How Often Should You Clean Your Home?

Coming home to see clothes strewn around your apartment, dishes piling up in the sink and dust collecting on your floors can be demoralizing—partly because it looks so messy and dishevelled, and partly because when the mess really starts to pile up, you never quite know what kind of germs or bacteria might be lurking out of sight.

You probably know that you need to clean your condo frequently if you want to stay organized and keep your place looking its best. But many people don’t know that there can potentially be health consequences to waiting too long between cleanings and letting bacteria build up over time.

Some areas of your home require fairly frequent cleaning, while others can go a little bit longer before they need to be tidied, cleaned or disinfected. Keep reading to find out how often you should clean some of the key items and areas of your home to keep them clean and safe.

The Refrigerator

The refrigerator is one of the most important parts of your home to clean, but also one of the most often neglected. Your fridge is one of the most dangerous places to let bacteria build-up, for an obvious reason: it’s where you store the stuff that you’re soon going to put in your body.

Unfortunately, despite the temperature, bacteria can still build-up quite rapidly in the fridge, so you should make sure you give it a good cleaning at least once a month. Drawers that contain produce need special attention because studies suggest bacteria can rapidly build up to unsafe levels in small spaces, especially if the produce is left too long.

Bathtubs

Even though your bathtub is the place you go to get clean, it can actually be one of the dirtiest places in your bathroom, and quite possibly in your whole condo. One study out of Boston found that your bathtub may contain more bacteria than your garbage can! And the bacteria that are lurking in your tub isn’t harmless; the study also found that it could potentially cause skin infections.

To keep your bathtub clean—and your skin safe from possible infections—you should clean it at least once per week, and probably more if you fully submerge yourself and take baths often.

Carpets

Carpets can be cozy and help keep your floors warm, especially during the frigid Toronto winter, but unfortunately, they can also play host to bacteria—a lot of bacteria. Studies suggest that each square inch of carpet could contain nearly 200,000 of them.

You should vacuum your floors every week, but if you really want to keep bacteria at bay, you’ll need to have your carpet professionally steam cleaned once every six months.

Kitchen Counter

As with the fridge, anything that stores or comes into frequent contact with food is a potential breeding ground for bacteria and requires more attention. It would be best if you cleaned your kitchen countertop daily. Most people tend to clean it after making dinner, but on the days that you eat out or skip making dinner at home, it’s still a good idea to give your counters a quick wipe.

The area immediately surrounding the sink tends to be the worst culprit in terms of bacteria because your sponge comes into frequent contact with food — and with it, bacteria — which then makes its way to the area around the sink. Make sure to swap out your sponges weekly, and give the area around the sink a good wipe down when you have a fresh sponge.

Computers

When you think about the items and areas in your home that are most in need of cleaning, your computer probably doesn’t even come to mind. But computers are exposed to a lot more bacteria than you may think.

Many people eat at their desk or with their computer nearby, exposing it to food and the bacteria that accompanies it. Plus, as you make your way through your day, your hands pick up a lot of bacteria, which you transfer to your computer every time you touch it.

It is recommended that you clean your computer once a week, being careful not to let any substances seep into the cracks and damage the hardware. To clean your keyboard, try dipping a Q-tip in alcohol — making sure that it’s damp but not dripping wet — and running it between the keys.

Bed Sheets

Throughout the day, your hands pick up more bacteria than other parts of your body, but that doesn’t mean your other body parts are bacteria-free. And just as your hands transfer bacteria to your computer — or anything else you touch — any bacteria that might be on your body gets transferred to your bedsheets at night. Make sure to clean your sheets once every two weeks to keep the amount of bacteria in your beed to a minimum.

Pillows

Most people throw their pillow cases in when they clean their bed sheets, but most of us don’t think to wash the pillows as often as we should. While the pillow cases should be washed every two weeks, the pillows themselves should be washed about every three months or so.

The various items and areas of your condo may have slightly different cleaning schedules, but all of them will benefit from vigilance. The more often you clean, the more organized, neater and healthier your home will be.

To learn more about how often you should clean your home, call Maid4Condos at 647-822-0601 or contact us here.