The Bond Cleaning Scam Nobody Talks About: Agents Are Setting Tenants Up to Fail

If you think you’ve done everything you can to sail through an end of lease inspection but the agent still finds something to flag, you’re not alone. At MaidForYou, we see it happen a lot more often than it should, and we’re here to explain why.

Although most tenants make the smart decision to hire a professional bond cleaning service, use the agent’s checklist to ensure nothing is missed, and prepare for the inspection and handover in a timely manner, the report somehow seems to come back with a long list of issues. Some of these can be as minor as dust behind a picture frame, water marks inside a drain, or worse, issues that existed before you moved in, like scuff marks on the floor.

The bond cleaning scam nobody talks about isn’t always about bad cleaners or careless tenants; it’s about inspection criteria that are impossible to meet but give agents the right to delay, deduct, or withhold bond money.

Let’s take a deeper dive into how this works, what we’ve experienced behind the scenes, and why so many tenants feel “scammed”.

1. Inspection Checklists Are Designed to Fail

Most tenants view inspection checklists as clear, fair rules. While that may be the case, many are written with standards so high that passing is extremely difficult.

We’ve seen checklists that demand dust-free and spotless surfaces or zero marks or residue anywhere in the property. These aren’t reasonable cleaning standards, and more often than not, expectations change depending on who is conducting the inspection. Moreover, in many areas, dust tends to re-settle on surfaces within a day, if not hours, after cleaning. So it’s unrealistic for agents to expect absolutely zero dust throughout the property, especially when they may inspect the vacated property 3-5 days after your end of lease clean has been completed.

On top of this, homes that have been lived in for years will naturally start to age. Fading, etching, and scuffs are all normal and expected signs of wear and tear. Unfortunately, these are often flagged as cleanliness issues in an inspection report.

When the lines between cleanliness and condition are blurred in the inspection report, tenants are almost guaranteed to fail.

2. The Reason Behind High Re-Clean Request Rates

In our experience, many properties fail end of lease inspections repeatedly, regardless of which cleaning service or professional cleaner was hired. In many cases, the agent requests a re-clean for “missed or improper cleaning,” even though the flagged areas were cleaned correctly the first time.

This pattern points to the fact that re-clean requests are often not related to cleaning in a way that’s fair; instead, it’s more about meeting inspection standards that are rarely attainable, easy to question, and hard for tenants to challenge once they move out.

This gives agents enough leverage over tenants to withhold the bond. Delayed bond refunds and deductions for cleanliness issues become normal and easily justified when tenants are too tired or short on time to escalate the matter.

3. The Same “Failed Items” Appear Every Time

When the same issues arise time and again, it’s hard to ignore. In the many years of providing end of lease cleans and dealing with agents, we’ve seen a few problems pop up repeatedly, in spite of how thoroughly the property was cleaned.

Here are some of the most commonly flagged items during an inspection:

• Interior oven glass, even when spotless
• Permanent etching on shower screens marked as “dirty”
• Discoloured grout mistaken for mould
• Dust inside vents, hinges, or tracks
• Hard water stains in drains
• Exterior windows listed in apartment inspections, yet excluded from the lease
• Animal smells within a vacated property

If you consider each item carefully, you’ll find they have a few things in common: they’re difficult to photograph clearly, often relate to permanent conditions rather than removable dirt, and are easy to describe vaguely.

Once they are raised as cleaning issues, the tenant has to prove otherwise; however, this usually happens after they’ve already moved out or handed over the keys.

4. Professional Cleaning Doesn’t Guarantee Inspection Fairness

Sometimes, professional cleaning has little influence over how an inspection will go. Many tenants believe that booking a professional bond cleaning service guarantees a pass, but that’s not how inspections work.

Even the most experienced cleaning teams cannot undo permanent damage or years of wear and tear. Moreover, no matter how thorough the cleaners are, they can’t change how strict an agent chooses to be during an inspection. We’ve seen properties fail inspections after multiple professional cleans, including re-cleans that were completed exactly as requested.

When inspection standards vary between agents, reports are often less about how clean the property actually is and more about how strictly the checklist is enforced. This is why some agents believe it’s justifiable to request further cleaning, even when there is nothing more the cleaner can do.

5. Exhausted Tenants Ultimately Accept Bond Deductions

When there is a back-and-forth between the agent and tenant, it can get really tiring and time-consuming to meet demands, especially when you feel like you’ve already done everything asked of you. In fact, timing plays a bigger role in bond outcomes than most people realise.

For starters, inspection reports can be delayed and often arrive when tenants are in the middle of moving to a new place, changing jobs, or focusing on other priorities. Every follow-up email, re-clean request, or delay becomes increasingly tiresome for the tenant to deal with, to the point where they eventually give up.

Many share the same sentiment when dealing with any form of delay, opting to accept the bond deduction and just be done with the paperwork. This is where tenants collectively lose hundreds of dollars, while agents managing the same properties benefit the most.

6. Why Tenants Are Set Up to Lose the Argument

Disputes generally arise when there is not much tenants can do about it. Either they’ve already moved out or didn’t attend the final inspection and are therefore relying entirely on photos and descriptions provided by the agent.

What happens here is that the agent has the freedom to interpret the checklist and frame certain issues however they want, knowing that most tenants won’t take the time to escalate matters to a tribunal. Moreover, once the window passes, inspection outcomes tend to stand by default, even when they are based on questionable criteria.

How Tenants Can Better Protect Themselves

While the system isn’t perfect, tenants can reduce the risk of failing an inspection or facing bond deductions by taking a few simple measures.

Here are some steps we recommend:

• Take detailed photos and videos of the entire property before handing over the keys
• Understand the difference between wear and tear and cleaning issues prior to moving in
• Ask for specific feedback rather than vague comments in inspection reports
• Get familiar with your bond rights; understand the terms and conditions going in
• Hire end of lease cleaners who understand inspection standards and are experienced in dealing with agents
• Make sure when moving into a property that you fill in the in-going tenant report as thoroughly as possible. 

Final Thoughts

If you’ve ever felt like your bond inspection was unfair, that’s the “bond cleaning scam” nobody really talks about but many tenants have experienced. It’s not a one-off issue between agents; it’s a system built on unrealistic standards and flawed checklists that leave tenants exhausted.

With that said, the more tenants understand how inspections work and how reports typically pan out, the harder it becomes for unfair practices to go unnoticed. More importantly, tenants have a better shot at passing an inspection and protecting their bond through knowledge and preparation.