If you clean homes in Seattle and are thinking about working for yourself, the hard part is rarely the cleaning. It is the paperwork: what you have to register, what tax sits on the work, and whether a small income changes any of it. This guide goes to the two offices that decide it, the Washington Department of Revenue (DOR) and Seattle's Office of City Finance, and quotes what their pages say.
We are a cleaning marketplace, not an accountant or a lawyer, and this is a reading of public pages, not tax or legal advice. We read every page below on October 17, 2026, and these pages change, so check each one before you file. This guide covers your own registrations. It does not cover workers' compensation, sick-leave or insurance rules, which we did not research, and it does not cover how any platform reports your earnings.
The short answer
- Washington asks you to register with DOR and get a business license if you meet any of its listed conditions, including "Your gross income is $12,000 per year or more." (DOR, apply for a business license)
- DOR lists "Janitorial services, including house cleaning" under its Service and Other Activities B&O tax class, and its janitorial page says "Retailing B&O and retail sales tax does not apply." (DOR classification definitions; DOR janitorial page)
- Seattle says "Anyone doing business in Seattle must have a Seattle business license tax certificate," with a new 2026 exemption at $4,000 or less of income in the city for someone with no place of business there. (Seattle business licenses)
- Seattle's B&O tax now starts at $2 million of taxable revenue, but businesses under that line still file a return. (Seattle Shield B&O changes)
Step 1: the Washington business license
DOR's page says to register with the Department of Revenue and get a business license "if you meet any of the following conditions." The ones that fit a person cleaning houses on their own include doing business under a name other than your own, "You plan to hire employees within the next 90 days," and "Your gross income is $12,000 per year or more." The page lists more conditions than these, so read the whole list on DOR's apply page.
You apply through DOR's Business Licensing Wizard. The page says online applications "will take approximately 10 business days to process," and "If you have city or state endorsements, it may take an additional 2-3 weeks" for the license to arrive. The application fee "varies," and the page points to DOR's instructions for working out yours, so we print no number here. When the license arrives, DOR assigns a Unified Business Identifier (UBI) number that you use when you file taxes or change your business.
The page names corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies and limited liability partnerships as the structures that must file with the Secretary of State before applying. A sole proprietorship is not on that list.
Step 2: how DOR taxes house cleaning
This is the question that decides whether you add sales tax to a customer's bill, and DOR answers it directly. On its B&O classification page, "Janitorial services, including house cleaning (but not including construction cleanup services)" sits under Service and Other Activities, the class that applies to "persons rendering professional or personal services to others." On its janitorial page, DOR says that when you perform janitorial services "regularly and normally performed by a commercial janitorial business," the income is subject to service and other activities B&O tax, and "Retailing B&O and retail sales tax does not apply."
In plain terms, the page puts regular house cleaning in the service class, where the B&O tax is on the income and retail sales tax is not added. Cleaning that DOR calls specialized goes the other way:
| Kind of cleaning | What the DOR janitorial page says (read October 17, 2026) |
|---|---|
| Janitorial work, including house cleaning | Service and other activities B&O tax. "Retailing B&O and retail sales tax does not apply." Examples DOR names include "Cleaning and waxing floors" and "Dusting." |
| Specialized or non-repetitive cleaning | "Specialized or non-repetitive cleaning services are considered a retail sale." Retailing B&O applies and you collect retail sales tax. Examples DOR names include "Mold abatement," "Duct cleaning," "Smoke smell removal," "Hoarder cleanup" and "Exterior cleaning of a building." |
Two limits on what the page tells you. First, it does not say how a single move-out or one-time deep clean is treated, and "non-repetitive" is in the wording above, so if you take one-time jobs, ask DOR before you assume which class they fall in. Second, the same page says "Janitorial businesses must pay sales tax on all the products and tools purchased for cleaning services," which is tax you pay on your own supplies.
Step 3: Seattle's business license tax certificate
Washington's license is not the end of it inside the city. Seattle's business license page says "Anyone doing business in Seattle must have a Seattle business license tax certificate," and about home-based work it says "Businesses based in a Seattle home usually need a Seattle business license tax certificate."
New for 2026, the page adds: "Any person whose annual value of products, gross proceeds of sales, or gross income of the business in the City is equal to or less than $4,000 and who does not maintain a place of business within the City is not required to obtain a business license tax certificate." It also says "The exemption does not apply to regulatory license requirements or activities that require a specialized permit."
Both halves of that test matter: income in Seattle of $4,000 or less and no place of business in the city. The page does not say whether a home counts as a place of business for this purpose. For home-based questions it says "Contact us," and gives tax@seattle.gov or (206) 684-8484.
On cost, the page's fee table lists $73 for 2026 and $76 for 2027 in the lowest tier, for taxable revenue under $20,000. It says "New general business license applicants pay Tier 1 fee as a default for first year, or half of Tier 1 fee if start date is July 1 or later," and that you renew each year by Dec. 31. Check the page for the current figure when you apply.
Seattle's B&O tax and the $2 million line
Seattle also has its own B&O tax. On its Seattle Shield page, the city says "The B&O tax threshold will increase from $100,000 to $2 million," starting January 1, 2026, and "A business that has taxable revenue that is less than the threshold for the calendar year owes no tax."
Owing no tax is not the same as filing nothing. The same page says "Even if a business is under the $2 million threshold for calendar years after December 31, 2025, they are still required to complete and file their Seattle B&O tax returns," and "businesses under the threshold will still need to file their return to report $0 tax is due." It adds "Businesses still need to renew their annual business licenses." The licensing page says the same in one line: "File an annual tax return, even if you have no revenue."
Separately, Seattle moved some service activities to retail on January 1, 2026. The city's list names advertising, custom software and website development, information technology, investigation and security services, live presentations and temporary staffing. Cleaning is not on it. The city also lists a public hearing on proposed rules for those changes on October 20, 2026, so look at the page again before you file.
A checklist in the order to do it
- Check DOR's conditions: $12,000 a year of gross income, a business name other than your own, or plans to hire within 90 days.
- Apply for the Washington business license through DOR's Business Licensing Wizard and allow about 10 business days, longer if city endorsements are involved.
- Work out whether Seattle's certificate applies to you: income in the city above $4,000, or a place of business there. If you work from a Seattle home, ask City Finance.
- Pay the certificate fee your tier calls for and put the Dec. 31 renewal on your calendar.
- File Seattle's annual return even if you owe nothing, and ask DOR how often it wants your state returns.
- Ask DOR how it treats any one-time or specialized jobs you take before you quote them.
Questions cleaners ask
Do I charge sales tax on house cleaning in Seattle?
DOR's janitorial page says "Retailing B&O and retail sales tax does not apply" to regular janitorial work, and its classification page lists house cleaning as janitorial services. Specialized or non-repetitive cleaning is the exception, as the table above shows.
Do I need a Seattle license if I only earn a few thousand dollars?
Possibly not, if your income in the city is $4,000 or less and you have no place of business there, though the page also says businesses based in a Seattle home "usually need" one. Whether your home counts is a question for City Finance. Washington's own $12,000 line is a separate test.
Do I need an LLC to start?
DOR's apply page lists the structures that must file with the Secretary of State first, and a sole proprietorship is not among them. Whether an LLC suits you is a question for a lawyer or accountant.
What this guide leaves out
Not covered: workers' compensation, sick-leave and insurance rules (ask Washington's agencies directly), whether any state tax credit lowers what you owe, and how any platform reports your earnings. For your own case, DOR and Seattle City Finance are the offices to ask.
Where Hometress fits
Hometress is a cleaning marketplace that connects independent cleaning professionals with customers. It is free to join, and cleaners carry their own insurance. The apply page says we are currently onboarding in Philadelphia, Chicago, and Seattle. If you want to see where things stand in your ZIP code, apply to be a service provider. For the customer side of the same market, see our Seattle page and our guide to what house cleaning costs in Seattle.