How to clean your room for inspection (in one hour!)

It’s inspection time again, and for whatever reason, you’ve left the job of cleaning to the last minute. Go figure.

We’re not here to ask why–that’s not important right now. When time is short, you need to prioritise actions that will have the biggest impact on the overall look.

The last thing you need is judgement or a to-do list more overwhelming than the job at hand. So here are seven simple steps to getting your space ready for inspection. Lucky number seven. Here goes.

1. Chuck rubbish first

The worst thing you can have is rubbish lying around. It’s worse than clutter. It smells. It attracts insects and rodents, and these can have an exponentially worse impact on the property (as well as your health).

That’s what any landlord or inspector is bothered about: how will this affect the shelf-life of their furnishings before they have to fork out for an upgrade? They might also be concerned about your health. It depends on how far your welfare is, contractually, their responsibility.

Wet rubbish (like food scraps or dead flowers) is worse; get rid of that first. Then tackle the dry stuff. Take out all bins as soon as they’re full. You’ll appreciate the extra space when you have to vacuum later.

1. Bag up your laundry

Laundry takes up loads of space, whether it’s piled up waiting to be washed, sat on the airer waiting to be put away, or draped across your bed waiting for the opportunity to be worn again.

If you want to wear it again, put it away. If it’s clean enough to go back on your body, it’s fine for the wardrobe. If you really must separate the never-worn from the once-worn, stick them on separate sides of the wardrobe. That’s a simple enough system for now.

The rest is easy: put away clean laundry and shove everything else in your hamper or washing machine drum.

1. Dishes

Just do them. It’s easy to elevate the look of a room when there aren’t dirty plates in the sink and used teabags on the draining board.

1. Make your bed

If your bed is dirty, strip it and throw everything in the wash or laundry hamper. A bare mattress is better than a dirty bed. If it’s clean to the trained eye (remember who’s judging), arranging the sheets and pillows is fine.

While dirty sheets might not necessarily impact the long-term integrity of the room and its furnishings, they're a warning sign of a lack of care and cleanliness throughout the rest of the property and could raise a red flag with the inspector.

1. Wipe surfaces

It’s amazing what a difference this makes. Sticky, dusty or dirty surfaces look bad. But clean ones? They shine right back at you.

This includes walls, your desk and the sink in your room, if there is one. You can also wipe the radiator and skirting boards in no time at all. You’d be surprised how much dust and coffee splatter these surfaces attract.

1. Spray away any smells

Quick and easy. If you don’t have an air freshener or a scented candle, don’t go mad with a heavy deodorant or fragrance. Just open a window.

1. Vacuum or mop

Leave this activity to last because you’ll need a clear space first to give you enough room to manoeuvre a vacuum or mop.

Survival tips

If you’ve made it this far, you’re clearly committed. And there’s even more good news: there are hacks that can make this process feel a whole lot easier on the mind and body.

Crack a window

Fresh air is everything. It increases the oxygen level in the room, which your body and brain need to function and focus. It’ll also help disperse any bad smells.

Play music or a podcast

Find what works for you. Some people prefer to occupy their mind with a podcast and clean on autopilot. Others use music as a way to lock in on the task at hand.

Pace yourself

Take regular breaks, either between steps or at set times, to make the whole process feel more structured and stop you from feeling overwhelmed.

If you just attack the mess in a frenzy, with no plan of action, that’s a recipe for burnout halfway through the cleaning process. You’ll find yourself sitting amid a pile of half-filled bin bags and a floor still full of mess without the energy to continue.

Stay hydrated

Your brain is roughly 60% water. When you’re dehydrated, you get tired faster, your mood levels drop and your brain doesn’t function as well. So, take a sip.

Shadow clean (body doubling)

This is a go-to hack for getting the cleaning done. Start a video call with a friend, then you both clean together. This shared focus is a great way to generate a sense of accountability and can help you both to stay on track.

Doom-box it

Got a load of stuff that just doesn’t have a long-term storage solution yet? Chuck it in the doom box.

Agonising over where to store random bits and bobs is time wasted when you’ve got bigger fish to fry, like dirty bed linen or a carpet covered in clothes.

This isn’t a system to rely on long term, though. And you can’t have multiple doom boxes. You have one doom box that gets emptied and organised regularly, when you have more time and energy to dedicate to it.

Don’t add steps you don’t need

You might think you need to go and buy extra cleaning supplies, but with an hour until inspection time, you don’t. Adding steps like this will just slow you down. Often, they’re a form of procrastination anyway.

At the time, shopping, even if it’s for cleaning products, feels better than tackling the actual job of cleaning. But trust us, a tidy room feels so much better. And you’ll get there so much faster if you just make do with what you have to clean with right now.

Set a timer

No need to track the time on your phone, your alarm will decide when it’s time to move on to the next task.

When you’ve got limited time, it’s often better to give a few minutes of your attention to each of the core clean-up tasks than to focus on fully nailing just one.

After all, whoever is inspecting your room is going to take in the full picture, not just focus on how little laundry you have left to do.

Get inspection-ready next time with household supplies from UNiDAYS

Head over to our household hub to find deals on cleaning products, tools and storage systems that can better prepare you for the next cleaning inspection.