When I was in college, it was hard to find the time to clean my apartment on top of dealing with classes, projects, midterms finals, etc. I know some of you can relate to this specific struggle, but that’s just one of many possible reasons for your messy apartment. If your apartment never seems to stay clean for long, here are a few possible reasons why.
Your apartment never stays clean because you’re too busy, you don’t have a solid cleaning schedule, you have too much stuff, you’re not cleaning correctly, you don’t ask for help when you know you need it, motivation is hard to come by, your apartment isn’t organized or you let the messes pile up.
As frustrating as it is to have a messy apartment, keeping it clean may not be entirely in your control.
1. You’re Too Busy
One common reason why some people can’t keep their apartment clean is because they’re simply too busy. The life of an adult can be a hectic one; especially one that lives alone.
If you’re the only one responsible for keeping the place clean, but you have things to get done all hours of the day, then the messes are just going to stay there. It’s not always as easy as freeing up time in your schedule either; sometimes you just have to wait for a free space to open up during the week and use it for cleaning. This may mean temporarily giving up relaxation time, social time or anything else that you normally look forward to.
2. You Don’t Have A Solid Cleaning Schedule
Another reason why some adults have trouble keeping their apartment clean is because they don’t have a cleaning schedule in place. Without this, you’ll probably just clean your home when it becomes noticeably dirty. If you decide to wing it when it comes to scrubbing the place down, then it might never be thoroughly cleaned.
You may decide to take the trash out, scrub the shower and get rid of old food, but then your friend calls you and you guys hangout at your apartment. After you guys hangout, there are snack wrappers on the counter and dirty dishes in the sink. Since it’s already midnight, you think “I’ll get to those later”, but later is never specified. Thanks to that, those messes are left there until the next spontaneous cleaning day. Instead of leaving it up to chance, you need to plan a specific time to clean and stick to it if the apartment is going to be truly spotless.
3. You Have Too Much Stuff
Keeping an apartment clean can be hard if you have to constantly scrub, dust and vacuum around piles of things. Having too much stuff in the way makes cleaning much more tedious. This can make it hard to muster up the energy to get started in the first place. Not to mention that, when you begin scrubbing the place, it takes way longer than it’s supposed to. You’re going to have to sort through your things and get rid of what you no longer use.
4. You’re Not Cleaning Correctly
You might not have a lot of belongings and you might even have a cleaning schedule that you follow, but those things won’t help you if you’re not tidying up correctly.
For example, the type of duster that you use determines if you’re actually getting rid of dust or just pushing it around to different spots in your apartment. Additionally, you might have wiped down your shower, but did you know that the bathroom floor needs to be disinfected as well? Maybe you leave your dirty dishes in the sink and do them once a week instead of nightly (or at least bi-nightly). Look up cleaning guides for the spots in your home that you’re not sure how to tidy up.
5. You Don’t Ask For Help When You Know You Need It
The task of keeping an apartment clean might realistically be too much for some of you. You might be busier than busy. Or maybe you’re not the best at cleaning in general. Despite all this, you try and do it all on your own. Well, we aren’t meant to face all of our challenges alone. If you have any friends and/or family that live nearby, call some up and ask them to help you clean your apartment. If you don’t know anyone in the area, hire a cleaning service to do the work for you.
6. Motivation Is Hard To Come By
Even if you have time in the day to clean, the chore itself isn’t easy to just get up and do. It takes elbow grease, sacrifice of relaxation time, planning, etc. All of this is hard to do if you have zero motivation to do so. More often than not, we’d rather curl up with our favorite show or video game, head out to a restaurant, talk to a friend, etc. If you have trouble getting motivated to clean, check out these “5 Benefits to Cleaning Your Apartment” to give you the boost you need.
7. Your Apartment Isn’t Organized
Similar to having too much stuff, cleaning an unorganized space is also hard. Your place may not be overflowing with things, but most of your belongings are still lying around the apartment with no rhyme or reason. That makes it hard to dust and scrub around them. Not to mention that, after you’ve cleaned up, the place still looks messy because there’s no organization system in place. To get you started, here are 29 tips to help you set up and organize your kitchen. If you want to get even more specific, here are 23 apartment kitchen cabinet organization ideas.
8. You Let The Messes Pile Up
Maybe you have a habit of not cleaning stuff up or putting stuff away once you’re done with it. Not only that, but you might have a habit of doing that over and over and over again. This is how piles of messes form in a living space. At that point, they take significantly longer to clean up than a normal pile of clutter. This can make the act of tidying up seem more time and energy consuming than it actually is, causing you to not do it at all. You need to start picking up after yourself more often if you want your place to stay clean.
9. You Have Roommates, Pets And/Or Kids
This is one of those factors that isn’t all that in your control. When it comes to roommates, you all might have a different standard of cleanliness than one another. In that case, check out this article to help you guys compromise on your hygiene standards. If we’re talking about pets, then obviously you can’t sit down and have a conversation with them about cleanliness. What you can do, however, is train them to be less messy. Check out this guide on how to train your dog, or your cat. If you have children at home, then here is a guide on how to teach them to be less messy as well.
10. You Don’t Clean Often Enough
You might already have a cleaning schedule in place. However, the days you set aside for doing so might be spaced too far apart. You can’t tidy the place up once a month. Clean your apartment every week or biweekly if you want it to stay presentable. You also need to be mindful of the time of day that you decide to get the chores done. For example, here are the best and worst times to vacuum.
11. You’re Not Home Often
Cleaning up a living space can be hard if you’re barely there to begin with. If you manage to make some messes during the short amount of time that you’re home, then cleaning it up might be very difficult. That’s why you need to make an effort to put things away the second that you’re done with it. As for the scrubbing and vacuuming, leave that in the hands of a cleaning service if you’re never around to get it done.
