How To Keep Your Home Sparkling Clean With Minimal Effort

Maintaining a tidy home feels like a fantasy for some people. The problem is the amount of time it generally takes to make your way through your cleaning to-do list, which includes far too many mundane tasks, like doing the dishes and tackling the laundry. But you don’t have to spend hours tidying up. According to the pros, it’s possible to clean your home quickly and efficiently if you’re willing to commit just 10 minutes a day to the effort. Seriously.

Cleaning expert Katrina Keith, owner of Molly Maid of DFW Metro Northwest, a residential cleaning company in Dallas-Fort Worth, says having some tricks up your sleeve will help you keep a neat home with minimal time and effort. All it takes to clean your home quickly is planning ahead and doing the small things that make a big difference. Here are some of her top tips for how to clean your home efficiently.

How to clean your home quickly, according to a professional cleaner

1. Multitask to the max

If you only want to clean your home for 10 minutes a day, the key is to multitask. “Figuring out which chores can be done semi-simultaneously is worth the effort,” Keith says. For example, vacuum or clean out the fridge while your clothes are in the washer or dryer. You can also multitask as you’re going about your daily routine. “While you’re in the shower, for instance, take a squeegee to the shower door or scrub the grout,” she says. “Organizing your to-do list to enable multitasking will allow you to get more done in the same amount of time.”

2. Clean as you go

Another simple way to cut down on how much time you spend cleaning is to tidy up as you go—especially in the kitchen, which tends to be one of the messiest places in your home. “Nothing is worse than baked-on, caked-on food stains in your microwave and oven and on your dishes and counters,” says Keith. “Rinse pots and pans and load the dishwasher while dinner is in the oven.” If you take a few minutes after you eat to wipe down fresh surface splatters and spills before they become stains, it’ll save you a lot of time in the long run.

3. Put things away

Every night, tidy up before you go to bed. Spend a few minutes putting away things that were left out during the day. Straighten up the living room, clear off the bathroom counters, and put away clothes in the bedroom. Cleaning goes a lot more smoothly when you can sweep, vacuum, and wipe down everything quickly without having to put things away first. Plus, you’ll wake up to a tidy home rather than being bombarded by a pile of laundry or products scattered around the bathroom.

4. Assign a day of the week to a particular room

Cleaning your entire apartment or house is going to take some time, so Keith recommends assigning a day of the week to a particular room. “Staying mentally organized is sometimes half the battle when it comes to cleaning and maintaining your home,” she says. “If the only pressure you have on a Monday night is to wipe down the bathroom and tidy up for 10 minutes, it won’t seem so bad. On Tuesday, you can change your sheets and vacuum your bedroom, and so on.”

Spreading out your to-do list over the course of the week will make each task feel less monumental. And if you keep up with it, you’ll never be confronted with a list of cleaning tasks so long that you need an entire weekend to complete it.