Smoke Damage Cleaning Tips

There is hardly anything worse for a home than a house fire, except for an earthquake shattering its foundations and bringing it down. Thankfully, sometimes fires are not nearly as destructive if they are caught on time and dealt with. Even if you dealt with the fire, the aftermath of it still remains. Soot, smoke and stains are common problems that need to be dealt with as soon as possible, as well as the chemicals used by firefighters in their efforts to put the fire out.

To clean after a fire requires hard work, follow these smoke damage cleaning tips:

• Soot and charring are always left after a fire has blazed in a home. They contain a lot of impurities with a carbon base, mostly left behind when the material never burned entirely. The texture of soot itself is oily in most cases. After the fire has been extinguished you will need to replace many of your belongings as they would have been damaged and destroyed. You will need to clean everything, so move on to step two.
• Begin by using a vacuum cleaner to remove the soot off all the surfaces around your home. Stains will remain, but this is an important first step. You will need a good set of gloves so you won’t hurt your hands in what needs to be done next. You will need a good TSP cleaner, also known as a trisodium phosphate cleaner. It is essentially a very good stain remover that works on a wide range of stains. Add about a tablespoon of it in a gallon of water and work on cleaning your walls.
• You will need to wipe the surface of the walls and ceiling with a sponge, using firm and hard strokes as you do so. Once you’re done with that you will need to use warm, clean water to rinse them. Repeat the process until the areas are cleaned thoroughly. Depending on the condition of your home after the fire, you may need to repeat this several times if you want good results. Avoid over-washing the walls and ceiling though.
• Once the previous step is complete you will need to prime the walls damaged by the flames, followed by repainting them. You may have a lot of soot in your AC filters as well, so you will need to remove them. You will also need to apply a new sealing layer on top of surfaces affected by soot. You will also need to clean and disinfect all your appliances.
• The last step of cleaning your home is to do whatever you can to remove the smell of soot and fire from your home. A simple deodorant or air freshener will try to mask the smell, but it will only be a temporary solution. To deal with the smoke you will need to use a cleaning product that removes smell. You can use distilled white vinegar to wipe surfaces where the smell comes from, counteracting the smell. The smell of vinegar on the other hand will dissipate after a few short hours, leaving your home in a better condition.

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About Vince Sandri

Vince Sandri is a content writer and blogger with more than 12 years of experience. His expertise is in creating content related to disaster restoration, including information about preventing and reacting to natural disasters like flooding, water damage, fire and smoke damage, mold growth, storm damage and more.
Vince has been the main contributor to RestorationMasterFinder.com since 2014. Over that time, he has written numerous service pages and blogs for disaster restoration providers featured on RestorationMasterFinder.com. Vince has done extensive research and covered a wide range of topics relating to disaster restoration to help homeowners, business owners, and property managers better protect their property. He understands the problems that disasters like flooding, fire, smoke, and mold can cause as well as the best ways to respond to these issues to limit the damage.
Vince completed his Bachelor of Arts degree at Aurora University and his master’s degree at DePaul University. He has been writing SEO website pages, blogs, and press releases since 2012. Vince is also a musician and can be seen playing in the Chicago, IL area.