I had the opportunity to get intimate with dirt during my move last week and I’m here to pass on some tips. Cleaning is one of those joyous tasks that everyone wished they could do more often instead of having that stupid sex or eating ice cream. Regardless of how odious a task it may be, the rewards can be great, such as: less alergies, or the afore mentioned deserts.
So I was “lucky” enough to get the keys to my new apartment two weeks before I was forced out of my old one. This gave me the time to really make the place look great before all my junk got thrown into to and made it look bad again. I had the chance to do a little touch up painting, clean the fridge, mop the kitchen floor and all the usual cleaning things you may do on a 4-6 month basis (seriously, let’s be realistic here). What I’m talking about here is the UNUSUAL cleaning…the 1 to 2 year cleaning job…the kind of cleaning that reveals dirt from when the building was built:
Painting
This is the panacea for problem areas: just paint over it! You get a fresh new feeling that really brightens up rooms. There are times when this is absolutly necessary but it isn’t always (see below). If you do have your heart set on painting a tip is to clean the walls first with ammonia water to take the dirt and grease off that will cause your paint job to peel, crack, or wear off. This is especially necessary in kitchens and bathrooms. Also, when choosing colors, always choose the lightest color on the swatch. The second to lightest should only be used if you want a real bright/vibrant color on a wall. Anything darker than that is used for accents only. Even with the lightest color, expect to do two coats.
Walls You Don’t Paint
The good news is you don’t need to paint most walls. If you have a grungy looking wall, especially in the kitchen, the ammonia water trick works really well. If the wall just has scuff marks or dirt streaks use a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. That thing is awesome. It will take almost any mark right off. Another trick to give a fresher feeling to a room: Swiffer the walls. This may sound neurotic but it takes like two minutes and it gets all the dust stuck to the wall behind doors and furniture (plus any spiderwebs in the corners). Between the Magic Eraser and the Swiffer you may find that you don’t have to paint after all.
Windows
Clean as much of the windows as you can reach. If you can clean both sides of the glass even better. Clean windows do wonders for brightening up rooms. In fact this should be in the 4-6 month category, not the 12-24.
Light Fixtures
If you don’t clean light fixtures every time you change the bulb, give them a good wash down. Now with the energy efficient bulbs this may be a forgotten area so make sure you get all the dead bugs and dust collected in them. It makes a big difference.
Spackle
Get a small pot of spackle and using your thumb, press it into any holes in your walls. Then wipe the excess away with your hand or a damp towel. Most spackle now-a-days goes in pink and dries white. If you apply it this way there is no need for sanding and if it’s in a white wall anyways there’s no need for repainting.
These can be really quick fixes that keep your place looking clean and new, or helps you get the full deposit back on a place that you are moving out of.
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