Spring cleaning tips: a checklist for the home and the people in it

Spring cleaning is the one big clean a home gets each year, done when the light comes back and shows every bit of dust. The tips that work are simple. Clear things out before you clean around them, work from the top of each room down, finish one room before you open the next, and pick a schedule you can finish. If you share a home, split the day by rooms, and let each person sort their own things.

An example: Hana opens every window in the flat and sticks her plan to the fridge door: each room, its jobs, and the order she has worked out. Theo turns the music up and starts wherever he happens to be standing. Later Hana is on the step stool, dusting the top of the tall wardrobe in the living room, when she finds a single grey sock. It's the lost half of a pair she threw away months ago. She holds it up like a prize. Theo is on the floor next to a box from the back of the closet, holding up a faded T-shirt with a hole near the hem. "This one stays," he says. "I wore it the summer we met." Hana waves the sock at him. "Then so does this." Both of them laugh.

What spring cleaning means, and when to start

Spring cleaning means the slow, thorough version of housework: the jobs you skip all winter, like windows, curtains and the floor under the bed. A good time to start is late February or March. The sun sits higher, light comes in at a new angle, and suddenly you can see the streaks on the glass and the grey film on the shelves. That is your spring cleaning day. Wait for a dry week, so the windows can stay open while you work.

It's a different job from the weekly kind. A Sunday reset keeps a home in order from one week to the next. Spring cleaning reaches the places a weekly routine never gets to.

Spring cleaning tips and tricks

A few habits make the whole job shorter and less tiring.

1. Start with the clutter. Every object you remove is one less thing to dust, lift and put back.
2. Clean from the top down. Ceiling corners and light fittings come first and the floor comes last, because the dust falls downward.
3. Finish a room before you leave it. Half-done rooms all over the home are what make spring cleaning feel endless.
4. Keep three bags by the door. One is for giveaways, one for rubbish and one for things that belong in another room.
5. Set an end time. Decide when you stop for the day, and stop then, even with a job left over.
6. Take the bags out the same day. Giveaways left in the hall for a month slowly find their way back into the cupboards.

Spring cleaning checklist, room by room

Every line below is a job. Use whatever you already have at home.

Kitchen

• Empty the fridge shelf by shelf and wash every shelf and drawer.
• Pull the fridge and the cooker out and clean the floor and walls behind them.
• Clean the oven inside, including the racks and the door glass.
• Wash the filter in the extractor hood.
• Scrub the tiles behind the hob and the sink.

Bathroom

• Scrub the grout lines in the shower and around the bath.
• Wash the shower curtain, or clean the glass screen on both sides.
• Clear the bathroom cabinet of toiletries nobody has touched since autumn.
• Clean behind the toilet and around its base.
• Wipe the fan cover and the top of the mirror.

Living room

• Take the curtains down and wash them, along with the cushion covers.
• Lift every sofa cushion and vacuum the frame underneath.
• Dust the lampshades and the light fittings.
• Take the books off one shelf at a time, dust them and wipe the shelf.
• Wipe the baseboards all the way around the room.

Bedroom

• Vacuum the mattress, and turn it if it's made to be turned.
• Wash the pillows and the duvet, or air them in the sun.
• Swap the heavy winter bedding for a lighter set.
• Empty the nightstand drawer and keep only what you use.

Wardrobe

• Take every item out, wipe the rails and the shelves, and put things back by season.
• Wash and fold the winter sweaters before you put them away.
• Bring the spring jackets to the front and the winter boots to the back.

Hall

• Wash the front door on both sides, handle included.
• Shake the doormat outside and wash the floor under it.
• Take the shoes off the rack, wash it, and put back only this season's pairs.

Windows and the spots nobody checks

• Wash the windows inside and out, then the frames and the tracks.
• Run a damp cloth along the tops of the door frames and the wardrobe.
• Clean behind the radiators and in the gap underneath.
• Brush the cobwebs out of the ceiling corners.

How to declutter when you want to keep everything

Some people throw things out with pleasure. Others hold each object for a long time and then put it back. If you're the second kind, decluttering works better in small pieces.

Take one box at a time. Sit down with it, sort all of it, and carry what goes out of the house before you open the next. Start with boxes that hold no feelings, like old cables and spare kitchen gadgets, so you get faster before you reach the hard ones.

For each thing, ask when you last used it. For things with a story, keep the best one: one T-shirt from that summer, out of the five. Give memories a single box of their own, and when it fills up, something old leaves before something new goes in. If a thing is still hard to let go, put it in a box with today's date written on top. If you never opened that box in six months, let it go without opening it.

Spring cleaning a small apartment

In a small apartment, clutter fills the space fast and there's nowhere to sort it. Clear the table and the bed first and use them to sort on. Work one corner at a time, clockwise, so you never move the same pile twice. Look up as well, because the tops of cupboards and the shelf over the door collect more than you'd think. Clean the balcony door and floor on a day you can leave the door wide open. In a small home, one weekend often covers it all.

A spring cleaning schedule: a room a day, or one weekend

There are two ways to plan it, and both work.

A room a day for a week:

1. On Monday, do the kitchen.
2. On Tuesday, do the bathroom.
3. On Wednesday, do the living room.
4. On Thursday, do the bedroom.
5. On Friday, sort the wardrobe and the boxes in the closets.
6. On Saturday, do the hall and the windows.
7. On Sunday, clean the spots nobody checks and take every bag out of the house.

The whole job in one weekend:

1. On Saturday morning, sort and declutter every room and leave the bags by the door.
2. On Saturday afternoon, put the curtains and bedding in the wash, then dust every room from the top down.
3. On Saturday evening, wash the windows if the light allows.
4. On Sunday morning, clean the kitchen and the bathroom.
5. On Sunday afternoon, do the wardrobe, the hall and the floors everywhere, then take the bags out.

When the windows are clean and the floor is clear, the rest of the season is for spring activities outdoors.

Spring cleaning for two

Splitting the job by rooms can save a couple an argument. Each person takes whole rooms and decides when their room is done. The one room you both dread, often the kitchen, you do together, with music on.

One rule matters more than the rest. Nobody throws away the other person's things. Each of you sorts your own boxes, and the keeper gets to keep their T-shirt. If you moved in together over the winter, this is the first time you'll see how much of each other's past you both carried in. If one of you plans and the other just starts, type is often part of why, and the free compatibility test shows your two types.

Spring cleaning with roommates

Shared homes need a date agreed well ahead and a clear split. Each person cleans their own room, and the shared rooms go to whoever picks them first. Things nobody owns, like the odd mugs and the umbrella in the hall, go on the kitchen table for a week. Anything nobody claims by then goes. If your home already has roommate rules, add spring cleaning to them as a fixed day. Some roommates clean side by side with no effort and some clash. A compatibility test for two roommates shows how your types tend to fit.

Keepers and tossers, lists and loud bursts

Hana is a tosser with a plan, and Theo is a keeper who cleans in one loud burst. Typeza sees personality type as part of this. Each line is a leaning from type theory. People are mixes, so read this as a guess about your own home, never as advice. Eight of the 16 types:

• Vitalizer cleans in one loud burst, with music up and a friend on speakerphone, and keeps anything tied to a good evening with people.
• Mentor works in waves, two rooms at a run, then a long stop to tell the story behind an old letter. They notice first when the other person's mood drops.
• Commander fills three bags before lunch and carries them out before anyone can change their mind.
• Diplomat sorts the wardrobe fast with one question: would I wear this out this week? They give things away freely and like company while they work.
• Strategist plans the order of rooms ahead, so dust only falls on what isn't clean yet. They keep a few things for later, each with a reason.
• Entrepreneur finds the fastest order and sticks to it. Whatever went unused for a year goes.
• Counselor goes slowly through a quiet list over a whole week and keeps what someone gave them.
• Craftsman takes the jobs that need hands, like window tracks and a loose hinge, and throws out anything broken unless it can be fixed today.

Who keeps the T-shirt in your home?

Type is often part of why one of you keeps the T-shirt and the other tosses the sock. Begin with the free compatibility test. After you finish, pass your result's link to your partner. When both of you have finished, Typeza names your relationship type: where you work together with ease, and where one plans while the other dives in.

Questions people ask

How long does spring cleaning take?

A small apartment often takes two people one full weekend. A family house can take a week of evenings, or two weekends.

Is spring cleaning the same as a deep clean?

Mostly. Spring cleaning is a deep clean done once a year, plus a big sort of the things you own.

How do you make spring cleaning more fun?

Do it with someone, play music, and plan a meal for when it's done. Or turn it into a party, where friends move from home to home and clean together.

Sources

• Wikipedia, "Spring cleaning". The practice of thoroughly cleaning a house in spring; in 19th-century America, March was often warm enough to open windows and doors for it.

Written by Virko Kask, founder of Typeza
Written with the help of AI tools.