Green Home Cleaning Tips: Clean Your House Without the Harsh Chemicals

Lemon and baking soda for green home cleaning

Open the cabinet under most kitchen sinks and you'll find a small chemistry lab: a spray for the counters, another for the glass, a third for the bathroom, and a mystery bottle with the label half peeled off that's been there since flip phones were cool. (Which one? Nobody knows.)

Here's the good news: you can get your home just as clean with a few simple, inexpensive ingredients, many of which are already in your pantry. These green home cleaning tips will help you clean safely, spend less and keep harsh chemicals out of your home, your yard and your local waterways.

The short version:

  • Stock four basics: baking soda, white vinegar, a gentle soap and borax.
  • Use vinegar for glass and grime, but not as a disinfectant.
  • Never mix cleaners, homemade or not.
  • Keep cleaning water and car fluids out of storm drains.
  • Take old paint and solvents to a hazardous waste site.

Green Home Cleaning Tips For Supplies

Homemade green cleaning supplies: vinegar, baking soda and spray bottles

You don't need a cart full of specialty products. These four basics handle most everyday jobs:

  • Baking soda. Mixed with a little water into a paste, it's a gentle scrubber for sinks, tubs, stovetops and stuck-on gunk. It deodorizes, too.
  • White distilled vinegar. Diluted with water, it cuts through grime, hard-water spots and soap scum, and makes windows sparkle.
  • A gentle soap. Castile or glycerin-based soap washes dishes and surfaces without harsh additives.
  •  Borax. Cleans, deodorizes and helps lift toilet-bowl stains. It's a natural mineral, but natural isn't the same as harmless, so store it out of reach of kids and pets.

When you do buy cleaners, "natural" and "eco" on the label don't guarantee much. Look for a third-party seal, such as the EPA's Safer Choice label, which means the product's ingredients have actually been reviewed.

Learn more in Green Home Cleaning Products: What You Should Know.

Viva Vinegar! How to Clean With Vinegar

Distilled white vinegar is the MVP of green cleaning, especially for glass.

Homemade window cleaner: Mix 1/4 cup (60 ml) white vinegar with 3 3/4 cups (900 ml) warm water in a spray bottle. It works just as well as the store-bought stuff, for pennies.

Vinegar also does a great job on soap scum, hard-water stains and grimy tile floors. A few things to know:

  • It cleans, but it doesn't reliably disinfect. For germy jobs like a stomach-bug cleanup or raw-chicken juice on the counter, use a registered disinfectant.
  • Skip it on natural stone. Vinegar can etch granite and marble.
  • Don't mix it with castile soap. The two cancel each other out and leave a curdled, gummy mess.

Never Mix Cleaners

This one's a safety rule, not a green one, but it matters: never mix cleaning products, homemade or store-bought. Vinegar or ammonia combined with bleach creates toxic gases. One cleaner at a time, rinse between them, and keep the room ventilated.

Green Pest Control

Bugs happen. You don't have to fog the house to deal with them.

  • Ants outside: Pour boiling water down the ant hole (carefully, and away from plants you love).

Where to Rinse Cleaning Tools

It's a little-known fact that the drain in your street and the drain in your sink go to very different places. Indoor drains send water to a treatment plant.

Storm drains, and anything that runs off your driveway or sidewalk, carry it straight to local creeks, lakes and the ocean, untreated.

So rinse mops, buckets and brushes in a utility sink, or over the lawn if you've used only mild, plant-safe cleaners. Never dump cleaning water on the pavement or into the gutter.

Green Cleaning in the Garage

Boy sweeping the garage floor with a push broom

The garage is often the most chemical-packed room in the house. A few smart habits keep it safer for your family and the environment:

  • Use metal drip pans under cars and equipment. They're easy to move and clean.
  • Soak up leaks with cat litter or sawdust. Let it absorb the fluid, sweep it into a bag and toss it in the trash.
  • Fix leaking cars promptly, and never hose the spill into the street. Oil and antifreeze that wash into storm drains go straight into local waterways.

Get the kids involved, too, with these tips for garage cleaning with kids.

Green Car Washing

Washing the car in the driveway sends soapy, oily water straight down the storm drain.

Better options: wash it on the lawn or gravel with a biodegradable car soap, or use a commercial car wash, which typically sends its water to a treatment plant or recycles it. Bonus: someone else does the scrubbing.

Green Painting and Touch-Ups

  • Choose latex paint for touch-ups around the house. It's water-based, so you can skip the paint thinners and solvents entirely.
  • Wrap brushes overnight. Mid-project, wrap brushes tightly in plastic instead of washing them every night, then do a thorough cleanup when the job is done.
  • Clean up the right way. Wash latex paint from brushes and containers in an indoor sink. For oil-based paint, let used thinner settle, pour off the clear liquid and reuse it.
  • Dispose of leftovers safely. Take unusable paint, thinner, residue and paint strippers to your community's household hazardous waste collection site.

Green Cleaning FAQs

Is vinegar a disinfectant? Not a reliable one. Vinegar is great for cleaning grime, glass and hard-water spots, but for killing germs on high-risk surfaces, use a registered disinfectant.

What can I clean with baking soda? Sinks, tubs, stovetops, ovens, pots and pans, and smelly spots like the fridge, trash cans and carpets. Mix it with a little water for a gentle scrubbing paste.

Is borax safe to clean with? It's an effective cleaner, but it's not something to ingest or leave within reach of kids and pets. Store it like any other cleaning product.

What's the easiest homemade glass cleaner? 1/4 cup white vinegar in 3 3/4 cups warm water, in a spray bottle.

Fewer Messes, Fewer Cleaners

The greenest cleaning product is the one you don't have to use. My book The Daily Home Reset shows you how to keep everyday mess under control in just 15 minutes a day, so grime never gets bad enough to need the heavy-duty stuff.

Keep Going

Keep your home clean, green and safe with these related guides: