Plant City is our home base

Older Plant City homes need gentler cleaning

Most houses in Plant City fall into two groups, and each one needs a different kind of cleaning. Near downtown you find older wood frame homes with porches, tall windows, wood floors and plenty of painted trim. Out toward the edges of town, the newer subdivisions are mostly block and stucco with tile floors and open kitchens. We clean both kinds of house, but never the same way.

An older house has more edges to catch dust. Window sills, door casings, baseboards and fan blades all collect it, and old paint scratches under a rough pad. Wood floors cannot take a soaking mop, because water sinks into the seams and makes the boards swell and lift at the edges. So we dust the trim by hand and damp mop the wood with very little water. Rooms with the most detail get more of our time. Diane Ryan wrote in a Google review: "So appreciate the special touches and attention to detail."

Newer houses have a different weak spot, and it is the grout. Tile usually covers the kitchen and bathrooms, and in many of these homes it runs through the living areas too. Light grout turns gray fast when it is mopped with dirty water. We change our mop water often and scrub the grout lines where people walk most. Glass shower doors and stainless steel appliances show every streak, so we wipe them dry instead of leaving them to air dry.

• Window sills and door casings dusted by hand
• Wood floors damp mopped with very little water
• Mop water changed often on big tile floors
• Grout scrubbed where people walk the most
• Shower glass and steel appliances wiped dry

Sand and farm dust get inside

Plant City sits on sandy soil with farms all around it, and that sand ends up on your floors. It comes in on shoes and on the dog, and it piles up just inside every door. On tile it feels gritty under bare feet. On wood and vinyl plank floors it works like sandpaper. Every step across it puts fine scratches in the finish. Left alone for a few months, the wear shows up as a dull path from the door to the kitchen.

The farms add a second kind of dust. Fields around town get plowed and planted in the fall for strawberry season. On a dry, windy day, fine dust from those fields drifts into the neighborhoods. In spring the oak trees drop pollen, and a yellow film coats screened porches and anything near an open window. Both get pulled into the air conditioning return and come back out as dust on every flat surface.

So the floors come first on every visit. We vacuum before we mop, because a wet mop pushes sand around and grinds it into the grout and the finish. The first few feet inside each door get extra time, and we shake out the entry mats. Blinds and window sills get a damp wipe, which lifts the fine dust that a feather duster only moves around.

Humid summers bring mildew into bathrooms

Summers in Plant City run hot and wet. Storms roll through most summer afternoons, and the air stays heavy after they pass. A bathroom that never fully dries starts to grow mildew. You usually spot it first as a pink or gray line at the bottom of the shower door. Then it shows up in the grout at the corners. Bathrooms without a window or a working exhaust fan get it the worst.

Mildew left alone is harder to get out later. It works into the grout and the caulk and stains them for good, and a musty smell settles into towels and bath mats. Mildew also grows where people rarely look, like the shower door track and the exhaust fan cover. By the time you can smell it, it has usually been there for weeks. Caulk stained all the way through has to be cut out and replaced by a handyman.

We spray a mildew cleaner on the shower walls and the tub and let it sit for a few minutes before we scrub. The corners and grout lines get a stiff brush, and we rinse everything so no soap film is left for mildew to grow on. We also wipe the exhaust fan cover and the tops of mirrors and cabinets, where damp dust collects. Regular visits through the summer keep it from building up again.

Getting a price in Plant City

Call (727) 334-7841 on a weekday between nine and five, or send a request from this page. Tell us the size of the house and what kind of cleaning you want. A regular visit and a deep clean before a move are priced differently, so it helps to know which one you need. You get a free quote before anything is booked, so the price is settled before we arrive.