8 Helpful Cleaning Tips for Insanely Busy People

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Keeping a house clean while working full-time is challenging.  These helpful cleaning tips for busy people will allow you to commit to cleaning and get the job done in the time you have available.

The flowery chime roared into my ears at 5:15 in the morning, sucking me out of a comfortable slumber.  Sure, I had technically slept in an hour later than I do the rest of the week.  But still.  This was my one day off, and I was exhausted after my usual 60-hour work week.

I turned off the exuberant alarm on my phone, closed my eyes, and willed myself back to bed.  But it was no use.  Thoughts of my neglected toilets, cluttered living room, and cat hair-covered furniture tortured me as I drifted in that netherworld between wake and sleep.

Yes, it was no use.  I had to get up and clean my house.

Working Homemaker:  The Struggle is Real

Keeping a house clean is a fair amount of work.  Add a full-time job, family, and activities to the mix?  You could easily detour to burnout city, with a pit stop to drain all cleaning motivation.

You’re not alone if you’re having trouble keeping your house clean while balancing a full-time job.  Or caring for little ones full time.  Or whatever your personal definition of crazy busy might be.

You worked all day.  You’re tired.  your brain is shot.  Tossing yourself into a chair in front of the TV like a discarded marionette sounds amazing.

And yet, you want a clean house.  A beautiful, decluttered, sparkling house.  But you just got home from work.  And cleaning sounds too much like… work.

I get it.  I’ve worked about 60 hours per week for the last 8 years or so, and I plan to keep on doing it.  I’ve also somehow managed to keep my house (more or less) consistently clean and decluttered.

Kick off your power heels, pour a glass of wine, and huddle up with me.  I have my cleaning tips for busy people at the ready.

Scroll down to read my 8 cleaning tips for busy people, or watch the video below!

A Smidge of Tough Love

Before I lay out my cleaning tips for busy people, I need to kidney-punch you with a tough love truth bomb.  (So sorry!)

1. You deserve to live in a clean, clutter-free house.
2. Nobody’s going to keep your house clean and clutter-free but you.

That wasn’t so bad, was it?

You work hard and you deserve a clean home that evokes positive feelings.  But, just like with so many other things in life, you have to work to get what you deserve.  There is no magic shortcut.  Ok, there is, you can hire a maid.  But that’s not what we’re talking about here.

My point is that you have to commit to doing the work.  Get used to keeping your house clean, if you aren’t used to doing it already.  It may be tough at first, but stick with me, ok?  You deserve that clean house, friend, and you can do this.

Cleaning Tips for Busy People

Ok, enough of that.  Here’s how I keep my house clean while working full-time.

Clean a Little Each Day

Finding a big chunk of time to clean your entire house is a longshot when you work full-time.  Add in hobbies, family activities, and time with friends, and it’s almost impossible.  Doing all the cleaning all at once can also feel like a huge, intimidating time suck.  As a result, if feels like you never have time to clean.

The good news is that you don’t have to clean your entire house all at once.  Instead, commit to cleaning a little each day.

There are a few ways to go about this.  You can clean 1 room top to bottom each day (Such as Monday – living room, Tuesday – bathrooms).  Or, you can complete 1 house-wide task each day (Such as dusting on Mondays, vacuuming on Tuesdays).

I wrote an entire post on how to keep your house clean in 30 minutes a day.  You can also grab a copy of my free cleaning checklist, which will help you keep your house clean from top to bottom.

Find Pockets of Time to Clean

You can micro-clean in the little pockets of time where you’re between activities or waiting on someone else.  Make great use of your time by knocking out little tasks whenever you have a free minute.  For example:

• Kids not quite ready for school?  Unload the dishwasher while you wait.
• Commercial break?  Throw a load of laundry in.  We watch almost everything on DVR anymore, but I sometimes let the commercials play so I have a chance to take care of a few quick cleaning tasks.
• Waiting on a friend to pick you up for coffee?  Sort the mail and shred anything you don’t need that can’t be recycled.  I always remove any portions with my name or address, because I’m paranoid like that!
• Washing machine not quite finished?  Pre-treat the items in your next load.
• Spouse taking a quick shower before a night out?  Spot-clean the kitchen floor or lint roll the lampshades.

Clean More Often

One of the most effective ways to keep your house clean when you work full-time or you’re “too busy to clean” is to clean more often.  This is probably the most important of my cleaning tips for busy people.

I know what you’re thinking.  “Umm, I already have NO time to clean.  Now you’re telling me I have to clean even more?”  I get it.  Hear me out.

Here’s the thing.  The cleaner your house is, the easier it is to keep clean.

Think of a toilet that hasn’t been cleaned in ages.  It probably has a thick layer of dust, grime, and, um, waste adorning it inside and out.  That’s going to take some elbow grease (And possibly a gas mask) to get cleaned!

Now think of a toilet that gets wiped down a few times each week.  When cleaning day rolls around, you’re looking at 60 seconds max to shine that baby up and disinfect the inside.  Which would you rather do?

Yeah, I’d prefer the shiny toilet too.  And the path to the shiny toilet (Countertop, floor, etc) is to clean more often.  A few times each week, take 30 seconds to wipe down the hard surfaces in your kitchen, bathrooms, and glass tabletops.  I like to wipe down surfaces after I finish using the kitchen or bathroom (TMI?  Sorry!).

Once you get used to wiping down hard surfaces regularly, you’ll see that it takes a miniscule amount of time and packs some awesome rewards.  As a result of those extra mini-cleanings, your full-on kitchen and bathroom cleaning sessions will be quicker, easier, and less overwhelming.  AND less gross.

Give Yourself Easy Access to Cleaning Supplies

Speaking of cleaning more often, you’ll be much more likely to do it if you have easy access to cleaning supplies.

As busy women, we’re not likely to finish up in the kitchen or bathroom, walk to another area of our home to get cleaning supplies, walk back to the kitchen or bathroom, wipe surfaces down, then return the cleaning supplies to their storage location.  Who has time for that?

The simplest fix is to store a basic cleaning product in the kitchen and in each bathroom, or at least on each floor of your home.  I’m partial to Clorox wipes.  I store a container of them in each bathroom, as well as on my kitchen counter.  As a result, it’s quick and easy for me to clean more often, because I have easy access to supplies.

I like to keep my organizing supplies at the ready too, so I can get started organizing when inspiration strikes.

Get Used to Putting Things Away

As they say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.  Getting in the habit of putting things away will go a long way toward keeping your house decluttered.  As with cleaning frequently, a little regular decluttering will make it faster and less overwhelming to maintain a clean home.

Before you leave a room, glance around for items that don’t belong – anything that’s stranded away from its home.  Take those stranded items with you when you leave the room, and put them away.

Look for Ways to Make Cleaning Easier

You’re already busy.  Don’t make life any harder than it needs to be!  Cut out extra steps in your cleaning routines and décor choices wherever possible.  Need an example?  Coming right up.

Making Life Easier:  Making My Bed

I LOVE a made bed.  It makes me feel like the adult I am.  It makes my bedroom feel sophisticated.  And it’s the first little accomplishment of my day.

But for YEARS, I struggled to make my bed, much to my own disappointment.

See, I always had a beautiful, stylish quilt set or comforter set.  These precious specimens were treated like the queen of England’s crown.  To be looked at and admired, not to be touched.  And certainly not to be slept in!  They were expensive, difficult to clean, and too beautiful not to preserve.

For sleeping, I had a set of sturdy, inxpensive blankets.  At bedtime, I would sanctimoniously fold my quilt or comforter, tuck the matching shams safely away, and break out my warm, trusty, workhorse blankets.

The next morning, I would get up, invariably run late, and not have time to put those pieces back on display at my little Smithsonian Museum of Bedding.  They stayed in like-new condition, stowed in my closet for weeks at a time, while my bed lay in a messy, unmade state day after day.

Cutting Out Extra Steps

Finally, I got tired of having 2 sets of bedding (“Display” and “sleep”).  What new level of neurosis WAS this?  So, I switched to a duvet and duvet cover.  I wash the cover once per week (Along with my sheets), and I wash the duvet itself once per month.

I use the duvet to sleep AND to display on my made-up bed.  As a result, I make my bed every single day.  I’m no longer dealing with 2 sets of bedding.  I just pull my duvet up, throw the shams on, and boom – bed made.  And FYI, the photo above is not my bed 🙂

Another shortcut I take concerns my shower curtain.  I switched to a fabric Hookless shower curtain with replaceable fabric liner.  The entire thing is machine-washable, so I pull it off once a week, pop it in the washer, and let it hang dry back on the rod in the shower.  It’s a snap.

Look at your daily and weekly cleaning and decluttering routines, and see where you can make things easier by cutting out extra steps.

Get Rid of Stuff You Don’t Need

Less is more when it comes to keeping a house clean and clutter-free on a tight schedule. That’s for 2 reasons:

• The more stuff you have, the more easily your house can get cluttered
• The more stuff you have, the longer and harder you have to work at cleaning

As a child, I gazed wide-eyed at many a collection of nick knacks in the homes of adults I visited with my family.  Ceramic clowns, plush toys, and thimbles from around the world.

And I bet they were hell to dust.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t have a collection or décor.  I am saying that collections or lots of décor will add to your cleaning time.  If you’re ok with that, then pop that group of stone frogs out for the world to see.

That being said, you should regularly weed out items you no longer use, need or love from your home.  As a result, cleaning will become faster and easier.  It’ll also result in less clutter.  Yes, please!

Enlist the Help of Family

Unless you live alone, I’m guessing you’re not the only one messing up that house you’re struggling to keep clean.  Enlist the help of your fellow mess-makers to keep things tidy.

Easier said than done, you say?  Try these tips.

• Lead by example.  Get crazy good at cleaning up after yourself.  Your kids and spouse might take notice and follow suit.
• Set expectations.  Let your household know that they’re expected to clean up after themselves.  Also lay down the law that chores aren’t optional, and that contributing around the house is part of being a responsible adult.  After all, you don’t want to be doing your kids’ laundry when they’re 35, do you?
• Make it easier on yourself to clean up after others.  Inevitably, you’ll end up having to clean up after your family, maybe more often than you’d like.  Make it as easy as possible on yourself by designating a basket or bin for each person, putting their clutter inside, and letting them take it from there.  You might tell them that anything left in their bin at the end of the week gets donated to goodwill.

Give Yourself Grace When You Can’t Clean, Then Get Back on Track

Despite your best efforts, and all of my cleaning tips for busy people, there will be days when you can’t clean for one reason or another.  Don’t get discouraged or beat yourself up.  Doing so will make you feel like you can’t do it, like you aren’t in control, and like it’s not worth it.  You can, you are, it is!

Instead, forgive yourself when cleaning and decluttering don’t go as planned, and decide to get back on track the next day.  Or the next minute, even.  You might even have to make yourself do it.  Whatever it takes, get back on track ASAP to avoid falling out of your cleaning routine and losing motivation to maintain a clean home.

Cleaning Tips for Busy People:  Conclusion

Keeping your home clean and decluttered home when you work full-time or are otherwise insanely busy is no small task.  Commit yourself to keeping your house clean, then make it faster and easier with my cleaning tips for busy people:

• Clean a little each day
• Micro-clean by completing quick cleaning and decluttering tasks in empty pockets of time – such as during commercials or while you’re waiting on another person
• Clean the hard surfaces in your house more often – think kitchen and bathroom counters, toilets, and glass-top surfaces
• Store cleaning supplies in easy-to-access locations, so you’ll be more likely to clean more often
• Get into the habit of putting things away
• Look for ways to make cleaning and decluttering eliminating out extra steps in your routines
• Get rid of stuff you don’t need to make cleaning and decluttering faster and easier
• Enlist the help of your family to complete cleaning tasks
• Give yourself grace when you don’t have a chance to clean, then get back into your routine.

I hope These cleaning tips for busy people help you achieve a clean home in the midst of your insanely busy life.  It’s not always easy, but it’s doable.  When my alarm goes off at 5:15 next Sunday morning, I’ll make myself get out of bed and get my house clean.  Because I deserve a clean house, and no one’s going to keep it clean but me.

P.S. –  Did you have a chance to sign up for my free cleaning checklist yet?  Grab your copy now!