Having clean floors is a necessary part of keeping your home healthy, welcoming, and pleasant. But cleaning hardwood, laminate, and vinyl floors can get tiresome. These days, who has the time?
Thankfully, there a number of easy tricks that make cleaning and maintaining your floors a breeze.
How To Easily Keep Your Floors Clean All The Time
1. Take Your Shoes Off
A shocking amount of dirt and grime is tracked in on our shoes. You might think it’s not there because you can’t see it, but we promise you — it’s there.
This small amount of residue can make your floors look dull and dirty very quickly. Removing your shoes at the entrance of your home, or having a bristled rug for you to wipe your shoes on can help keep your floors looking clean and shiny for longer periods of time.
2. Clean Light, Clean Often
One of the best tricks for making sure that your floors stay looking bright and fresh with minimal effort is to vacuum or sweep them every one or two days.
This might sound intimidating and unreasonable, but the comforting reality is that it does not have to be a deep clean. Just run your vacuum or broom over the surface of the floor daily to collect the previous day’s collection of dust, dirt, and grime.
Light cleaning on a regular basis comes with a long list of benefits. Not only is this a task that can take you less than five minutes time, but it increases the amount of time that you can leave between really deep floor cleanings. The frequent removal of dirt keeps buildup from occurring on your floors, making it easier for them to look nice for longer periods of time.
3. Vacuum or Sweep Before Mopping
If you don’t take the time to sweep or wipe down your hardwood, laminate, or vinyl floors before you begin mopping, you actually end up forcing more dirt and grime into the surface of your floors. Skipping this step can also make it harder to pick up the hair, dust, lint, particles, and grime left on your floor. This debris can be swept or vacuumed up before you begin cleaning to make your job easier and faster while protecting your floors.
4. Remove Scuffs and Stains
While it may seem simpler to simply ignore scuffs and stains, these blemishes will make your floors look dirty regardless of how recently you cleaned them! Because of the variety of flooring options available, there is a wide selection of products, DIY concoctions, and cleaning materials that can be used to remove scuffs and stains.
Be very cautious, though! Some cleaners can cause in irreparable damage when used on the wrong floors. If you are ever unsure about the best way to remove scuffs or stains from your floors, contact your local Seattle flooring experts.
5. Always Dry The Floor
We know what you’re thinking — “If my floor gets mopped, I’m lucky. Who has time to dry their floors too?”
Trust us on this one, though. If you make time to mop, definitely make time to dry. While it may seem unnecessary to dry your floors after having washed them, it is a final and necessary step to cleaning your hardwood, laminate, and vinyl floors. If the floor is left to air dry, the remaining evaporating water causes dust, dirt, and lint particles in the air to adhere to the surface of your floors. Instead of looking clean and shiny, your floors look just as flat and dull as they did before the cleaning.
The best way to avoid this is to take a soft towel and dry your floors off after they’ve been cleaned. If a film has been left on the surface of your floors, than you can use a soft cloth, like a cloth diaper, to buff away the film and restore the shine.
What Cleaner Should I Use On My Floor?
There are different kinds of cleaners and products that are available for different floors. Depending on if you have hardwood, laminate, or vinyl floors, there are different tools, products and materials you can use to get your flooring looking shiny and new.
Hardwood Floors Cleaner
When it comes to hardwood floors, cleaning can get a little tricky. The manufacturer, installation company, and type of finish on your hardwood play a significant role in determining the products you should and should not use.
Generally, Bona floor cleaner has been recommended for hardwood floors. The product is safe, leaves no residue, and is non-toxic and biodegradable. For floors without a laminate, consumers have recommended Murphy’s Oil Soap to keep floors hydrated and clean. The tannic acid in tea even has some people using room-temperature tea to add shine to their floors.
Laminate Floors Cleaner
The best and fastest DIY solution for cleaning laminate floors is to add a cup of white vinegar to a gallon of warm water and use a microfiber mop to gently clean the floor’s surface.
There are also several laminate approved cleaners available that you can purchase from your local flooring company. Avoid using pine, lemon, bleach, or ammonia based cleaners.
Vinyl Floors Cleaner
When it comes to vinyl floors, you can sometimes just get away with using clean, warm water to remove grime and dirt from their surfaces. Adding a mild, ph neutral soap can help to cut through the grease, or you may also use the vinegar and water combo described above for cleaning laminate. Use a clean, microfiber mop to gently clean the surface of the vinyl to leave it bright and clean.
Considering New Flooring?
If your floors have experienced so much wear and tear that they are past the point of no return, then maybe it’s time to think about getting your floors replaced. At Carpet To Go, we have a variety of hardwood, laminate, and vinyl floors for homeowners to survey so that they can find the perfect flooring for their home.
To learn more about how to properly care and maintain your home’s flooring, or to learn more about flooring services, contact Carpet To Go today by giving our Seattle office a call or by filling out our contact form.
