How to Prepare Your Apartment for a Parent's Visit

By Francine Fluetsch on October 30, 2016

This article is brought to you by CORT Furniture Rental. We take the hassle out of furnishing your new place so you can do more important things like read this article. Learn more about why furniture rental is the best way to get a great looking apartment.

You know what’s great about living on your own? There aren’t any parents nagging at you about when to do your chores.

The bad part? Well, you probably don’t keep the place spic and span 24/7, so if your parents are coming for a visit, you are going to have to do some deep cleaning.

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You don’t want the whole visit to revolve around your parents telling you that you are a slob and you need to clean more, because that will just cause agitation on your part and will give you flashbacks to the days of living with your parents.

To avoid this, here are some tips on how to prepare your apartment before your parents come and visit you.

Deep clean the bathroom.

Your parents are probably going to be the most critical of the bathroom since it can get dirty rather quickly, and it’s easier to point out someone else’s messes. This happened to me when my parents first came to visit my apartment. I had lightly cleaned, but by dad went on and on about how dusty the toilet was and that I should use bleach the next time. Talk about embarrassing.

You are going to want to get on your hands and knees, pull on the heavy-duty yellow cleaning gloves, and break out the bleach. The most important areas are around and in the toilet, as well as the sink. The floor should be clean enough that your parents can walk in there barefoot and not have hair or other foreign objects attach to their feet.

As for the shower or tub: if you have a cute shower curtain that you can close and you know they won’t need to shower during their visit, you can do without scrubbing the tub, which takes a while. If, on the other hand, you have a see-through glass door thing or don’t have a curtain, you’re going to want to scrub in there too or be subjected to a rant on how mold can kill you and such.

Stock up on “healthy” items.

Okay, your parents are coming, and you can’t make them ramen for dinner, so it’s time to weed through the pantry and get rid of things that are considered totally junk. If you need these for desperate measures, put them away in a closet or something so they aren’t out in the open and it looks like you are eating healthy all the time.

Figure out an easy but healthy dish that you can make them, or just have some fruit out for show and opt to take them to a fun restaurant so you don’t have to stock the whole fridge.

This will help you in the long run since you can only digest that much sodium for so long before your body will fight back, so think of your parents’ visit as a necessary cleanse from your usual diet.

Make the living room sit-able.

What do parents want to do when they visit? They want to sit and chat with you, see how your life is going, bother you about your future and so on. You want to make sure that your living room is ready to receive them.

Spruce up your couch by putting a nice throw blanket over it, or by buying some cute yet cheap pillows at Target. If you have limited seating, why not drag a dining room chair into the living room already and adorn it with a comfy memory foam seat cushion? Your parents will appreciate the effort you are going through in hosting them, and even if the living room furniture doesn’t all match, they will enjoy having a place to sit and chat with you.

To make it cozier, you can have the coffee table clear of clutter and maybe have some coasters ready for them if they want some coffee or tea while you chat. Having some healthy cookies out for them to nibble on would be a great touch too, and don’t forget to light that candle on your end table to ensure that your place doesn’t smell.

Don’t forget the little things.

While deep cleaning your whole place in a panic, you might forget the small details like making your bed or putting your jackets away so they aren’t covering the couch, so to avoid this, make a list of all the little details that need to be taken care of right before your parents get there.

If everything is in order, you are going to look so put together and will probably be able to avoid a lot of their judgment and questioning.

Inform your roommates. 

While you can keep all your areas clean, it’s a little hard to get rid of the odor coming out of your roommates’ dwellings. About a week before your parents come (if you have the luxury of a heads-up), inform your roommates that your parents are coming and hope they take the hint to at least make their rooms smell decent or shut their doors.

It might also be cool if they can give you and your parents some space to catch up, so if they know ahead of time when your parents are coming, they can help you keep the place clean and can also make plans to be elsewhere so they aren’t awkwardly trapped in the house with you and your parents.

These are just a few cleaning tips to keep in mind before the rents pay a visit. Keep it classy and clean!

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