How Often Should You Vacuum?
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Wondering how often should you vacuum? The answer may surprise you. It depends.
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The house we live in had brand new carpet when we moved in. What a treat!
Forget the fact that it’s practically white carpet, okay, very light beige. And a rental. Who does that?
Needless to say, we’ve tried hard to take good care of it. Well, as best as one can when you live in a busy household of eight people, six of them active children.
Daily vacuuming has been our first line of defense. Regular carpet cleaning has been the second. The question often comes up, however, daily vacuuming?
How Often Should You Vacuum?
Yes, daily.
A few summers ago, almost eight to be exact, I decided to instill some better cleaning habits in all of us and instituted the daily vacuuming of the living areas.
There are three carpeted areas in the downstairs, and so each of the big boys had to choose one area to vacuum every day. It’s amazing what a difference it made to the overall appearance of our home.
I’d read once that you should vacuum an area as many times per week as the number of people that regularly use that area.
So, for a bedroom for one person, a weekly vacuuming is sufficient. A room with two roomies should get a twice a week treatment.
Our main living areas? According to that formula, they should receive eight vacuumings a week!
Well, that ain’t happening. But, since that fateful summer day we’ve been able to swing a daily once over. It really doesn’t take very long to go over each area.
And, since it has to be vacuumed, all the junk has to be picked up off the floor, too! {Maniacal laughter from the Mama.}
We’ve hired the same carpet cleaner for many, many years, and he has agreed that the daily vacuuming has helped our carpet last this long. It’s cheap, renter’s carpet in beige, so there’s only so much you can do, but daily vacuuming has helped.
What kind of vacuum should you get?
For over 20 years, we’ve had an Oreck upright vacuum. The first one lasted us about 13 years. The second is almost seven years old and going strong. You can read my review of it here.
For a short time, we had Jarvis, a robotic vacuum. Unfortunately, he wasn’t as loyal to us as he was Ironman.
When we had hard floors, we loved the Shark Cordless Sweeper. It was so light even the toddlers could use it. You can read my review of it here.
How often do YOU vacuum at your house?
Originally published August 16, 2010. Updated January 31, 2018.
Our house has a combination of carpet/hardwood/linoleum in the main living areas (bedroom, family room, kitchen, mudroom) and I vacuum each of those everyday. We don’t wear shoes in our house and food remains in the kitchen/dining areas but nonetheless, it needs it! (2A/4K)
I’ll admit that my upstairs bedrooms aren’t vacuumed as often but not much goes up that the carpet doesn’t catch before there – ha!
Habit or necessity, it just feels better clean!
I definitely don’t vacuum as much as I should (read once every month or so, if I remember), but we’re getting ready to move into a BRAND NEW HOUSE (yeah God – totally His provision and timing), and I want to start a daily/weekly routine of vacuuming, sweeping, and mopping to keep our new floors looking new.
It is our oldest son’s responsibility to vacuum our downstairs daily. Even though we have hardwood and mainly area rugs, I think it needs done on a daily basis because it really does make the house look cleaner. He then has to vacuum the other levels of the home at least once a week, including the stairs.
Since you tweeted asking if a Dyson is worth it, I’ll answer that one too 🙂 We do have a Dyson and it is completely awesome! It actually helps with keeping the hardwood clean too since it can go from carpet to hardwood seamlessly (and no scratching the floors). The first time we used it, we got SO MUCH stuff off the carpet, it was pretty disqusting. The full canister showed the value in having one especially with our boys having allergy and asthma issues. It’s worth every penny for a clean home and prevention of asthma flare-ups.
I’ve never heard that saying. I like it! I love vacuuming, but I don’t like having to get everyone to pick up their toys from the floor. If I had Oprah’s money, I would hire people just to vacuum when I left a room….so there would be vacuum lines in the carpet. (Oh yes, I’m a little (Adrian) “Monk-ish”.) However, I think a Dyson is a necessity!
The downstairs – twice a week. Upstairs – once a week but we don’t “live upstairs”
I steam clean the main rooms downstairs 4 times a year ( maybe more if vomit/ pet stains is involved.
Upstairs once/twice a year (thats where we have our guest room, office, guest bathroom, etc)
i so only vacuum once a week…. but it’s just 2 of us and a cat… who doesn’t shed too much…. but i’m sure extra vacuuming would be good!
We vacuum two times a week. I am completely on board with the Dyson. We have 2 dogs and I am amazed at how much that vaccuum picks up! We vaccuumed with our old vacuum then re-vacuumed with the new Dyson and I was amazed at how much more stuff the Dyson picked up. So if you are vacuuming a lot with an old vacuum you are still missing a lot of stuff! I also steam clean once a year!
You know, I’ve been thinking about this lately! I posted last week about my Dailies, my daily cleaning tasks, and I’m working on my list of Weeklies right now. I vacuum the downstairs (living room, dining room) once a week….okay, sometimes not even that often. The upstairs bedroom and playroom get vacuumed even less frequently. I really need to start doing this more often, and really wishing I had a Dyson!
What a great topic! Living on a ranch with a husband, six children, and sandy soil, the main living area, hardwood, receives a daily sweeping/dusting with the kitchen and dining room being swept after each meal. Even with this our floor still gets gritty. I’m hoping the dirt slows down some after the grass grows and is established in our yard. Right now one side is a large sandbox. As much as I enjoy a clean floor, I’ve got to admit that the sight of little people footprints through the house are just so cute I can’t help but smile as I clean them up.
I vacuum the downstairs every other day and the upstairs once a week. We also have a no shoes in the house rule.