Making a household perfect for living and entertaining guests is an unattainable goal most of us gladly chase after. We obsess about every little thing, including color schemes, style, comfort, cleanliness, feng shui, lighting, and many other things. Still, we sometimes tend to put too much emphasis on the visual side of things. 

An active household is more than capable of developing a vast array of smells that can make even the most stylish home lose some of its shine. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, it’s just how things are, but there are a few ways you fight this. Let’s see what you can do to keep your home smelling fresh most of the time.

Moisture is a problem

Cooking, drying laundry, and the environment can all contribute to the amount of moisture that circulates around your house. Get a hygrometer and check your house for humidity — if it’s over 60%  you are in trouble. It will add to the odor and contribute to the development of mold, which is a health hazard. 

Get a dehumidifier — they are not cheap, so start with one and use it in the room that produces the most humidity,  which is usually the kitchen or the bathroom. Furthermore, avoid wall-to-wall carpeting as that traps moisture in the house, and ensure that your laundry is fully dry before you fold it into the closet. 

Hiding in plain sight

The thing with odor is that we can get used to it, especially if it’s a constant in your house as you spend a lot of time there. This means that garbage cans, pet beds, litter boxes, and so on are things we’re used to. If you are smelling it, it’s too late. Put in extra care when it comes to these and do it on a schedule — don’t trust your nose to tell you when it’s time. 

The fridge

Fridges tend to be an inevitable mess of smells and odors. In a family home, they hold a lot of stuff and tend to be overstocked at all points in time. Leftovers, baby formula, condiments, milk, sweets, you name it. It is not uncommon for some things to get pushed in the back and just rot there. Do a check-up every once in a while and throw stuff away. You’ll make your life easier and your fridge less smelly. 

Now after a while, even the walls of the fridge start taking in smells, so you need to give it a good scrubbing from time to time. This should include all the drawers you may have and defrosting the icebox. 

Personal habits

There is something to be said about the personal habits of the inhabitants which contribute to the smell of a household. 

Smoking is one of the biggest contributors to house odor, especially if multiple inhabitants smoke. We recommend you quit, but this is sometimes easier said than done. As a healthier alternative, we recommend you go for vaping. It doesn’t involve burning plants, so there is no smoke, and most vapes come with a variety of tastes, so they can even contribute to a pleasant smell of your home. You can get disposable vapes like Flume vape or a variant that allows you to change the juice you use. Either way, replacing the smell of tobacco with the fruity smell of e-juice is a great upgrade in terms of smell. Vapes don’t only remove the smell of smoke but also sidestep the smell of ashtrays which tend to be a constant source of bad odor even if you are constantly airing out your space. 

Another big contributor to house odor is dirty laundry, shoes, unwashed dishes, and so on. Make sure you get everything in the washers regularly and do not leave them around the house. The longer the wait, the more complex the odor of your home becomes, and you’ll have a harder time getting rid of it. 

Good habits

There are several good practices that you can include in your routine to keep things fresh. First, your windows are not supposed to be closed all the time. Once a day, open them up and let some fresh air in. If you are living in an urban area with a lot of traffic, wait for a time in the day when it's at its lowest, so you get the freshest air — usually early in the morning before everyone goes to work or late at night. 

Neutralizes are great when bad smells are simply unavoidable. If you have pets or small children who are still in diapers, smells are unavoidable. Charcoal filters are a great option in this case as they don’t add to the smell; they just remove it. 

Sometimes, less is more. In an effort to make their home smell nice, people sometimes mix in too much stuff. Room fresheners, incense, and other products intended to make your home smell nice, when mixed, tend to produce the opposite effect.  Also, artificial smells don’t agree with everyone and are not always the best option. There are a lot of DIY ideas to create natural air fresheners out there, and they are also cheaper and fun projects to do. 

Combating smells in an active household is a constant struggle, but with good habits in place, and some assistance from reliable products, it is a very achievable goal. Of course, inhabitant participation is very important to make this goal achievable because if only one household member does all the work, things will spiral out of control pretty fast. 

While it is not realistic to expect that a family home will always smell nice, we’d like to point out that if you are selling a house or an apartment, smells can run your potential buyers out of the house, so make sure that at the time you are showing them around, your home has a fresh and pleasant smell.