The toilet is one of those things in a home that can feel really overwhelming to clean if you’ve never been taught how to clean it properly so in this article I want to break it down for you because I didn’t know how to clean a toilet properly and now I can get it done in under three minutes so i’m going to show you the products tools and techniques that you need to get it done.
I think the biggest misconception about a toilet is that it itself is dirty and bacteriolated where in my professional cleaning experience it’s actually the area around the toilet that’s a lot dirtier so you can do your regular toilet cleaning stuff for the toilet and then focus on the other areas as well to make sure that the stuff you can and cannot see is cleaned from the toilet now if you feel a little bit grossed out with the idea of cleaning a toilet the best protection you can offer yourself is a pair of rubber gloves when I put those on I feel like a cleaning superhero I feel like I can touch and tackle anything.
I’ll break it down into the products tools and techniques that you’re going to need to get the job done first the products we’ll start with an all-purpose cleaner now if you want to amp it up a little you can use a disinfecting cleaner just make sure it’s not a disinfectant if it’s a disinfectant you will have to use a cleaner first and your disinfectant second, I am not going to be using a disinfectant today i’m just going to be using an all-purpose cleaner. Next you’re gonna need a good toilet bowl cleaner any brand that you like is fine I always look for a green brand and if you find that your toilet has a lot of hard water or some particularly difficult stains you can grab a pumice stone and use that as well.
Next let’s talk about the tools that you’re going to need start with a good pair of rubber gloves ideally you want a pair that you would only use in the bathroom go ahead and invest in another pair that you would use in the kitchen I use paper towel when I clean the toilet I don’t use cloths because I don’t want to wash them and think about my cloth that was cleaning the toilet wiping my counter and finally you’ll need a good toilet bowl brush.
Start by spraying the toilet from the top to the bottom using an all-purpose cleaner but feel free to use a disinfectant cleaner if you like, now i’m going from the top of the tank to the top of the lid to the hinges to the seat to the base and everywhere in between your idea is to get the toilet pretty soaking wet you’re going to let that sit for a couple of minutes and while that’s happening you can take your toilet bowl cleaner of choice and squirt it generously under the rim once that’s done I start with paper towel and I wipe from the top to the bottom using the same spray pattern that I used when I was spraying it down so i’m always working in order and as the paper towel gets saturated I just replace it you want to make sure that you’re wiping everything nice and clean and if you notice that there are some hairs you can use a bit of a dampened paper towel to get rid of those now any of those difficult areas you want to spend a couple of extra minutes scrubbing we take pretty good care of our toilet so it’s in pretty good shape but obviously if you have a toilet that is in need of a deep clean you might need to spend a bit more time doing this.
The base of the toilet is an area that’s often forgotten as well as the floor surrounding the toilet so make sure that you give that some tlc too now get your toilet brush get it wet by dipping it into the toilet and if you like you can even take your toilet bowl brush and push water down the chute a few times to expose more of the bowl then take your brush and start scrubbing around the top of the underside of the rim and then swirl around until you get to the bottom scrubbing as you go flush and I always like to twist my brush in the toilet while it is being flushed to give it a little bit of a clean and then I place it under the lid for a drip dry.
There are a few other crappy things you might encounter when you’re cleaning your toilet so I want to just cover these off so that you have these techniques in your back pocket first you might notice that the hinges of your toilet seat are particularly dirty if that’s the case you can use a bathroom designated cleaning toothbrush spray that hinge area well and then scrub that area and wipe it clean I will also mention that I find hair to be rather challenging to deal with around the toilet so when you’re done cleaning just take a slightly dampened paper towel and kind of do a review of the areas where you might find hair just to remove them that’s kind of the trick now one thing I didn’t cover when I was doing my technique but something i’ve seen a lot professionally is sprinkles and splashes around the toilet whether that’s on the base the floor area around or on the wall the best way that you can deal with this is to get yourself a good quality enzyme cleaner, enzyme cleaners can deal with those odors that urine splashes leave behind you would want to spray the area allow the product to sit for about five minutes or so and then wipe the area clean but most importantly follow the directions on the label of the enzyme cleaner it will always tell you exactly how to handle it but if you notice that there’s quite a bit of odor that is what you would want to do.
Now if your toilet bowl is stained if you have hard water or if you’re noticing that there are black marks or dots or things like that that you can’t quite get rid of that’s where the pumice stone can come in handy you’ll want to dip it into the toilet bowl first you can use your gloved hand to do this a pumice stone has to be wet so it doesn’t scratch and then you can use it to start erasing some of those lines or marks that you’re noticing that are difficult or challenging pumice stones tend to work really really well you can flush and rinse I don’t typically recommend using bleach in toilets but I have known people to say that it works I also think if you’re encountering a specifically difficult issue with a calcium lime or rust stain you can pick up some clr as long as we’re following package instructions and use that.
Thanks so much for reading and we’ll see you next time.
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