About the only time that renters have it easier than those who own their own homes – apart from when the roof leaks and needs major repairs – is when it comes to moving in. If you’re moving into a rental property, you can pretty much bet anything you like that the landlord will have either insisted that the previous tenants clean up the place properly or he/she will have organized someone to clean the place before you moved in.
It can be another story when you buy a new home. In the case of estate sales or if you’ve bought something that has been on the market and vacant for a while, then things aren’t quite so squeaky clean when you arrive with your boxes, bags and heavy furniture. Sure, real estate agents will stop things getting too awful because they don’t want to put off prospective buyers too much, but even so, houses can be left in not quite spiffing condition. Hey, it’s happened to me – twice!
Why Moving In Cleaning Isn’t Like Moving Out Cleaning
Although both moving in and moving out cleaning have a lot in common – they both involve deep cleaning of more or less empty rooms while you’re surrounded by your household effects all packed up in boxes – there’s quite a few ways that they’re not the same at all.
First of all, it’s always just a bit more pleasant dealing with your own dirt – the stuff that’s got dirty from you living in the place, like your toddler’s handprints on the walls. It might be grimy but it’s your dirt and you know where it’s come from. However, with a new house, you have to deal with someone else’s grime, which is always a bit unsettling because you don’t know what that mystery smear on the bathroom wall is. It’s definitely a case for getting out the rubber gloves, even if you’re just damp-dusting. The house sometimes smells faintly of the previous occupant. Although the human nose isn’t anywhere as sensitive as a dog’s, it’s sensitive enough and we’re affected more by our sense of smell than you realise, particularly at the emotional level.
Sometimes, the previous occupant’s mess is a bit more obvious. At times, they’ll leave bits and pieces behind, especially in the case of an estate sale when nobody really wants to or thinks of checking everywhere for bits and pieces. Either that or the sellers think that they’re being helpful by leaving whatever it is behind for the new occupants (that’s you). It happens more often than you think and the left behind objects can be anything from a wonky TV cabinet to a whole linen cupboard full of sheets and the like. This leads to those “What the heck is this?” moments and the “What were they thinking?” moments when you discover a stockpile of toilet paper at the top of the bedroom wardrobe or a box of half-used cleaning products dating back to the 1970s in the laundry… and the rubbish that hadn’t been put out for collection. One doesn’t get those sort of moments when doing end of tenancy cleaning because you know perfectly well what it is and what they were thinking.
The other way that moving in cleaning isn’t like moving out cleaning is because you don’t tend to get the same level of help from friends and relatives as you do when you leave a place. Partly, this could be because when you move to a new place, all your friends have been left behind in your old area and they haven’t really wanted to trek to another city to help you get your new house ready.
However, on the other hand, when you clean a new-to-you house, you do have more time on your hands than when you have to move out from somewhere. You can take things a bit more slowly when it comes to scrubbing that engrained dirt off the laundry floor and you don’t have the time pressure. And you can ignore things like the windows if you want to unless they’re really bad.
Making Start Of Tenancy Cleaning Easier
Fortunately, there are a few ways that you can make the process of cleaning your new home a lot easier so you can actually enjoy the process of settling in and making it actually feel like home.
Professional Cleaners
Call in a professional cleaning company to go ahead of you and deep clean the place for you so it’s all ready for you when you move in. This takes care of all the headaches and all you need to do is unpack, put the furniture where you want it and find the best place to hang your favourite artwork.
Pay Attention to the Floors
Deal with the carpets and the floors first before you move in the heavy furniture. This may mean hiring a carpet cleaning machine or a professional carpet cleaner. The carpets hold a lot of odour and by removing that, your new place won’t smell like someone else. Cleaning the carpets is an absolute must if your new home was previously owned by a cat crazy person, a smoker or a dog lover… and the smell makes that abundantly obvious! Give the floors a good mop and scrub as well, at least in the places where you’re going to put your fridge, your washing machine and other heavy whiteware that’s hard to move.
Clean as You Unpack
Clean as you unpack. This way, cleaning feels like part of the unpacking and moving in process. For example, if you’ve decided that one particular cupboard in the kitchen is going to be where you keep your saucepans, you give it a good wipe out inside and out (and maybe line the bottom of the cupboard with something, even if that something is old newspaper), then move your saucepans in.
Prioritise
In the stress of getting used to the new system and the new routines that are always involved in a new house, it can be tempting to focus on unimportant stuff simply because you’re trying to start at one end and work through to the other end. While going from one end to the other all in one big hit is something that professional cleaners will do in an empty house in preparing for new occupants, the professional cleaning team aren’t trying to do life in the house at the same time. You are trying to do life, so you have to clean according to what’s most important. Yes, it’s usually best to clean from top to bottom and that’s the way that one usually does deep cleaning, but if the kitchen counter where you want to prepare your dinner is covered with mouse crap because the mice got in when the house was empty, it’s silly to concentrate on getting the light fittings and ceiling fans perfect first. Make sure that you can do the basics of living hygienically first – good food, clean clothes and somewhere to sleep. The houseplants can live in a corner of the laundry for a while without any harm if you need to deep clean where they’re ultimately going to live in your new home.
Clean or Replace?
If some things are really grotty, it might be simpler to replace them rather than trying to clean them. If the curtains or blinds are simply foul with mildew, thick layers of dust and the like, then just take them down and get new clean ones. The same goes for other comparatively easily replaced items, such as lampshades. What’s more, if you have plans to renovate or redecorate in the near future (in a matter of weeks or months, not years), then just make sure that whatever you’re going to rip out isn’t mouldy and don’t worry about getting it spotless.