A house manager working about 20 hours a week handles laundry, home resets, grocery shopping and errands, meal prep, supply inventory, vendor scheduling, and recurring household admin. The checklist below breaks a typical week down task by task.
Most people underestimate how much invisible work keeps a home running. The mental load of tracking what’s low, what’s due, and who’s coming when rarely shows up on anyone’s calendar, it just fills the gaps of evenings and weekends. A house manager takes over that entire layer of work. Here’s what a typical week looks like.
First, what a house manager actually is
A house manager works in your home roughly 20 hours a week, handling recurring household tasks with real ownership. That’s the distinction from a Family Assistant, who covers transactional tasks at about 8–10 hours a week. A house manager doesn’t wait for a list. They run the systems: they notice the pantry is low before you do, schedule the HVAC service before the summer rush, and keep the household calendar moving without check-ins.
Sage Haus has matched 8,000+ families, couples, executives, and busy households with house managers, and the weekly scope below reflects what those placements actually cover.
The weekly house manager checklist
| Category | Weekly tasks | Cadence |
|---|---|---|
| Home operations | Laundry, dishes reset, tidying common areas, changing beds, restocking bathrooms | 2–3x per week |
| Food & groceries | Grocery list and shopping, meal prep, fridge cleanout | 1–2x per week |
| Errands & returns | Dry cleaning, pharmacy, post office, package returns | 1–2x per week |
| Inventory & supplies | Tracking and reordering paper goods, cleaning supplies, toiletries, pet food | Weekly check |
| Vendors & maintenance | Scheduling cleaners, landscapers, repairs; meeting vendors; follow-up | As scheduled |
| Household admin | Calendar management, appointments, gifts, travel prep, seasonal tasks | Ongoing |
How the week typically flows
Home operations. Laundry washed, folded, and put away. Dishes reset. Common areas tidied so the house starts each day at baseline instead of behind. Beds changed weekly, bathrooms restocked.
Food and groceries. Grocery list built from what’s actually running low, shopping done, meal prep for the week batched in one or two sessions. Fridge cleaned out before the next run so nothing gets buried and wasted.
Errands and returns. Dry cleaning, pharmacy, post office, package returns — the loop of small trips that eats a Saturday when nobody owns it.
Inventory and supplies. Household staples tracked and reordered before they run out: paper goods, cleaning supplies, toiletries, pet food. A good house manager keeps a running system so nothing hits zero.
Vendors and maintenance. Scheduling the cleaner, the landscaper, the handyman, the HVAC tune-up. Being home to let them in. Following up when work isn’t done right. This is one of the highest-value pieces of the role, vendor coordination is pure calendar friction for most households.
Household admin. Calendar management, appointment scheduling, gift purchasing, travel prep like packing lists and house shutdown routines, and the seasonal tasks that pile up, holiday logistics, school-year transitions, donation runs.
What’s not on the list
A house manager runs the household, but the role has edges. Deep cleaning stays with your cleaning service, the house manager schedules it. Childcare is a separate role, though many households pair a house manager with a nanny or sitter coverage. And full-time estate staff for larger properties is a different search entirely.
What 20 hours a week actually buys back
The checklist above is 15–20 hours of work. When you’re doing it yourself, it doesn’t feel like a part-time job because it’s scattered across every evening and weekend — but that’s exactly what it is. Reading this and recognizing your own to-do list? That’s the conversation to have. Join a group info call to talk through what a house manager would take off your plate.
Frequently Asked Questions
A house manager working about 20 hours a week handles laundry, home resets, grocery shopping, meal prep, errands, supply inventory, vendor scheduling, and household admin like calendar management and travel prep.
Around 20 hours a week. Roles at 8–10 hours a week are Family Assistant positions, which cover transactional tasks rather than full household ownership.
No. A house manager schedules and oversees your cleaning service, handles day-to-day tidying and resets, and coordinates vendors — deep cleaning stays with the cleaning service.
Families, couples, executives, empty nesters, and anyone whose household tasks have outgrown their available time. Sage Haus has matched 8,000+ households with house managers.
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