5 Tips to Disinfect Your Home Effectively
In times like these, no doubt keeping your home disinfected and pristine is high on your to-do list, especially with so much time on our hands! What better way to spend our time than to keep our homes sterilized? We want to give you a few tips for cleaning your home to keep you and your family safe and healthy; that we have found helpful as well. Here are 5 tips to disinfect your home effectively:
1. Certain Surfaces Require More Attention Than Others
First of all, disinfecting every square inch of your home is significant; but it is also very time consuming and, in this case, it can be advantageous to “work smarter, not harder”. It is beneficial to aim your focus towards more “high-touch” surfaces such as doorknobs, light switches, sinks, faucets, tables, and toilets. These are where germs are most likely to be, as everyone in the house will come in contact with them multiple times each day. It’s worthwhile to keep these surfaces decontaminated. If you keep your focus on what in fact harbors a substantial amount of the germs than you can make the most out of your cleaning.
2. Cleaning, Disinfecting, and Sanitizing- What’s the Difference?
Not all cleaning solutions are equal. All-Purpose cleaners can make objects and surfaces look clean to the visible eye and may remove some germs from surfaces. However, all-purpose cleaners are mostly built to remove visible stains, smudges, and debris from surfaces.
Cleaning itself may not kill all the germs, which is why you would want to follow up those “high-touch” areas of your home with a sanitizer or disinfectant. There is a small difference between sanitizing and disinfecting that some people often miss. Sanitization is reducing contamination or bacteria to a safe level, while disinfection is killing everything on a particular surface. Sanitizing is a little gentler than disinfecting, which can be powerful and often uses strong chemicals.
A Sanitizer in most cases can kill up to 99.9% of bacteria while a disinfectant aims to destroy all of the bacteria. So, if you are just doing a routine gentle clean of your home, a sanitizer should be fine. On certain surfaces that can often get contaminated quicker, a stronger disinfectant may be a preferred choice.
3. Sanitize Your Gadgets
Did you know that studies show there are approximately 25,000 bacteria per square inch of our phones? That’s about ten times dirtier than a toilet seat! Our phones are with us all day, every day. They are put on random surfaces, dropped on the floor, held in other
people’s hands and then we put them right up to our ear and talk into them. By the simple act of cleaning something so small, we eliminate an immense part of the germs in our household.
4. Do Quick Touch-ups
Small cleaning projects prevent filth from building up. A daily spot clean of the “high- touch” surfaces can prevent smudges from staining, banish dust bunnies, and even combat allergens.
So why not create a spot-cleaning kit so you can address small, dirty situations in minutes. Cleaning pads, microfiber cloths, dry sweeper cloths, and a sanitizing spray. Cleaning pads are great for eradicating dirty fingerprints on walls and light switches. Dry sweeper cloths can quickly pick up dust and dry dirt off floors, shelves, and electronics.
5. Cleaning Your Floors
Some floor surfaces cannot handle bleach. For indoor hardwood floors and other porous floors, you should avoid using bleach as it can cause staining. Instead, you can use a disinfecting wet mop without bleach to clean those types of floors. Generally, bleach is suitable for disinfecting floors made of hard surfaces like ceramic tile, vinyl, and linoleum. For carpets and other furniture, some sealants like Scotchgard protect the fabric from fading and resist mold, mildew, and bacteria.
We hope you find these tips helpful in your cleaning and hopefully one day soon we won’t have to worry so much about keeping everything so perfectly sanitized. If you have any questions about your home or remodeling, contact us directly click here. Be safe and stay well!
