Cleaning Services in Williams, AZ

Williams is a town of about 3,200 people that hosts a very large number of strangers. The Grand Canyon Railway leaves from here for Grand Canyon Village, Bearizona Wildlife Park sits at I-40 Exit 165, the Polar Express runs through the winter, and the six-block Historic Downtown District carries the fact this town is proudest of: Williams was the last city on Historic Route 66 to be bypassed by the interstate, on October 13, 1984. That is what "Gateway to the Grand Canyon" actually means on the ground -- the South Entrance is about 60 miles north, and a great many of the people who visit it sleep here.

Which is why Williams is the second-largest short-term rental cluster in this market. There are 836 active listings here, at roughly 48 percent occupancy, in a town of 3,202 residents. The housing numbers say the same thing from another angle: ZIP 86046 runs a 24.01 percent housing vacancy rate against 83.85 percent ownership, which is the classic seasonal and second-home fingerprint, and more than one and a half times the vacancy rate of Flagstaff city. A lot of the homes here belong to somebody who is not standing in them this week.

So the cleaning work in Williams splits cleanly. On one side, turnovers: same-day, on a deadline, with a guest arriving off a train or an interstate exit who has already paid for the night. On the other, houses that people actually live in year-round -- Williams is an incorporated city with its own council-manager government, incorporated in 1901, and its own unified school district, and it does not think of itself as a suburb of anywhere. Between them sit the second homes that need someone reliable checking on the place between visits.

Williams sits high in the pines at about 6,900 feet, and it gets the weather to match: December is the coldest month, July the warmest, August the wettest, and the record book runs from 102 degrees down to 25 below. Winter here is not a novelty, it is a season, and it comes in through the door on every boot. We run the I-40 west route to get here -- Bellemont first, then Parks, then Williams, about 35 miles and roughly 35 minutes from Flagstaff -- so this is a scheduled stop for us rather than a special trip.