Cleaning your house on a budget

Welcome to one of my first articles on the subject of cleaning!

Many people know what works for them at home, but could you be saving money by not buying all brands or even store brand? The answer is yes, of course you can! This could mean it’s at least 50% cheaper and much healthier for your family.

The well-known secrets that the trade and many establishments regularly use are the millennial traditions of vinegar, lemon and bicarbonate soda (used separately or together).

I have worked for many cleaning companies before setting up my own business and the experience I have gained at different job sites has allowed me to find the best of the bunch that are the fastest and cheapest available.

When I inspect a house and look around me, I have to take into account the different rooms and the materials I use to know what suits the house. If you have marble, natural stone, slate, or any other specialized material on any of your surfaces, it’s important to follow the manufacturer’s guidelines and not necessarily what I say in this article.

The MOD used vinegar and water on all their surfaces except the kitchen. We use the normal brown vinegar and water mixture to polish wood, mirrors, pictures, dust, clean tables and counters. For the kitchen, we had to use standard specialty catering chemicals to stop bacteria and meet industry standards.

When I worked for a home cleaning company, they had clients who did not require any chemicals due to allergies in the family or their beliefs about chemicals in the home. In these homes we would use damp cloths or a specialist Australian product called Enjo. Enjo is a total green cleaning and environmentally friendly microfiber cleaning: without chemicals, with the revolutionary enjo fiber technology Both options worked just as well as using products.

So why do we keep hearing advertising telling us to use this or that when no chemical is needed at all?

I think it’s because we’re used to using products and haven’t tried cleaning without them.

If you want to go back to the natural way of cleaning, I suggest you look up the book that accompanied the TV series ‘How Clean Is Your House?’ called ‘The Cleaning Bible: Kim and Aggie’s Complete Guide to Modern Home Management’ as there is so much information and advice on every cleaning and repair task that I couldn’t possibly fit here.

As far as the top products I use to get through the worst dirty house, here are my “choice” products. I buy them from Booker (for the wholesale trade) or places like Savers, Wilkinsons and Robert Dyas as they always have great deals.

For kitchen and bathroom use you can get Mr Musle products separately and they work very fast and last well. You can use them in toasters for toilets. Any polish works fine if you like the smell. We use Mr Muscle glass and window cleaner. We love microfiber cloths for dusting, polishing, and cleaning windows, glass, and mirrors that we dry with a kitchen towel or microfiber cloth. The trick to making everything look like a model home is to use window spray on everything or shower shine that buffs with a dry towel.

For floors we bought a general all purpose cleaner which can be an unbranded basic at 35p!

Now, oven cleaning is the worst job for some. If you’ve left it a long time, that’s okay, we all do. The best product in the world for ease and results is ‘Oven Pride’ and currently at £3.51 at Sainsburys its great value! You can also use this product on barbecues. You put on your gloves, take out the grids, put them in a bag and put half of the gel. Leave it overnight, wash off and you’re done! Like new! Inside the oven, the rest of the gel is poured and with a cloth/sponge it is spread over all surfaces from glass to all metals except Aluminum. Leave 2 hours and everything comes off.

For the rugs we use professional spot cleaners which you can’t buy unless you get lucky on eBay. Rugs are something to be careful with because the color can run and sometimes even shrink. But if you know what the mark did, you’re in luck! It means you can find the right product to get it out.