r/CleaningTips

I am not a dirty person. My apartment is clean, my dishes are clean, I do laundry regularly. The machine itself just never occurred to me as something that needed cleaning. It's the thing that cleans things. The logic felt airtight.

Then a few weeks ago my towels started smelling musty right out of the dryer and I went down a rabbit hole trying to figure out why. Rewashed them, same smell. Added more detergent, slightly worse actually. Eventually I found a thread that described exactly what I was experiencing and every single reply said the same thing: clean your machine, it's probably full of mold and detergent buildup and you've been washing your clothes in essentially a bacteria soup for however long it's been since you last cleaned it. I had never cleaned it. I did not want to look inside the drum seal.

I looked inside the drum seal. I won't describe it in detail because this is a family subreddit but I will say that what I found in that rubber gasket had no business existing in a household appliance. I used a full bottle of white vinegar, a box of baking soda, an old toothbrush, and about forty minutes of genuine personal reckoning. Ran two hot cleaning cycles back to back. The water that came out during the first cycle was a color I don't have a name for. By the second cycle it ran mostly clear and I felt like I had acomplished something meaningful with my life.

Washed a load of towels after. They came out smelling like nothing, which is exactly what clean laundry is supposed to smell like and which I had apparantly not experienced in quite some time without realizing it. If you have never cleaned your machine I am not judging you becuase I was you three weeks ago, but please do it this weekend.

I need to share this because I am equal parts disgusted, relieved, and offended that something so small was winning against me for this long. For months my apartment had this weird stale smell that I could not describe without sounding insane. It was not trash, not mildew, not drain smell, not spoiled food. It was more like if warm dust, old oil, and a forgotten lunch had a baby and hid it somewhere just to ruin my evenings. I vacuum regularly, wipe counters, clean the sink, took out the trash constantly, washed the inside of the fridge, cleaned the microwave, even pulled the couch apart because I once found a rogue grape in there and thought maybe I had a repeat offender. Nothing. The smell would fade for a day, then come creeping back around dinner time like it paid rent. The maddening part was that my kitchen always looked clean. Last weekend I finally got annoyed enough to do the kind of cleaning that makes you look like you are investigating a crime scene. I pulled out the trash can, moved the little rolling cart, cleaned the baseboards, got on the floor with a flashlight, and eventually decided to pull the stove out from the wall. I have lived here two years and had apparently never fully pulled it out because I genuinely believed nothing back there existed except dust and regret. Wrong. There was a blackened little puddle trail under one side, a few fossilized pasta shapes, a bottle cap, and what I can only describe as a greasy cornflake made of unknown origin. But the real villain was this thin charred strip stuck partly under the stove leg and partly to the floor. It looked like a burnt peel or maybe a slice of onion that had gone through war. When I scraped it up, the smell hit me instantly. That was it. That tiny demon. I cleaned the whole area with hot water and dish soap first, then a degreaser, then wiped again because I was spir aling a bit, and my apartment has smelled normal ever since. I am posting because I spent months thinking there was something wrong with my whole place when it was basically one cursed snack fossil under an appliance. Please tell me I am not the only person who got humbled this hard by something the size of a potato chip.

I hated cleaning as a teenager. With undiagnosed ADHD and a need to be literally anywhere except home, my room became one huge "floordrobe" and whenever mum would complain, I'd tell her to keep my bedroom door closed if she didn't want to see it. Before mum died she said to my partner, "I'm so sorry about her, I really tried". Essentially, I've been a mess my whole life!

I've lived out of home for many years, and my cleanliness and tidiness has slowly been improving, but it's always been my absolute last priority. Since having a tiny human 14 months ago, I started cleaning because I love my tiny human and want them to have a nice space. The shift from cleaning because I have to, to cleaning because I want to, has been profound!

But I need all the best cleaning tips and tricks to ensure I continue to love it! Having a tiny human means it can get overwhelming pretty quickly, so I want to try and keep on top of it. Also, totally playing the Dead Mum Card so I can hopefully get those tips that are usually guarded as tight as Buckingham palace. Thank you in advance xx

I teach yoga and go through multiple outfits in a day. The synthetic fabric smell situation got embarrassing. I'd wash everything and then put on a clean tank top and smell gym within 20 minutes of starting to move. I tried enzyme detergents, cold wash cycles, adding vinegar to the rinse, air drying instead of the dryer, and the borax stripping method.  Some things helped temporarily but nothing fixed it. A student mentioned she sends her workout gear out because apartment washing machines can't actually get synthetic fabrics fully clean, especially once the machine drum has its own bacteria buildup. That made immediate sense to me. I started using one of these near my area in Dallas for my workout clothes specifically for a couple months now. I still do regular laundry at home but performance fabrics go out. The smell issue is completely gone. If you've tried everything and the smell keeps coming back, it might not be your technique, might be the machine.

I always plan to clean weekly, but sometimes it turns into “I’ll deal with it later” until it piles up, haha..

Do you stick to a routine, or just clean when you feel like it’s needed?

No judgment here, just curious how everyone manages it.

Air purifiers? Airing out the room every day? Lighting a candle? These are all things I’ve considered trying but does anyone have advice on what actually works? I don’t have any pets but I have three kids and cook so I’m sure there’s still some type of “smell” I’m not noticing but am feeling self conscious about when people come over so I would love to know how I can actively work on keeping my home smelling fresh!

I feel like I’m always cleaning, but never really getting ahead. Some days it’s overwhelming to keep up with everything.

For those with experience, what’s one cleaning tip, shortcut, or hack that genuinely saves time or effort? Could be anything — organizing, scrubbing, laundry, whatever works.

I’ve been trying to get my place into a state where I can actually clean it properly, but I keep getting stuck on all the stuff everywhere.

It’s not really trash, just things I don’t use anymore, so I end up going back and forth instead of actually making progress.

I did clear out a small area before and it felt way easier to clean after that, but I haven’t been able to keep going.

I think part of it is I don’t have the energy to deal with sorting everything or figuring out what to do with it, so it just sits there.

How do you get past this stage and actually make enough space to clean?

I love the idea of a cordless vacuum because it is lightweight and easy to move and there is no cord to trip over. My old upright vacuum is very powerful and can basically eat a carpet in one pass, but it is so heavy and awkward that I avoid cleaning under furniture and tight corners.

Has anyone here switched to cordless and found it actually handles those hard to reach spots? I have a mix of thick rugs and low-clearance furniture and I do not want to end up doing extra passes or missing half the dirt. Tricks, hacks, or any warnings would be helpful because I am trying to save my back and keep my floors clean.

my boyfriends fridge has this absolutely horrendous smell that kinda smells like decomposition, old period blood, and slightly fishy (so i suspect something has died). both him and his housemate have complained to their landlord (its a student property), because its truly unbearable (i have to hold my nose when i open it and i cant go back into the kitchen for several minutes after because it lingers). it makes it hard to cook fresh food since stuff stored in the fridge starts smelling like it too.

ive gotten on at him about it and he said that a fridge maintenance person came and flushed it out and they’ve scrubbed it all and checked all the internals and they found nothing?!?!? are we cursed lol

he’s tried everything he can such as bicarb, bleaching. and the property owners wont replace the fridge since its new, and he cant really afford a new one but at this point its unusable.

does anyone have any idea what to do? he’s still got another year of living here and doesnt want to live off canned stuff forever

Most of the positive reviews posted on here are just fake and paid.

Be careful for those stupid reviews for stupid GEO thing.