Does anyone else just feel so down about their house?

Honestly, I despair over my house and we are trapped here. We live in a 2 bed and have 2 teens sharing a room (boy and girl). The house is tiny and we don’t even have room for a dining table anywhere. All our furniture is mismatched and there are so many things we need to do, such as repairs and decorating, but never seem to be able to find time. Keeping tidy is a nightmare as there just isn’t room for everything

It's probably worth bearing in mind that most people's houses are at their cleanest when they have guests. Your friends are probably running around like blue arsed flies trying to tidy before you arrive, before returning to their usual state! :P

We have 4 kids, one a toddler, sometimes a dog, a cat and two adults.
I feel the same, our house is quite nice for how busy it is but my OH is always repainting walls because there's marks everywhere. The skirting boards get battered and although it's clean, it just doesn't feel sparkling clean.
But I've accepted it won't (most the time) then I get fixated on it and become obsessed til I knacker myself out then repeat 🤣

Yeah it's never-ending and I don't even have kids. I have cats and they make enough mess.
I made a list of all the jobs that need to be done on a less regular basis, divided into rooms. That ended up running to 4 pages of A4. I've printed out copies and made them into a ring-bound book (yeah I'm really weird). I do everything in the spring and then just before my summer holidays and once in the autumn. It sometimes takes up to a month to get through everything. But I also choose a room a month in addition to the 3 major cleans and go through the list again.
There are things on that list like clean around light switches, skirting boards, clean windows etc.
Other more regular jobs just get done as I'm going along but it really is constant.
My lounge looks way better since I got rid of all the furniture in January (some of which I managed to sell) and replaced with new. It looks really nice now. I do think that furniture ends up looking a bit grotty (all of my stuff was 15 years old). It isn't really made to last like in the past. Modern furniture shows its age and doesn't look clean, whereas I find proper antique furniture doesn't. I think I'm describing that badly.
You can't polish a turd is what I'm trying to say.

The bathroom will always look a bit grotty if its old and needs replacing. If you can't afford to replace it now, can you start a savings account specifically for the bathroom. Declutter and sell some stuff if possible and put all of that money into the bathroom account. It will take ages to build up the money but it's the only way really and will need to be done at some point.

@Disneyblueeyes You may be thinking of Marie Kondo

Can you afford a deep clean rather than regular cleaning? They would then tackle the bits that need doing more.

we have two cats and two kids (2 and 4 months). The house is always clean enough but only because we have a cleaner every 2 weeks, i hoover everyday and have MINIMAL stuff. The house is very bare but it means there is less to clean and looks in good condition.

Also fresh lick of paint helped massively!

You need to get scummier friends.
I do know how you feel. We have one set of friends who have loads of money, a beautiful house and cleaners who clean a few times a week and a gardener. Of course my house is never going to look like theirs.

Tough with pets around.
less clutter, less dust - so declutter if and investing in good storage for the rest is helpful. But I do think with pets you need to hoover daily.
re the bathroom - could you do it but by bit? Fresh paint on walls and tiles, new shower curtain, regrouting the bath? Nee toilet seat? Fresh tap? New mirror…

Sort of… I love my home, it’s a lovely house in a beautiful spot, but my goodness, the cleaning list is absolutely never ending. And it still doesn’t ever feel spotless! We’re on a farm, with a toddler and two indoor dogs, my husband works all the fucking time and I’m a bit pushed for time too with plenty to do. I’m just never on top of it.
I find I’m much happier if I just accept it and remember there are much more important things than having a spotless home.
I did find that I can keep ahead of it a little more by following the organised mum method (I’m sure that’s what it is called!), it’s like a little and often sort of approach. And by being absolutely brutal with clutter, my husband jokes that if something is left alone for half an hour, I’ve either binned it or donated it 🤣

You need a cleaner that comes in weekly. I have one now that comes in 3 times a week. No pets, 3 dc with 1 just a baby. But we have a very decluttered house so our cleaner just ends up deep cleaning every room because there's not piles of stuff to move around or faff around with. My dc are good though in that every night they spend 5-10 min of tidying up. Everything needs a place so that there's order.

With kids and pets it's a never ending battle. Just sat here looking at muddy cat paw prints on the window ledge, the plum stone my daughter has left on the table, the socks my ds has left on the stairs in despair.

Lower your expectations. I am sure that tv programmes/social media have given us an unrealistic expectation of what a family home looks like.

I don't ever remember my parents/family/friends houses being spotless when I was younger. I have been reading the Shirley Hughes 'Alfie' books to my DC again recently and the beautiful illustrations show plenty of clutter and dishes piled up in the house.

Your friends houses will all be tidy as they have panicked and tidied before you arrive!

Why not start with getting in a decorator?

paint everywhere white or whatever colours you like and buy washable paint

then you just clean the walls as and when they are marked

definitely get a deep clean done

start to focus on one room at a time to revamp

give your two year old a dry cloth and a spray bottle with water sure she would be happy to help

There's a woman who had a Netflix series out (she's Chinese I think?) About decluttering.
I've always remembered something she said about clothes - if it doesn't bring you joy when you wear it, chuck it out.

Always resonated with me. I had so much stuff in my wardrobe from pre-pregnancy and I kept saying to myself I'd wear it again some day.
Yea right. Got rid of the lot.

You need to lower your expectations. I live in a big 4 bed house with my 3 year old, DH and a house cat. I only work 2 days a week yet I still employ two cleaners once a week for 2 hours.

To be honest I could probably do it myself, but it would be at the expense of my daughter. After all, at 3, she's very demanding and it would take me a whole day to do a 2 hour clean with her around.

You are not going to have a clean house all the time. It's going to feel like a conveyor belt constantly running. Once you've got one room clean, another will need doing, then another, and then the first room will need cleaning again. It's never 'done', and the sooner you change your mindset on this, the happier you will feel.

Absolutely nobody with young children has a pristine house, unless they get help. Either from a nanny, or a cleaner.
Nobody. If you think they do without help, you're wrong. They've just cleaned and tidied before you've arrived, or before they've taken the photo. Or they've hidden all the clutter in another room.
Seriously.

Lower your expectations, hire a cleaner and/or save up for a new bathroom if you can afford to.

Seriously your house will not look anywhere near as bad as you think to others.

I have come to the conclusion it is the dog. I can get my home tidy and clean even with kids but the dogs! They are always shedding hair, bringing in dust, shaking mud everywhere.

When you go to other people’s houses they will have just cleaned so you’re not getting the true picture of what their houses are really like. For me there’s nothing like having visitors to focus the mind and get the house clean, so maybe invite some people round. In between visitors my house looks like a bomb has exploded. I’ve given to trying to clean things up when the children are at home, it’s like trying to sweep up leaves in a hurricane. We have to much stuff as well which doesn’t help!

When I felt this way I threw out around a third of our possessions

This. I’ve just had a massive clear out, eight bin bags just of clothes to the charity shop, and that’s not counting the bags of old Tupperware, single wine glasses, and random bits of tat that I found. it feels bloody fantastic. I actually feel like I can get in to clean stuff now, even though everything was crammed into cupboards and not in the way before. I don’t know why it just feels better.

I felt like this in our old house. It was a miserable old council terrace that frankly just needed starting from scratch with. Everything needed painted and redone which the landlord refused to do/pay for. The area was also a bit shit and that really didn't help.

The key here is old house. We moved into a brand new build. I bought a load of new furniture when we moved. I think being in a new house made it easier to keep on top of the cleaning. My kids are also older now and in theory less messy. It makes the logistics of repainting a room easier now they can entertain themselves. We also don't have pets.

I know it's not the solution you want. But I can empathise exactly with how you feel. It will hopefully get easier when kids are older if you can hang on in there until then.

Was going to suggest the same.

I have three kids and 3 cats and everything always feels grubby. I do a lot of cleaning but there is always something else to clean. I just a couple of rooms each day over the week for a hoover, polish, mop etc then run the hoover round downstairs each evening. Keeps on top of it although it’s never clean for long I just leave it till the next week when it’s that rooms turn again.

Our house needs a ton of work doing too, new bathroom, kitchen, most rooms need re plastering, new radiators etc. We can’t afford though. I’ve got much better at just accepting it. I do everything I can with it and that’s all I can do!

Oh and our house smelled so much better when I started to hoover everything instead of dust. I use the Bristle nozzle to hoover everything now, coffee table, pictures, light shades... man I love my hoover 😂

But it's the little stuff that gets left that I'd be looking for someone to do i.e. light fittings, skirting boards, windows, blinds dusting, radiators and doors wiping down etc.. practically all of the cleaners I've spoken to have said that stuff isn't included in their cleans so 🤷‍♀️ I'd actually rather a cleaner come and wipe the skirting boards down than clean the bath

that’s really unusual. Every cleaner I’ve had has done this stuff, without even being asked. My current cleaner does her normal cleaning, which includes blinds, and then does windows, skirting’s, light fittings, doors etc as she sees they need doing. I don’t really get involved.

When I felt this way I threw out around a third of our possessions 😂 it helped A LOT. Also checking on FB or second hand sites to see if you can change some of your furniture so that it matches more. What about chalk painting it all the same colour if it's ikea stuff? Repainting the skirting boards and wood will really help it feel cleaner too. I don't spend a lot of time in one go cleaning but I do a lot of taking a couple of minutes to clean a mirror or dust a skirting board. It is a bit of a crutch to be honest, when things are stressful then having a clean and tidy house really calms me down. It is really sad that you feel you can't invite people over because of the bathroom. Can you pain the units/tiles and get a few new towels etc to make it nicer?

I think something like an 'end of tenancy' clean will be more suited to what you need. Depending on the size of the house they can be there's all day doing the jobs you listed.

I'v painted my whole house white now because I couldn't be doing with the marks on my wall, I just touch it up regularly now.

I think with 2 plus kids things do slip, even when you have the best of intentions. I have 4 and luckily I'm a SAHM to keep on top of everything.