of sealant, and a mould line along the silicone bead or grey grout in the corner of the screen reads as a deduction just as fast as a dirty oven. We scrub those back as far as honest effort takes them and treat the silicone line; where something is genuinely past cleaning we photograph it before we start, so a worn bead from before your tenancy does not land on your deposit.

The Greenwich licence a tenant rarely hears about

The dockyard sits in the Woolwich Riverside ward, and that ward is one of the areas covered by the Royal Borough of Greenwich selective licensing scheme for single private rented homes. The scheme runs from 1 October 2022 to 30 September 2027, so it is live right through your move. On top of it the council runs a borough-wide additional HMO scheme, in force from 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2028, which catches shared houses with three or more people from separate households. A landlord letting a single-household flat in this ward needs the selective licence; a shared house needs the HMO one.

This rarely reaches a departing tenant directly, but it shapes the hand-back. A licensed, properly run let tends to follow a documented check-out, which means the inventory clerk is methodical and the standard is written down rather than made up on the doorstep. That is good news, not bad. A procedural clerk is not the problem at a check-out; an un-evidenced one is, because that is where a deduction turns into an argument that drags.

Selective licence

What a landlord needs to let a single private home in the Woolwich Riverside ward, under the Greenwich scheme that runs to 30 September 2027.

Additional HMO licence

The borough-wide licence for a house shared by three or more people from different households, in force to 31 December 2028.

Check-in inventory

The clerk’s day-one report, with photographs, that your hand-back is judged against. It is the benchmark we clean to, not a general idea of clean.

Deposit scheme

The government-approved holder of your deposit. Money only moves on evidence, which is why dated photographs decide most disputes.

The 57 things, room by room

Every booking here runs to the 57-point agent-approved checklist. It is the full hand-back clean of an empty flat, not a tidy, and the flat should be empty or close to it when we arrive, because clerks check inside and behind everything and so do we. Here is the shape of it.

Kitchen

The kitchen is where most riverside deposits are won or lost, so it takes the most time. The oven is cleaned inside to the back wall, the door glass split and cleaned between the panes, racks and trays degreased. The induction or ceramic hob is lifted of burnt residue without scratching the surface, and the control surround degreased. The extractor hood is wiped and its metal grease filter degreased rather than just rinsed, because a solid filter is a guaranteed flag. The fridge-freezer is cleaned inside, defrosted if it needs it, seals and runners done, and left off with the door ajar if you have moved out early. The washing-machine drawer and the rubber door seal are cleaned, since that seal is where mould hides on a flat that ran humid. Cupboards and drawers are emptied and wiped inside and out, the sink and mixer tap descaled, the splashback glass brought back to clear, skirting and floor finished last.

Bathrooms and wet rooms

These flats tend to run wet rooms or compact en-suites with a lot of glass and chrome, and the hard water makes this the second deduction zone after the kitchen. The screen is descaled on both faces until it is genuinely clear under a low light, where a quick straight-on wipe would still pass at a glance. Taps, the shower riser, the head and every chrome fitting are descaled. Tiles and grout are cleaned, any mould line along the silicone treated, the toilet done inside and out including the base and the cistern, the extractor vent wiped, mirrors finished without streaking, and the floor cleaned to the edges.

Bedrooms and living areas

Floor-to-ceiling glazing is normal in these blocks, so the windows are cleaned inside, frames and runners included, since that is where grime collects. Built-in wardrobes are emptied and wiped inside, and mirrored doors brought to a clear finish. Skirting, sockets, switches and the tops of doors are dusted, because a daylight lamp run along a high edge finds dust fast. Radiators and any trickle vents are done. Carpet is vacuumed thoroughly; carpet shampoo is a costed add-on where a stain or pet residue means a vacuum will not satisfy the inventory.

Throughout

Internal glazing and any glass balustrade are cleaned both sides, light fittings and the visible top of every door wiped, switch plates and sockets done, skirting the whole way round, and the entrance door and its frame cleaned where hands and bags have marked it. All floors are finished last on the way out. The order matters: we work top to bottom so nothing falls onto a surface already done. It is dull, methodical work, and it is what passes a check-out.

What it costs, and the sum nobody runs in time

Flat pricing by size, no per-hour surprise on a standard end-of-tenancy job, and no riverside premium. These are the Woolwich Dockyard rates.

Carpet shampoo is added per room where the inventory needs it: £36 a bedroom, £43 a living room, or £115 for the whole carpeted area of a typical two-bed. Oven deep-cleaning is already included in the end-of-tenancy price; if you ever want a standalone oven clean booked on its own it is £77 for a single, £110 for a double and £114 for a 90cm range. If you would rather buy time than a fixed package, for instance a part-furnished flat or a short top-up before a re-let, that is £30 per cleaner an hour. For a normal hand-back the flat rate is almost always better value, and it is the one the guarantee attaches to.

Run the sum the way the deposit makes you. A one-bed at £207 to protect a deposit several times that is not really a decision, yet most tenants only do the maths after they have tried a DIY clean, failed the check-out and lost the first round. The first round is the cheap one to win. Across the work we have done this way, our figures show roughly £1.2m in tenant deposits recovered and held rather than deducted, at a 97% first-time pass rate. The other 3% is what the 48-hour re-clean guarantee is for: flag anything on the list within 48 hours, the flat untouched since we left, and we come back and redo it free. There is a reason 300+ letting agents keep us on their books.

A Mast Quay job from April

“We had three years in a one-bed in one of the Mast Quay towers, river side, and both of us were being moved to Manchester for work with about five days to clear and hand back. The flat looked spotless to us. What would have cost us was the wet room: the glass screen and all the chrome had gone a flat, even white from the hard water and neither of us had ever clocked it, it came on that gradually. Two cleaners came on the Wednesday and spent most of their time on that bathroom, descaling the screen, the riser and every fitting until the glass went properly clear again. The managing agent ran the daylight lamp along it on the Friday and passed it without a word. Full deposit back before we moved. That bathroom was the whole job and they knew it.”
Priya and Tom, former tenants, Mast Quay SE18, April 2026

That is a fair example of the pattern on the riverside blocks: a tidy-looking flat, an oven and a wet room doing the real damage, and a managed check-out that opens the move-in report rather than guessing. What turned it was the descaling, but also the dated photo set that went out with the invoice, which is the part a DIY hand-back never has when the agent pushes back.

What 1 May 2026 changed for move-outs here

The Renters’ Rights Act 2025 went live on 1 May 2026. Section 21 no-fault evictions are gone, and every existing assured shorthold tenancy in England has converted to a periodic tenancy, so a tenant now gives notice rather than running to a fixed end date.

The part people get wrong is simple. The cleaning side of a move-out did not change at all. The Tenant Fees Act still applies, the check-in benchmark still applies, and the deposit maths is exactly what it was the week before. What changed is timing. The dockyard blocks were already high-churn, full of one and two-year professional lets, and rolling notice makes the hand-back dates less predictable and the month-end pile-up no easier. If anything a booked, guaranteed clean is more useful now, because you have less slack to absorb a failed check-out. The practical takeaway is dull and pays for itself: book earlier than you used to.

Questions we get asked

How much does an end of tenancy clean cost in Woolwich Dockyard?

Pricing is by property size, fixed before we start: £156 for a studio, £207 for a one-bed, £243 for a two-bed, £339 for a three-bed and £425 for a four-bed. Carpet shampoo and a standalone oven are costed add-ons. The figure does not move on the day for a normal hand-back, whether the flat is at Mast Quay or a terrace near the station.

Do you clean the Mast Quay riverside flats?

Yes. The Mast Quay towers on the old dockyard are a regular part of our SE18 work, and we are used to the floor-to-ceiling glass, the wet-room glass and the hard-water scale that the newer blocks throw up. Send the block name and floor when you book so we can sort the loading bay or visitor bay in advance.

Will the clean pass a managing agent or letting agent check-out?

That is the whole point of it. We work to a 57-point agent-approved checklist that 300+ letting agents already recognise, and we hold a 97% first-time pass rate. If your clerk flags anything on that list within 48 hours, we come back and put it right at no charge under the 48-hour re-clean guarantee.

What does the 48-hour re-clean guarantee actually cover?

If your inventory clerk or managing agent marks a checklist item within 48 hours of the clean, we return and redo it free. It covers the clean we carried out, not new mess made after we left or anything outside the list we agreed. You tell us inside the window and the flat is still as we left it, with nobody moved in.

Why does the hard water in SE18 keep costing tenants their deposit?

Thames Water here is hard, drawn off the chalk, so over a tenancy it leaves a white bloom on shower glass, chrome taps and the kettle that builds so slowly you stop noticing it. A clerk holding a daylight lamp flat against the screen sees it at once. We descale those surfaces with a proper scale remover and a controlled dwell time, face by face, rather than a quick wipe that leaves a ghost of it behind.

Is there a central-London surcharge for a riverside flat?

No. Woolwich Dockyard is priced at our standard rates, the same as the rest of SE18. A two-bed at Mast Quay and a two-bed terrace off Woolwich Church Street are both £243 for the standard end-of-tenancy clean before any carpet add-on. The rate is set by bedroom count, not by postcode pocket or the view.

Does the property need to be empty when you arrive?

Empty, or as close as you can get it. The clerk checks inside and behind appliances, inside wardrobes and into the corners, and so do we, so furniture left in place blocks the clean and leaves doubt at the check-out. One item left for the next tenant can be worked around; a flat half full of boxes cannot.

Is carpet cleaning included, or extra?

A thorough vacuum is included. Carpet shampoo is a separate add-on for a stain or pet residue a vacuum will not satisfy: £36 a bedroom, £43 a living room, or £115 for the whole carpeted area of a typical two-bed. We will tell you honestly whether the inventory genuinely needs it rather than adding it by default.

Do you clean inside the oven and behind the fridge and washing machine?

Yes. The oven is done inside to the back wall, the door glass split and cleaned between the panes, racks and trays degreased. The extractor grease filter is degreased rather than only rinsed. Where access allows we pull out the fridge-freezer and the washing machine to clean the seals, the drawer and the floor behind, because that is exactly where a clerk looks.

My check-out and my move-out are nearly the same day. Can you still fit it in?

Usually, yes. Tell us the date and the constraints when you book. We try to slot the clean after the removals van has gone but before the clerk arrives, and the 48-hour guarantee gives a margin if the timing is tight. The Mast Quay loading bay needs booking ahead, so flag that early.

How far ahead should I book around Woolwich Dockyard?

A few days is usually enough, but the last Friday of the month and the final couple of days are the busy ones, because that is when most tenancies end. Since the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 put tenancies onto rolling notice rather than fixed end dates, hand-back dates are harder to predict, so message us as soon as you have one.

Does the landlord here need a licence, and does that affect my check-out?

Most single private rented homes in the Woolwich Riverside ward need a selective licence from the council, and the whole borough has an additional HMO scheme on top. It does not change your clean, but a licensed, properly run let tends to follow a written check-out process, so the standard is documented rather than improvised. A clear paper trail on both sides is what keeps the deposit conversation short.

What if the managing agent hands me their own check-out sheet?

Send it across and we work to that list instead of only our standard checklist. The managed blocks on the dockyard and some high-street SE18 firms issue their own hand-back sheets, and matching theirs line for line is the cleanest way to head off a dispute before it starts.

How do I book, and how fast do you come back to me?

Call 0333 555 2076 or email [email protected] with the address, the bedroom count and your hand-back date. We confirm a fixed price and a slot, normally within the same working day. A couple of photos of the kitchen and bathroom sharpen the quote.

Other Monster Cleaning services in Woolwich Dockyard

Staying put rather than moving out? We also offer carpet cleaning in Woolwich Dockyard, oven cleaning in Woolwich Dockyard and domestic cleaning in Woolwich Dockyard. Moving within the borough? See nearby Thamesmead East, West Greenwich and The Lighterman.