Even if you live by yourself or don't experience frequent activity in your home, your floors still need attention if you want it to remain spotless. In this case, we recommend giving your floors sweep and mop sessions once a week. Dust and dirt can accumulate over time if no one is going in and out of different rooms.
Mopping Helps Prevent Floor Scratches
When debris builds up on the floor over time, they accumulate and can cause tiny scratches in your floor, which might become permanent and eventually become an ugly blemish.
That's why it's best to give the floor a good mopping every week. First, start with sweeping up all the dirt and dust. Then, using a store-bought floor cleaner or a home mixture and wet the floor to disinfect. Then, use a mop or a cloth to clean!
Using excess water
A common mistake is thinking that wet is clean! On the contrary, when cleaning a floor, you should try to use the least amount of water possible! After dipping the mop in the bucket, wring it out until it's almost dry!
Mop Frequently
High-traffic areas, like kitchens, bathrooms, hallways, and entryways, require weekly mopping. Infrequently used rooms, such as formal living areas or guest rooms, can be mopped every other week, or even once a month, so long as they're vacuumed once every seven days to remove dust and grit.
To keep your house clean, you may want to consider mopping with two buckets. Keep plain water for rinsing in one bucket and detergent in the other bucket. Start with the detergent bucket, mop the floor, and then dip the dirty mop into the rinsing bucket.
But as a rule of thumb, you should mop your floors at least once a week—especially in areas that are more likely to get stains from drips and spills, like the kitchen and bathroom. “Of course, you need to vacuum or sweep the floor before mopping,” explains Leiva.
At this point, your floor should now be quite clean, with little or no detergent residue left. But for an extra cleaning step, you can mop over the entire floor a final time using nothing but fresh hot rinse water. If your rinse water gets at all dirty or sudsy, you will know the final rinse has been necessary.
Overall, microfiber mops have more pros than Swiffer mops. Microfiber mops can be used as a two-in-one to both sweep and mop at the same time. However, a Swiffer mop can typically only clean after the sweeping has already been done.
Downsides to just using water to mop floors
Will not remove bacteria from floors. Cannot remove stains. If you cannot clean the floor effectively with just water, you might end up just mopping the dirt around the surface. In turn, the entire floor could look grotty and blemished.
By sweeping the house during the four hours at night, negativity spreads in the house and Maa Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, becomes angry, which affects the movement of money in the house.
Once a week at least.
Tetro says your bathroom is the ultimate bacteria host; E. coli can be found within six feet of the toilet and in the sink. To keep it at bay, disinfect the toilet and sink at least once weekly, and the bathtub every two weeks — more if you shower often.
How Often to Wash Your Floors With a Swiffer. Clean floors at least weekly to remove grit and grime that can leave minute scratches. Of course, clean up spills as soon as they happen. If you don't have time to wash the floor, use a dry Swiffer to sweep up loose dirt until you can wash the floor properly.
How Often Should You Clean Your Shower? Koch advises cleaning your shower weekly, but don't worry, it doesn't have to be a serious deep clean every time.
Dust mop (obstructed) 10 min. Damp mop (unobstructed) 16 min. Damp mop (obstructed) 30 min. Wet mop & rinse (Unobstructed) 35 min.
Using a dry mop first will make wet mopping easier and ensure a cleaner floor.
There are a few reasons why it happens: Using Too Much Soap: When it comes to cleaning, using more soap does not mean getting the floor extra clean or cleaning it faster. Using more soap leads to a residue build-up that can actually attract more dirt to the floors instead of getting rid of it.
For a deep clean, probably every week or so, mix 6-7 drops of a mild detergent (dish soap is usually fine) with one gallon of warm or hot water. Use the mixture to dampen a mop, and clean the floor in sections.
Over-mopping
For best results, mop your high-traffic areas no more than once a week. Other areas that see less foot traffic can be cleaned once a month, or (prepare to put your feet up) even once a quarter. Too much mopping can wear down the seal on your floors or oversaturate them with water.
How often should you mop? To put it simply, you should mop when the floor looks dirty. For small households, this may be every other week; for households with kids and pets, it may be once a week or more. Aslett suggests using doormats at entry doors to keep floors cleaner for longer.
Step 11: Let the floor dry
Try to avoid walking on it for 15 to 20 minutes, or until it's dry to the touch. If you do have to walk on it, wear clean socks. You can also help your floors dry faster by using a floor squeegee.
Floor Mopping
Mild dish soap is a surprisingly good floor cleaner. All you need is 1 to 2 tablespoons of dish soap mixed in with a bucket of water. Floors will be clean and shiny in no time. Dish soap is very effective on resilient floorings, such as linoleum and vinyl, and also works well on ceramic tile.
For us this means the living room, dining room, and kitchen. I also use Fabuloso® to mop the floors with too, it works great and leaves them smelling wonderful and clean too.
Make sweeping a part of your everyday chore. This prevents the accumulation of dust and keep the floor clean all the time. Make use of a specialized broom with short bristles so that it can get in between the grout and clean the floor. Mopping regularly helps to prevent dust accumulation on the floor.