Home and Garden Repairs

Improving your home's appearance needn't cost a fortune. Here are two very affordable ways to spruce up your property, without breaking the bank:

Have the carpets professionally cleaned

Over the course of several years, grime, dust, soil and pet hairs can become trapped in the deeper layers of your carpets. This can give the fabric a dirty appearance, which cannot usually be rectified by hoovering, as the dirt is embedded too deeply into the carpet fibres.

The faint stains left behind by drink spillages and pet accidents can also affect the appearance of your carpets, creating discoloured patches which are next to impossible to remove with standard household stain removers.

If despite your best efforts, the carpets in your home still look stained and dirty, it might be worth getting in touch with a carpet cleaning company in your area. Professional carpet cleaning services have access to industrial cleaning solvents and heavy-duty hoovers and steam cleaners, which can refresh the colour, texture and overall appearance of your carpets.

Whilst having your carpets professionally cleaned will, of course, cost money, the fees charged by most cleaning companies are very reasonable, and will certainly be far lower than the cost of buying brand new carpeting.

De-clutter

One of the easiest ways to quickly improve the appearance of your home is to remove all of the unnecessary and unwanted clutter from it. Keeping the tables, windowsills, mantles, shelves, floors, cupboards and countertops of your home free from 'stuff' that does not serve any real purpose in your life not only feels very freeing but can also help to make your home look tidier and more spacious.

If you have a lot of items to get rid of, it's best to de-clutter in brief spurts; you could spend, say, three hours each weekend going through your belongings and picking out items that you no longer want.

Try to be as ruthless as possible; any clothing, old books, toys, knick-knacks or sports equipment that you haven't used or looked at in over a year should be donated, sold or thrown away. Don't talk yourself into keeping items that you don't need, 'just in case' they may prove useful at some point in the future.

The end result of this (admittedly challenging) process will be a more spacious-looking home that only contains items which you find to be beautiful or valuable. Provided you avoid accumulating more clutter, this process will also make it easier for you to keep your home looking neat and clean, as you won't have nearly as many belongings to wash, dust or tidy away.