Cleaners of Mumsnet - what do you find hardest to clean?

[Zaphodsotherhead]

Sort of following from another thread - I'm decorating and 'finishing off' my new house but anxious to avoid anything that looks fabulous in the shops but either doesn't work the same way or is impossible to clean in real life.

For example - I really wanted a free standing bath, but another thread has told me that cleaning behind them is impossible. I'd love a butler's sink, but apparently they stain.

So what do people find the hardest things to clean in their own (or other people's)? Chrome in bathrooms? Matt paintwork?

We inherited a shower with a fixed head. I fucking hate it. I've never figured out a way to clean the shower without actually getting in and getting soaked. We can't justify changing the bathroom though as it was brand new when we moved in.
I would never ever ever have a fixed shower head again (or a shower cubicle with sliding doors with all sorts of tracks and over lapping bits for dirt and gunge to get caught it)

Oh and we have a ceramic kitchen sink but have a bowl in it because it's huge, it cuts down on the staining but tbh if you clean it regularly, it doesn't stain.

Concur with the sliding shower doors - concertina ones are even worse.

@DuaneBenziesvoice

We inherited a shower with a fixed head. I fucking hate it. I've never figured out a way to clean the shower without actually getting in and getting soaked. We can't justify changing the bathroom though as it was brand new when we moved in. I would never ever ever have a fixed shower head again (or a shower cubicle with sliding doors with all sorts of tracks and over lapping bits for dirt and gunge to get caught it)

This is EXACTLY the sort of thing I mean!

I want to get a rainfall shower fitted over my bath, but you've convinced me that, without a separate hand held shower (which, we all know, is for rinsing your bits and cleaning the tiles), it will be incredibly annoying!

I have a white ceramic sink - really easy to clean with a quick spray of bleach.

I hate our glass shower cubicle- the door seals quickly get manky and with limey water the clear glass needs regular scrubbing.

However I treat the glass several times a year with Rainex (it's for car windscreens and motorcycle helmets) which improves things as the water seems to just slide off.

I really hate my stainless steel Franke kitchen sink. Always looks water stained and a bit grubby ( hard water area.) The best sinks I ever had were moulded all in one from white corian of a piece with the worktop. People, including the kitchen designer, told me they'd be difficult to clean but a quick wipe with Flash bleach and they looked perfect every time.

We have a fixed shower head, over a large bath, (and no separate shower on a hose thing) and I’ve never found it a problem. You just rinse down the sides with a wet cloth/sponge after you’ve cleaned them. And I can easily wash myself without the hose bit!

VERY hard water area here too. Limescale builds up really fast, so I'd never want fiddly taps or areas behind taps that I couldn't easily get to. I don't want to have to clean ANYTHING with a toothbrush ever again (apart from my teeth, obvs).

Not me but my friend who built her house had these two complaints.

1. Stainless steel (I think?) fridge. Said she had to polish the doors every day as otherwise there were fingerprints everywhere.

1. Beautiful shiny white floor tiles - sheer gloss finish. Said floors had to be washed and polished every day. They really were beautiful and her home was immaculate, but you wouldn't want to be caught on a bad day.

Another friend with a floor tile issue. She got black/dark grey floor tiles (sort of stone effect - rough surface) but got white grouting put in. The grouting turned yellow and nothing would restore it to white. My tiler had advised me to only ever put grey grout on a floor as the white will yellow.

Wooden slatted blinds with tapes! The bathroom gets quite steamy so all the dust just sticks to them. Far too fiddly to clean each individual row.

I sympathise with the tile issue.

I bought this house partly because it had tiled floors downstairs throughout. A kind of matt terracotta, they look beautiful and I have a dog, so much more practical than carpet.

But my god, the cleaning... sweep every day, hoover, then mop then hoover again (because the bits, oh my god, the BITS!). And then as soon as you step in through the front door (no hallway), there are footprints...

Plus worrying myself sick about dropping anything heavy on a tile in a major traffic area and cracking it...

At least with carpets, they may have been minging, but it would be invisible ming and I could hoover to 'tidy up' rather than the round of cleaning I have to go through.

I loathe the black and white towels in my hallway. No matter how often I hoover and mop, the white ones look grubby and the black ones attract all the dust and fluff. I loathe them.

Brushed nickel taps. Always look dirty

I agree on the Franke stainless steel sink, always looked water stained. Now I have a grey composite one, and whilst it does get tea stained, etc, it's easily cleaned with Flash bleach or by soaking in dilute bleach for a while, and then looks brand new again.

@Dancingwithdaftness - couldn't agree more.. I am currently restoring (!!) my 5 year old stone floor with ivory grouting. The ivory grouting was literally the worst decision I ever made and I tell anyone who will listen not to do it when they renovate their house.

I have been scrubbing the grout with pink stuff and a steamer with tiny brush head for about 3 days now (not 3 full days but doing sections at a time). Then I will wax it..

The only thing I would say though is that stone (without the ivory grout) is a god send.. I could have a herd of wilderbeast gallop through my floor with wet muddy hooves and within about 10 mins a quick hoover and a wipe and it looks fine for visitors. I deliberately put it in my kitchen after being a slave to a white polished floor and having to clean it every day in the winter.

For Belfast sinks and chrome work - use toilet descaler. Done regularly it only takes a few minutes to rid of stains and limescale.

I have a non-shedding (well, a very very close coated) dog.

Yet the amount of hair that gets stuck to the tiles, you'd swear she was fourteen German Shepherds. Plus it gets jammed in the gap between the floor and the skirting (very old cottage, lots of gaps). Why they didn't take the tiling up the wall to skirting board level I don not know.

Don't get waterfall taps in a hard water area. They are impossible to keep free of limescale and look rubbish very quickly.

The worst floor I ever had was a pale/white rubber floor DH insisted on, with raised studs (remember when that was really fashionable about 15 years ago?) Oh my god. It was only in a bathroom (thankfully I'd resisted having it in the downstairs loo) but the cleaning! Every single day on my hands and knees and it still looked filthy. Hairs and dust would catch attractively round the knobbly bits. Eventually I had it covered over with a waterproof wooden laminate.

Probably not a problem these days as it's not as fashionable, but - avoid!

Inherited a bath with the spa hose jets. Ok if you have a spa bath every few days....but if not the water inside the hoses goes mouldy very quickly. .Nothing in terms of rinse cycles stop it- tried all sorts of chemicals recommended to put in the rinse cycles. Spent a fortune on water meter rinsing and rinsing.
Haven’t used the spa pumps in years now...but the thought of all that manky mouldy water in the pipes 🤢🤢🤮. Have to be desperate to even get in the bath tub now.

Another one who agrees with the Franke sink and hard water areas, it’s a nightmare to keep clean.

I hate anything freestanding or with gaps at the bottom. Kitchen units, sofas, beds and general furniture. This is what I got when moving into a furnished property. I hate moving furniture or going underneath the kitchen unit to hoover. DS loves to throw and hide toys and food underneath all the furniture which is annoying. I would normally hoover underneath sofas and beds once a month whereas now, I have to do it couple of times a week :(

Avoid wooden panelling in a bathroom, especially if it has detailed beading on the panels, top and bottom. In the damp atmosphere dust and towel fluff sticks to it and you either spend hours cleaning it all or it always looks a bit mucky. The same goes for twiddly skirting board designs.

DH (designated bathroom cleaner in our house) insisted on swapping wall tiles for a single plastic - coated wall panel so he wouldn't have to clean grouting any more.

I spent yesterday morning dragging our enormous heavy sofa out so I could clean behind and under it. It was disgusting. But I love our sofa more than life itself, so it was worth it.

We used to have a rainfall shower head as well as a hand held shower thing on the wall - because we live in a hard water area the rainfall head clogged up really easily and then kept bloody dripping whilst not being used! Ok for OH as he didn't mind wetting his hair every shower but for me it was rubbish, Will never have another one.