Efficiently Eliminate All Kinds Of Gross Home Cleaning Conundrums With These 35 Tips

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04-05-2025

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Kick it all to the curb: Grime on your stove vent filter, hard water buildup on your glass shower, and layers of pet hair in your rug.
1. Soak your cooking fat-coated vent hood filter in a sink full of hot water and dish soap for an hour — I weighed mine down with a jar of peanut butter — then rinse to reveal its original shine and grease-catching ability.
That's exactly what I did with our filter, which hadn't been cleaned or replaced in over three years, and it worked like a charm! Yep, I took these pictures myself! And yes I also made sure the PB jar's lid wasn't close to submerged, and I washed the jar afterward.
Sure, it's not expensive to buy a new filter (they run about $10 from Amazon), but we're renters and I wasn't sure what brand we needed to get. Our NYC landlord was not about to replace it for us without a loooooot of hassle. Aluminum ones like these are perfectly washable. If you have a charcoal filter, though, you'll need to replace it if you want it to remove odors the way it's designed to.
2. Get deep down in those dirt-packed window track crevices with a cleaning brush specifically designed for the purpose. Paired with your favorite all-purpose cleaner and some paper towels to wipe, in less than five minutes you'll be saying "bye" to the eyesore!
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Sure, you could use an old toothbrush for this too, but it'll take you longer because the brush head's not nearly as long as this one. Reviewers say the stiff scraper end of this brush really helps get into tricky corners, too.
Get a pack of two from Amazon for $4.99 (available in 5 color combos).
3. Eliminate nasty, seemingly-impossible nicotine, grease, and smoke stains with an industrial-strength degreaser.
The reviewer who got these pictured results used Purple Power, which works wonders on stuff like nasty car wheels, greasy clothing stains, and built-up oil on stoves. While it's excellent for heavy-duty problems, it is a tad harsh, so always test it in a hidden area before using it on painted surfaces or fabrics.
Get two spray bottles of it from Amazon for $22.61. It's also available as a gallon of concentrate for $6.97.
4. Secure a plastic bag filled with vinegar + baking soda around your shower head to descale hard water stains and break up mold or mildew while you go back and sit on the couch.
I do exactly this about every six months or so, and it works every single time! See my full shower hack review.
5. Wipe down your fingerprint-smear-riddled, sneeze-droplet-encrusted, dust-covered TV and laptop screens with an extra large MagicFiber microfiber cleaning cloth that's exactly like the tiny cleaning cloths that come with your laptop and phone, except HUGE. Nope, you don't need anything else. And it's so good, it won't take you long to make those screens look perfect.
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A different type of microfiber than the towels you use for car and other house cleaning, these have a super tight weave that's safe for more delicate surfaces like camera lenses, eye glasses, and modern flat screen TVs.
Get a three pack from Amazon for $14.99.
6. Work a miracle on your disgusting toilet tank by pouring in a cup of citric acid, topping with some boiling water, and walking away for a few hours.
The step-by-step:
1. Turn the water to your toilet off with the little metal valve in the back.
2. Flush the toilet so the tank empties, but doesn't refill (because the water's off).
3. Pour a half cup of citric acid in the tank.
4. Fill the tank up with hot water (some people boil it, some people just use hot from the tap).
5. Let it sit for at least two hours, and up to overnight.
6. Give it all a scrub with your toilet brush.
7. Turn the water back on, and flush a few times till all the mess is gone!
Get a two-pound bag from Amazon for $14.99.
7. Brighten your greying, dirty, and mildewed white grout by running some bleach gel over all the worst spots.
From Classy Clutter, who also uses a drill scrub brush to supplement. Note that this only really works for white grout, and could even change the tone of any grout with color.
TIL that the pictured Clorox bleach pens were discontinued, womp womp. I recommend either DIY-ing your own (Happy Money Saver has a how-to) or opting for the Skylar Life bleach gel, which you can get from Amazon for $14.99.
8. And run a line of the same mold and mildew remover gel along your mold-infested caulking to banish even seemingly embedded black spots from your bathroom without having to do more than simply rinse it away after a few hours.
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You do have to let it sit for four to five hours (or even overnight), but the results, as proven by the review photos like the one here, are worth it. The gel formula lets it stick and stay exactly where you put it down, which is why it works better than just spraying with regular bleach: The bleach stays right on the mold stain until it's gone, without drying up or running off. My best friend bought some of this from one of my posts and said it worked exactly the way I said it did — and when I saw her shower, all the grout and caulking were perfectly white!
Get one bottle from Amazon for $14.99 or three bottles for $36.99 ($12.33/bottle).
9. Melt away years of rusty stain buildup all over your bathroom with some spray-on cleaning gel — all you do is spray, wait a minute or two, then rinse to reveal your bathroom's ~sparkle~.
10. Save yourself lots of fruitless scrubbing with a toilet brush and use a pumice stone to quickly banish those impossible rust and mineral rings in your toilet bowl.
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Citric acid could work here too, if you want to leave it sitting overnight. But if you want that ring gone in five minutes of scrubbing, the pumice stone's the way to go. Get one from Amazon for $10.80.
11. And if you have to pumice regularly, start dropping in a weekly-ish citiric acid-infused toilet bomb and you might not have to scrape those hard water stains off ever again.
Bombs Away / Etsy
Just swish once or twice, let it fizz for about five minutes, then scrub for a minute or so with a toilet brush. You'll probably still need a pumice stone to get it clean the first time, but regular use of these can help keep your toilet hard-water-stain-free for longer.
These are both made and sold by Bombs Away, an Elizabethtown Pennsylvania-based small business that sells hand made cleaning and bath products.
Get them from Etsy for $11.99+.
12. Then stamp some gel into your clean toilet to actually keep it that way for weeks and months at a time.
Tap to play GIF
Scrubbing Bubbles
All you have to do is re-stamp as needed. If you can't imagine not using your toilet brush, you can use the small remaining bit of gel to scrub down the bowl before applying more. I used this in college and can personally attest it really does work!
Get enough to keep your toilet clean for up to 10 weeks from Amazon for $4.67.
13. Wipe away built-up layers of soap scum and hard water stains on your glass doors with the help of a soft cleanser — the reviewer who took the photos below said they didn't even have to scrub.
14. Leisurely dab up even the most impossible and old set-in carpet and upholstery stains with the help of a spray-and-blot spot remover. Yes, really: the pictured stain below was *six years old*, and even it came up.
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I've used this stuff on a week-old strawberry smoothie stain (on a blue and white rug), chocolate stains on fuzzy pillows, and other mystery stains, and have seen it for myself — it really does work! It's great for all kinds of stains, like oil, makeup, food, dirt, rust, ink, and wine; even if they're years old. (It won't work on, say, hair dye stains, though. It's a cleaner, not a bleach.)
Get it from Amazon for $6.65; or if that's sold out, from another listing for $17.79.
15. Have pets that shed? Pick up every last little bit of their fur that's embedded in your carpet using the squeegee-side of a rubber broom. Can you believe the German Shepard owner who took this pic uses a Dyson pet vac — and THAT is how much hair the broom got that the vacuum didn't??
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It also works wonders on hardwood floors and tile! It won't take very long for this thing to pluck every last piece of pet hair out of your space. One reviewer recommends using short, quick strokes to make it happen as quickly as possible!
Get it from Amazon for $12.99.
16. And use any old squeegee and some water in a spray bottle to easily clean pet hair off your sofa, furniture, and basically anything that's upholstered with fabric.
Just spritz once or twice, squeegee, and watch it clump up. Then use your hands or a vacuum to suck up the clumps. It's the same concept as the broom above, but for smaller areas than your floor, and you probably already have a squeegee at home!
From CareaBearaSara. Get a similar squeegee from Amazon for $10.99.
17. Nab entire neighborhoods of dust bunnies in a single swipe with a reusable, extra-thick microfiber mop pad designed to fit snugly on your Swiffer and wash effortlessly in the laundry. Get it wet (squeeze it out before attaching) to wipe up dried mud, pasta sauce, or whatever everyday gunk's gracing your floors after the dust's gone.
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You'll cut down on single-use pad waste while making everyday cleaning about ten billion times easier.
Get a set of two from Amazon for $11.49.
18. Or enlist iRobot's Roomba Robot Vacuum and Mop Combo to sweep and mop at the same time so you don't have to. Your dogs shed significantly too much hair for you to even attempt to keep up with it. IDK about you, but there's no way I'm ever going to vacuum or mop every day without one of these little buddies doing it for me.
The little microfiber mop pad is washable and reusable — it says up to 30 times, but I've had a lot of microfiber cleaning towels in my day and I suspect it would last significantly longer than that. You still may want to get extras though ($64.99 for several replenishment parts) so you can have several in the laundry!
Get it from Amazon for $149.
19. Or if you have carpet / hard floor combos, splurge on a robo vac. Regular vacuuming = the best way to keep all that pet hair, tracked-in kid dirt, and wafted-in tree pollen under control so it doesn't build up into a coating on your barefeet when you walk through the kitchen. *Gag*
And like I said, I'm not one to vacuum or sweep or mop every day unless something like this does it for me.
This vac moves between hard floors and low-pile carpets/rugs without a glitch and can pick up all the accumulated dust, dirt, and hair left strewn about your home while you go do literally anything else. The reviewer who took the pic on the right above says that with a goldendoodle in the house, it picks up that much dust and hair EVERY DAY. Omg.
Get it from Amazon for $229.99.
20. Clean and polish your stainless steel in a single, quick, satisfying step with this spray-and-wipe cleaner.
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My mom's had stainless appliances for well over a decade and a half now, and discovered this spray from reading our posts, and said it works *wonderfully*, truly 100% better than any other kind of stainless cleaners she'd tried in the past!! So naturally I bought a bottle when we moved to a place with stainless appliances, and I second every word she says. It's fast, cleans off all kinds of stains, and leaves a like-new shiny finish with a simple spray and wipe!
Get it and a large microfiber cloth from Amazon for $19.95.
21. Kick all the gunk and scum out of your dishwasher, including hard water buildup, by running it empty with a cleaning tablet.
Get six tablets for $8.99 from Amazon.
22. Microwave a bowl filled with water + lemon for three to five minutes — then leave the door closed for a few minutes so everything can steam — and you'll be able to wipe off every single dried-on food bit with one swipe of a paper towel.
Tap to play GIF
Natalie Brown / BuzzFeed, Facebook: watch
This also works with water + vinegar, or honestly just plain water. And of course you can wipe off with a sponge instead. I've been doing this for years, and have yet to find a gross microwave where this doesn't work wonders. Read my full review or watch the Nifty video.
23. Spray some fume-free foam cleaner in your oven, let it all sit overnight, then easily wipe away the crud in the morning — the oven will look brand new.
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Technically, you can let this sit anywhere from two hours to overnight to get results. And while you might have to do *some* light scrubbing, it should be much easier than it would've been without this cleaner! Don't forget to spray it on the racks too (unless your racks have a special coating on 'em, then skip it and stick with soap and water for those).
Get a 24-ounce can from Amazon for $8.98.
25. Or if you have a metal or enameled gas stove, enlist a soft cleanser to easily scrub off that cooked-on gunk that's layered itself up into a very nasty looking situation. I'm talking the stuff that soap and water don't touch.
Kayla Suazo / BuzzFeed
Kayla, a former editor here a BuzzFeed, tested it out herself when she used it on her enameled stove — and it made the stains completely vanish! Get a bottle from Amazon for $7.45, or read her Barkeeper's Friend review for more.
26. Run a knife wrapped in a damp cloth through the gap between your oven and your stove to extract all the crumbs and crud lodged in there. Then cover that gap with a pair of stainless steel covers so you never have to clean that spot out again.
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They simply slide right in there, or you can use an included adhesive to make 'em more permanent. Because they're stainless, they won't warp with the heat.
Get them from Amazon in two sizes: 20-3/4" long for $34 or 23-3/4" long for $45.59.
27. Dissolve hard water stains on your water faucets by wrapping them up in vinegar-soaked paper towels for an hour — they'll wipe off in one go.
28. Grind up a garbage disposal cleaning packet — its foam will reach into the depths of the disposal to clean every. single. last. inch. Bye, nose-wrinkling stench.
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Note that if you're disposal's clogged, though, this definitely won't take care of the problem. For that, you'll probably need to call a plumber.
Get a pack of eight from Amazon for $10.84.
29. Pick up that grimy, sticky dust that seems to inevitably accumulate on your stove and vent hood with a few drops of mineral oil (or even olive or vegetable oil) on a paper towel.
If you do opt for veg, olive, or some other food oil instead, make sure to wash it off any surfaces thoroughly when you're done to prevent it from going rancid and smelling bad. From The Manly Housekeeper (which doesn't seem to exist anymore, sigh).
Get a 16-ounce bottle of mineral oil from Amazon for $8.40.
30. Spray Dawn's Foaming soap on especially nasty, grease-caked things like griddle pans, countertop appliances, and your favorite pink skillet that doesn't look so pink anymore from all the years of cooking oil that have burned onto its sides. Let the soap sit for a few minutes to do its work, then marvel at how easily it all wipes away.
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In fact, Elizabeth Lilly, an editor here at BuzzFeed, swears by this stuff! She says: "I live without a dishwasher, and I honestly use that as an excuse to order takeout. But, as soon as I got my hands on a bottle of this stuff (regular Dawn is my go-to dish soap, BTW), I put it to use on both a saucepan I used to make homemade enchilada sauce *and* the casserole dish I baked those enchiladas, which had a ton of caked-on food. It really does work like I say it does! Like, scary well."
Get four bottles from Amazon for $16.63.
31. Press a boot scraper into the ground next to your back porch to help get all the gunk off your shoes before going inside, especially if you have a particularly mucky yard or garden. The less you track in, the less you have to clean later.
Forge and Flower / Etsy
It works for all kinds of shoes, of course! This one's made by Forge and Flower, a small Massachusetts-based family-owned business.
Get it from Forge and Flower on Etsy for $55.
32. You could even take it one step further and create a designated spot for everyone to take their shoes off at (or right inside) the door.
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Keeping your floors clean without having to actually clean them constantly starts with eliminating sources of dirt! Set it up wherever you enter and exit your home the most.
There are lots of options out there: Large cabinets that'll look like any other piece of furniture ($162.99 from Amazon), big cubbie benches that could be the start to a DIY mudroom ($106.83+ from Amazon), smaller shoe ottomans for tiny apartments ($96.82+ from Amazon), basic racks that could sit just inside the back door ($24.87 from Amazon), or even over-the-door cubbies you could stash inside your coat closet ($32.97 from Amazon).
33. And if you have dogs who constantly bring dirt in from the yard, wipe down their paws with an old towel — or if a towel just doesn't cut it, a paw washer — before they come back inside.
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Enlisting an old beach towel really can work wonders to keep your floors cleaner, especially if you're consistent about giving them a quick wipe-down.
But if you deal with lots of mud or sand that gets embedded between their toes, a paw washer could help. Its silicone bristles are super gentle so many dogs don't mind them, and they help rinse off most dirt and mud with just a quick dip or two (for particularly muddy days, you may have to change the water once or twice, but that will still be easier than pulling out the hose). Just imagine how much cleaner your floors would stay if your dogs stopped bringing dirt inside with them, period!
Get one from Amazon for $16.99+ (available in three sizes and eight colors).
34. Grab that bottle of stain remover from number 14 again and use it to make the years-old mystery stain on your mattress vanish right before your eyes.
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Or at least make it look, like, 1000x better.
Get it from Amazon for $6.65.
35. Bust through the layers of dirt and hard water buildup on your most-used kitchen and bathroom cabinets *and* condition the wood and finish so they gleam in one fell swoop with a wood polish and cleaner. *mic drop*
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Get it from Amazon for $19.95.
You, waving farewell to the mess you just cleaned quickly and easily:
Warner Bros.