Carpets are notorious for being a pain to take care of. They get dirty easily and are hard to clean. If you don’t vacuum them in a while they almost take on a life of their own. That’s why we have rounded up some insider tips for carpet cleaning. It doesn’t always have to be a huge chore when you know just what you need to do.

Cleaning up spills

Any spills that you have on your carpet, the best way to make sure they don’t stain is to get to them straight away. Clean any debris off the top of the carpet that remains, then get a clean cloth and start blotting (not rubbing). This means pressing the cloth firmly into the carpet. After each press, turn the cloth so that you are blotting the next press with a clean part of the cloth. Blot until the cloth comes off dry and/or without colour. This will clear up most stains (yes, the whole thing) instantly. Rinse the spot afterwards with warm water and then re-blot again after that.

If you catch spills in time most of the time they will come right out in less than 30 minutes using this method – yes even red wine.

Get in a professional cleaner

Look, there really is no other way to give you carpets the best clean than to get a professional in to do the job for you. Any carpet cleaning that you do yourself is really not going to get the job done as properly as it should be. Professional carpet cleaning doesn’t have to be that expensive, either. Shop around for a good company, as well as making sure to read their reviews. You will likely find that the price goes down the more rooms you have done or if you add in lounge furniture to the job as well.

Another tip that might work is to rally your neighbours together to see if they need carpet cleaning done too. You might find that there is plenty of carpet cleaning to be done in your street and that the cleaners will have a whole days’ work ahead of them.

If this is the case, then you might be able to get a discount seeing that you’re giving the cleaning company so much work. You’ll have to negotiate this with them, and spread the savings across the group of neighbours that you’re pooling with, but it’s well worth a shot. Why not book the street in for a yearly or half yearly clean while you’re at it?

Steam cleaning or chemical carpet cleaning?

Though you might be tempted to give chemical carpet cleaning a go, since the dry application method means you don’t have to wait to walk on your carpets again, it really isn’t as effective as steam carpet cleaning.

Steam carpet cleaning is the best method and removes more than 97% of dirt and bacteria – which is the whole aim of cleaning your carpet in the first place! Steam cleaning involves cleaning the carpets by way of high pressured machines getting in there with the 8 step hot water extraction carpet cleaning method – that’s the exact same method that Standards Australia recommends, so if they say it’s the one to go for, then it’s definitely the one to go for.

If there is some reason that you can’t get steam carpet cleaning done (you can’t find a provider last minute, the access to your home prevents it, etc.), then you can attempt other methods, however just be aware that they will not be as effective as steam cleaning.