Guest Post: How to Increase Your Homes Value with Proper Floorcare
Our guest blog post today is from our friends at Lake Norman Carpet and Tile Cleaning located in Cornelius! They provide both residential and commercial services, and use the most modern equipment to professionally clean your carpet, area rugs, and upholstery! You can visit their website by clicking the link above!
When it comes time to sell your home it might seem like there are a million different things to take care of. Of course, everyone wants to get the best price that they can, so it becomes important to consider every aspect that could possibly affect the value.
One of the things that is often not talked about, but can have a huge impact on the quality of the offers you receive, is the condition of the floors. In this article, I will go over a few tips that can help you to get more for your house when it comes time to put it on the market.
Carpet
If you have carpet in your home then you’ll want to keep reading while I go over a few things that can prolong its life and help you to save money in the long run.
Stopping Dirt at the Door
One of the simplest, yet most underused tactics to stop the carpets from getting damaged and dirty is to stop the dirt at the door. Having a good doormat is essential for every home and especially ones that have pets or children.
Stain Removal
Stains are one of those annoying side effects of being a homeowner. You can do your best to try and stop them from happening but every once in awhile there will be accidents.
What you do about these stains greatly depends on the severity. For the more severe ones it’s best to let a professional like Lake Norman Carpet & Tile Care deal with it as we have the experience and equipment to deal with it fast and efficiently.
For the less severe stains that you opt to clean up yourself, the number one piece of advice I can give is to act fast. The faster you start the cleanup process, the less chance your carpet suffers permanent damage that could reduce the value of your home.
Routine Vacuuming
Everybody knows that they should be vacuuming their floors but how much is enough? The frequency will depend entirely on the traffic that the floor receives. For example, a household of 5 people with 2 dogs and 2 young children might require vacuuming the highly used areas 3-7 times per week. On the other hand, a house with just 2 adults and no pets might be ok with just vacuuming 1-2 times per week on areas that don’t get much use.
Hiring a Professional Cleaner
Hiring a carpet cleaning company to perform deep cleaning on your carpets is one of the best things that you can do to extend the life of your carpet and keep your family healthy. Vacuuming is good for everyday dirt and dust, but to really get down deep into the carpet and remove all the hidden dirt, bacteria and grime you’ll want to hire a pro.
For the average home, I would recommend doing this once every 12 or so months. If you have pets or children that dirty the carpet regularly, then every 6 months would be better.
The method that most companies are using is known as the hot water extraction method. This method is great because it really gets down deep into the fibers and removes all the dirt and dust that isn’t visible to the human eye. The way it works is that first, a combination of hot water and cleaning detergents are sprayed deep into the carpet. This solution acts to loosen up the dirt before it is extracted by a vacuum pump. It is then rinsed clean to remove all the dirt and detergent. Finally, the remaining water is vacuumed up.
Besides the benefit of saving money in the long run, having regular cleanings can also have health benefits. Dust can be a major irritant to everybody, especially children. Regular cleanings greatly reduce the amount of dust mites in the carpet and can help your family to breathe easier.
Tile and Grout
With tiles being very common in homes across the world it’s important to know how to maintain them properly. I will go over briefly what should be done to maintain the most popular types of tile and grout.
Stone Tiles
When it comes to stone tiles like the limestone and marble ones, you can use a kind of natural solution for getting out those easier stains. First mix baking soda with warm water to make a paste. Then use it on the tiles to help with your cleaning.
Ceramic Tiles
When it comes to ceramic tiles you can also go the natural route and use a white vinegar mixture. To make this you just mix one-part vinegar with four parts of warm water. However, you shouldn’t use vinegar on stone tiles because the acidic aspect of the vinegar can damage the stone tiles.
Grout Sealing
Getting your grout sealed properly is probably one of the best things that you can do to extend the life of your tile. Sealer helps to stop spills/dirt from penetrating the grout where it could eventually end up rotting and damaging your tile.
Grout sealer works it’s magic by being absorbed into the grout and filling up all the available tiny spaces. This acts as a barrier for when spills occur, stopping them from getting into the grout. Getting your grout sealed is a long-term investment that will pay for itself by preventing cracked and damaged tile.
I would recommend hiring a professional to seal your grout, as if it isn’t done properly there can be a sticky residue that is left on the floor and is extremely hard to get off.
Conclusion
I hope that this post was able to help everyone out a bit with their floorcare. Even basic floor maintenance can really help you when it comes time to put your home on the market.
For expert Carpet, Tile and upholstery cleaning all over the Lake Norman area don’t hesitate to give Lake Norman Carpet & Tile Care a call today! Visit our site to see the latest deals – http://www.lkncarpet.com/.