How To Easily Organize And Clean Up A Garage
You may think that to clean up a garage, all you need to do is throw away the old junk or sell it in a garage sale. There’s more to properly cleaning it so that it adds value to your home, makes it an extra room with organized storage and a stress-free zone.
When you come home at the end of a day at work, you don’t want to be placing your car in a messy, dusty and chaotically, jam-packed extra storage area. At least, I don’t, and I’m sure there are others like me! When you organize a garage, you create a stress-free zone that’s not only for car storage but other garden and tool storage.
We decided to do a bit of spring-cleaning on ours, and here are our tips on organizing and cleaning up a garage.
How To Clean Up A Garage
These are general tips that you should consider – from the cement pad to organizing tools and equipment.
1. Protect The Cement Pad
The first thing to look at when cleaning up a garage is the floor. Salt that drips from your car in the winter will eventually eat into the cement pad, pitting it and making it look unsightly. It also weakens it making it more prone to cracks. Oil drips are also a pain as they are very difficult to remove when they have soaked into the concrete.
While it may take a weekend of hard work, sealing it with concrete paint and a special clear sealer will protect it for years to come and make clean-up after a snowy day or oil/fluid leaks much easier.
Here’s how:
- Clear the floor of all things, shelving units… everything!
- Sweep the floor and remove as much dust and other particles as possible.
- Use either a power washer, or a regular hose with a wide sweep broom to push out all excess dust and dirt from the floor.
- Once the floor is dry, use a bonding primer for concrete/masonry to create the first layer. Let it dry according to package directions.
- Use a concrete/masonry paint (ask to have anti-slip paint additive included to reduce the slippery texture) to lay down the first layer. We did this by hand with a paint brush so that we could get the paint into any crevices and holes. Let it dry and do a second layer. You may want to use a piece of cardboard under your knees to reduce discomfort from the gritty first paint layer.
- Once it has completely dried, seal the paint with a sealer – there are some that have the “wet-look” and make it super simple to clean off any dirt and dust with just a rag and soapy water.
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2. Paint The Walls
The second way to clean up a garage is to ensure the walls are in tip-top shape. First, check to see if there are any holes in dry-walled sections of the garage. Plug small holes with a bit of fast-drying spackle. Larger holes will require a mesh.
Make sure there aren’t any holes in the walls first to prevent carbon monoxide from seeping into your house. Patch them up, sand them and then paint.
Once the holes are fixed, it’s time to paint!
Use masonry paint on the cement blocks for a clean look. Cover up the gray and sometimes stained cement block with a clean white paint that makes it easy to spot cobwebs and other dust that you can sweep off with a broom. For walls that are drywalled, use a mildew-resistant white paint.
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3. Think About Storage In Your Garage Space
One of the easiest ways to clean up your garage is to get things off the floor.
The former owners of our home did a jimmy-job with mismatched wood pieces and screws to create shelving that was completely impractical. We couldn’t manipulate it easily to store our winter/summer tires.
Like with home furniture, we measured out the space for sturdy metal shelving units that could be adjusted.
This made it super easy to store our tires, while also giving us some extra room for other items. The metal shelving unit also looks sleek against the white wall.
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4. Pegboards And Other Storage Tools Are You Best Friend
Organizing a garage can be as easy as putting up a pegboard for tools. Keep everything easily accessible by adding hooks and other storage options for gardening tools, rakes, shovels, etc.
We found cool hooks for our recycling bins that kept them close to the wall and hanging vertically. This gave us extra space on the floor so that we could walk around the car to get to the side door.
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5 // Opt For A Smaller Central Vacuum Unit
Central vacuum systems are often placed in the garage. If you don’t need one that’s meant for a 8,000 sq. ft home, then trade it in for a new, small and quiet unit that won’t take up too much space.
We’re in the process of looking to get ours replaced with a Canadian-made central vacuum that won’t impede traffic from the car to the back door.
What Does It Cost To Clean Up A Garage?
It’s a small investment in time and materials to clean up a garage and organize it well. We spent approximately $500 on paint and sealers, the shelving unit and the storage strip unit. Luckily, we got the pegboard second-hand for free. The central vacuum is a separate expense.
Time-wise, it’s about three to four days of work to clean up a garage, paint it, put up shelving units and storage systems and organize it all.
Was it worth it? Totally!
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QUESTION: What are your tips to clean up a garage? What are your tips to organize a garage?
These are great tips! Storage has been big for us since we have 3 boys so have to keep all their clothes to keep passing them down. We installed hanging racks from the ceiling of our garage and it has helped a ton for storage.
That’s a GREAT idea! Are the clothes nicely packaged up airtight to keep bugs away? Our garage is a haven for spiders.
Much like a well organized closet, a well organized garage just makes me happy! We need to invest in our current garage to make it more appealing.
Our garage is is in pretty bad shape. It’s not even finished…
Cleaning out the garage is a tough job. For some it may require hiring some outside help to get it organized and cleaned. But it really is worth the effort that gets put into it.
We have been wanton to paint our garage floor a cobalt blue! Love the pegboards for tools too!
Garage cleaning is hard work and laborious, but this article is certainly helpful. Especially for me.