Cleaning Your Home Before Moving Out

If you’re a tenant, you will need to make sure your home is absolutely spotless before you move out. This is to avoid any costly deductions from your deposit and to make sure you get a good reference from your landlord for any future properties you want to move into. Also, it is good courtesy to leave the house in the same state as when you moved in, so you need to make sure that everything looks immaculate for the next person who moves in. So what are the main things you should consider?

Firstly, the rugs and carpets are one of the most frequently overlooked aspects of house cleaning. 

While running a vacuum cleaner over them will lift away the superficial dust and debris, dirt can quickly accumulate in carpets, so a professional clean will get them looking as good as new. Go for a local company for the quickest result. For example, if you live in Brighton, get a Brighton carpet cleaning professional to carry out the job. That way, if there are any problems or they miss a spot, they can come back to help you sort it out.

Secondly, get the exterior into shape. It can be easy to forget that windows need to be cleaned and weeds need to be removed from between paving slabs, but it won’t create a great impression if your landlord returns to the house to find that the outside is in a state of disarray. It doesn’t need to be a military operation; simply removing the weeds, mowing the lawn and giving the windows a quick clean from the outside should be enough to keep it looking neat. Don’t worry about planting lots of new flowers, as you won’t be there to enjoy them and you’ll be wasting money.

Often, furniture can get neglected over the course of your tenancy. If anything has become damaged which your landlord isn’t already aware of, get it fixed or replaced as soon as possible. Fabric-based furniture, such as sofas and living room chairs, might benefit from being professionally cleaned if you don’t feel comfortable doing it yourself. This usually involves steam-cleaning the furniture in your home. The problem with doing it yourself is that you might use too much water and saturated the padding inside, so be careful.

The wiring and pipes should be in full working order. It is unlikely that you’ll know how to fix this yourself, so don’t try. It can be dangerous and very expensive to fix if something goes wrong, so if you haven’t already agreed a plan of action with your landlord, be sure to get this seen to before you leave. Not only will this reduce any hassle when it comes to retrieving your deposit, it also leaves your landlord with an excellent impression of you as a tenant.

Rathnait Velokomudu is a recent graduate who blogs about his experiences in making the transition from student living to real life