5 top hacks to make cleaning a cinch

Whether it’s an annual spring clean or you’re a regular Marie Kondo, cleaning and tidying up can be taxing and time consuming. Or rather, it used to be! With our 5 top tips, SMARTY can help you make cleaning your home a total breeze. Plus, while you’re saving your data by scrubbing, you’re making money, because SMARTY will refund you for all that data you don’t use.

Tip #1: White vinegar is a serious win

White vinegar can be the most useful cleaning tool in your arsenal, and you might even have some lurking in your kitchen cupboard already! If you’re looking to descale your showerhead, you can pop a bag of white vinegar over it. Tie it tight and leave it overnight; in the morning, wipe it down and you’ll have a shiny, clean showerhead. Or, you can use white vinegar to clean up those cloudy drinking glasses you’ve got, or even to clean your blinds by covering your hand with a sock and dipping that into the vinegar. Way easier than stripping them down.

Tip #2: Don’t be a lemon, but use one!

If you’re tired, unable to scrub your microwave rigorously, or can’t bear tackling that age-old soup stain, there’s a simpler way. Squeeze some lemon juice into half a cup of water, and add the lemon in there too for good measure, then microwave it for about 3 minutes (to get the water boiling). This will steam the water, so make sure you let everything sit with the microwave door closed for about 5 minutes after the ding so it can cool down. Then, open it up (be careful, as there may be some steam left, and you don’t want to get burned!) and remove the water. You can wipe down the microwave now with a cloth or rag, and everything should just clean right up. No scrubbing! You can also use a lemon, cut in half, to clean a chopping board. Rub it across the surface and then rinse the chopping board down; the lemon acidity will eliminate any lingering smells or grime caught in the material.

Tip #3: Don’t cry over spilled glitter

Chances are, if you’ve got a child, you’ve ever celebrated Christmas or you’re just a big fan of sparkle, you’ll have suffered the pain of glitter causing a mess in your home. Whether you’ve had a crafting mishap or your friends thought it’d be funny to fill your birthday card with the offending substance, you’ll know it’s a nightmare to fully purge it from the carpet. However, if you’ve got some Play-Doh or something similar (or even sticky tape!), it’s easier than ever to sort out. Just press it into the glitter and watch as it removes the nightmare plastic from whatever surface you need to clean.

Tip #4: Extra, extra, clean all about it!

Newspapers are great for that Sunday morning perusal of the stock market (okay, we prefer the cartoons...), but it can also double as a great glass cleaner. Grab your local paper and, once you’ve read it cover to cover of course, you just need to test it. Hold the paper between your thumb and forefinger for a minute or so, an dif your fingers are stain-free, you’re good to go! Mix that trusty vinegar we mentioned before with some water, then use the newspaper the same way you would a regular cloth. Now that’s a headline story!

Tip #5: Don’t throw out those stained clothes…

...Fix them, instead! There’s a tonne of household items that can counteract stains. Here’s some of the top ones. With all of these, take the method with a pinch of salt, and remember that really tough stains might still need some additional methods.

• Remove sweat stains with lemon juice, to save that grim gym wear!
• Grass stains from too much park football? Trusty ol’ vinegar will sort that right out.
• Any writers or artists out there (or anyone who has a habit of forgetting to cap their pen!) will love to know that milk works wonders on an ink stain.
• Use salt to prevent a red wine stain occurring; grab it quickly, pop it onto the wine to stop the liquid spreading through any fabric, then dab at it gently. Never scrub a red wine stain!

So there you have it. 5 simple household cleaning tips without hassle or stress. Easy and simple, just like SMARTY.