How often should you wash your walls? Walls are the main building blocks of a home. They protect us by providing a barrier between indoors and out. Beyond that, they hold up the ceiling and roof while partitioning spaces to give us the much-appreciated sense of enclosure. Yet, walls hardly ever show up in our regular household cleaning schedules. Perhaps that’s because walls are not the easiest part of the house to clean.

So let’s discuss walls today, we’ll give you a trick or two about how to clean walls fast and effectively similar to how a professional cleaning company does it.

Check Out : Benefits Of Engaging A Cleaning Company Singapore

How Often Should You Wash Your Walls?

How often you should clean your walls typically depends on how fast or slow your house gets dirty. Some of the factors that play a role in this include:

• The weather condition or season in your area. For instance, spring is commonly associated with cleaning and performing heavy-duty tasks, including scrubbing floors and washing walls to remove the dust accumulated during winter.
• How often you leave your windows open: Besides allowing fresh air into the house, open windows also welcome lots of dust, sand, pollen, chemicals, small insects, and debris trapped in the air from outside.
• Kids and pests: Little kids and dirty walls go hand in hand. Kids love to experiment, so it’s not surprising that your walls are bound to get little-dirty-fingerprints, marks and scuffs if you have kids in your home.
• Allergies: There are many things that can increase allergies and make you miserable in your own house. For instance, dust particles, debris, pets, mold, and pollen allergies.

If any of the above factors play a role in your home, you will need to ensure regular wall cleaning. For instance, homes with lots of allergies need the walls cleaned at least 3 to 4 times per month. If you have little kids, you can spot clean the dirty fingerprints and stains rather than doing a full-wall cleaning every week.

Generally, you should be keen to notice as your walls get dirty and clean them accordingly. But a good rule of thumb is to clean your walls at least two times every year. You can make it easy by including wall cleaning in your spring and fall cleaning.

How To Clean Painted Walls

The most important thing to consider when washing painted walls is the type of finish. Whether your wall has a glossy or flat finish will determine how washing/scrubbing affects its final look.

Below is a quick guide on how to wash painted walls.

How To Clean Walls With Flat Paint

Flat paint, also referred to as a matte finish, has the least amount of shine, and it doesn’t reflect light. Other dull paint finishes include satin and eggshell finishes. Though washable, these finishes are not durable when it comes to washing. As such, you should use a clean sponge and ensure that you wring it almost completely before cleaning walls with flat paint. Note that you should not use harsh chemicals or detergents and do not scrub flat painted walls too hard!

How To Clean Glossy or Semigloss Painted Walls

These types of walls are known for being super shiny with an ability to reflect light, giving them an almost mirror-like look. Besides that, glossy and semigloss paints are highly durable. This allows you to use a mild degreaser to clean them. You should only use a soft sponge when cleaning as gloss, and semigloss walls can scratch easily.

How To Clean Walls With Oil-Based Paint

Walls painted with an oil-based paint are pretty easy to wash. You can use a solution of white vinegar and ensure that you wring the soft cloth or sponge until it’s slightly damp before cleaning the wall.

Texture-painted walls tend to be dust-catchers. A good example of such walls is those with a troweled finish, and they require deeper cleaning. You should add one ounce of borax to every pint of water when cleaning such walls.

How To Clean Walls With Latex Paint

All you need to clean walls with latex paint is warm water and vinegar or dish detergent. Prepare a cleaning solution by adding an appropriate amount of dish detergent or a few tablespoons of vinegar into half a bucket of warm water. Ensure the solution is properly mixed before using a soft sponge to clean the wall gently. You should wring the sponge until it’s nearly dry and gently scrub the wall to remove dirt and grime. Pay keen attention to the frequently touched place like near light switches and doorknobs.

Make a water and baking soda paste, then gently rub the latex paint with a nonabrasive pad to remove stubborn smudges, fingerprints, and scuffs. Rinse the wall with a second clean sponge and clear water. Be careful not to wet areas around light switches and electrical connections. Ensure electricity is turned off at the circuit breaker box if you need to clean such areas.

How To Wash Stubborn Stains From Painted Walls

Cleaning stains as soon as they occur increases your chances of removing them successfully and with ease. Baking soda and warm water make the best cleaner to remove stains from painted walls. Mix a few tablespoons of baking soda with warm water to form a paste. Gently work the formula into the stained area on the wall. Use a clean damp cloth to wash away any residue. This slightly abrasive formula is highly recommended for grease wall stains.