I was wondering if any of the moms out there have any advice on whether purchasing a steam vac is a good or bad idea. I have carpeting through out the house and currently only have 1 kid, but definitely plan on having more. Our carpeting has taken a beating since we moved in a little over a year ago. My in-laws come to the house to watch the baby on the days that I work, and since they have no regard to anyone's home, they make their mess and leave and expect that since it is my home, I should clean up.
I'm tired of spending my days cleaning up stains off the carpet on my hands and knees.
I do plan on getting the carpet chem-dried prior to putting down some plastic runners on the stairs and high traffic areas, but I wanted to know if investing in a good steam vac to maintain the carpeting through out the rest of the house is a good idea.
Any suggestions re: brand, model, and any good and/or bad experiences would be a great help.
Thanks!
I LOVE my Hoover steamvac. With a toddler and 3 pets, it gets a fair amount of use, and it does a great job with stains. The nicest part is if a drink spills, all I have to do is pull it out of the closet and suck up the mess. Worth every penny for us.
Hi S.,
I bought my steam vac. 10 years ago, and I never regret it. To me it's a great investment, because I am a bit of a neat freak and my kids sometimes had accidents like spills on my couches or floor. I have two dogs that sometimes track dirt. Also, if you have company, one time my grandma spilled grape juice on my carpet and it washed right off.
I love my Bissel Proheat 2x Cleanshot (the red one). I have used it many times and it's worth it, especially when my kids spill milk or juice everywhere. I got mine from Bed, Bath, and Beyond and used the 20% coupon you get in the mail. It is heavy but very easy to use.
I really liked having one and it would have come in handy in the new home we have that came with off-white carpeting. Unfortunately, my husband took it to our rental apartment and tried cleaning the carpet there before vaccuming up the gobs of cat hair. He ruined it! So, if you do get one, be sure to vaccuum up any area before using the carpet cleaner or it will certainly clog and be ruined forever!
Its too heavy. Our is Bissel. i was very excited when i bought it and planned on using it but never got around it. I may be have used it once. if you are interested get it from me ###-###-####
I got one 8 years ago when I got married and love having it. I don't use it as much as I wish i had the time too but it's great especially now that my 6 month son spits up a lot. He's on his yummy a lot on the floor learning to crawl so it comes in handy if he spits up. It's good also for the car if you have cloth seats especially as your child gets older and will spill stuff in the car. I have a Hoover and never had a problem with it.
We have the bissel proheat too and we love it. I would also recommend for small jobs the Resolve Carpet Fick. We use it in the high traffic areas or quick spit-up clean up on the carpet.
I have a carpet steamer and it is a godsend! It works really well and I steam clean my carpets every 3 months. They look amazing when I'm done.
Just know that you have to rinse the carpet after you clean it with solution. The solution in the carpet actually ATTRACTS dirt so if you don't rinse the carpet with water (with the steamer) your carpet will get dirtier after you clean it. I didn't know this, a friend told me and she was correct. They don't tell you this in the directions!
My Bissel Proheat broke, my fault for lending it out to friends. I hope to get a new one soon!
we borrowed our friend's bissell proheat 2x. it was awesome. we just had to buy the solution for it. we bought the pet stain & odor remover (we have a dog). i really liked it. cleaned our carpets great. we have 3 little girls, so it really needed to be cleaned. that's the only one we've tried. if i had the money (i think like $250 for the vacuum), i'd buy it. it heats the water and really cleans the carpet well. there's also an attachment to do the stairs and it can do upholstery too. good luck. i feel your pain with cleaning the stains!
I don't have a steam vac per se, but we recently purchased the Shark steam mop, and I can tell you I absolutely love it. It works really well and I don't have to use any chemicals to know my floor is disenfected since it is being cleaned with steam. I also use the carpet sweeper to go over our carpeting, and that works really well. For old stains, I use a little bit of Basic H by Shaklee and it works wonders - it removes even ground in year old stains like a magnet. If it was a urine stain or something, then I go over it with the steamer just to be safe but this works well for us. Oh, and about getting your carpeting chem-dried, please don't. Infusing those toxic chemicals into your carpeting is never a good idea especially with little ones walking around. Even though you're thinking of covering it up, doesn't matter - those chemicals leak out and would affect your air quality for a long time.
Contact me if you'd like more info. - I do rep. for Shaklee.
K.
I got a steam vac for Christmas one year and love it. When I got it we had 3 cats and if you're familiar with cats, you know the mess they can make, plus a baby about your son's age. I would recommend it. It made me feel better when the carpen was clean and reduced the amount of poisonous cleaners we had to use to spot clean.
Save yourself the stress of buying one and cleaning it yourself and have if done professionally. You should only need to do it once a year and they have better and more expensive equipment. I have one and it's a pain to do sections and having to change the dirty water every 5 minutes.
Hi S. Yes investing in purchasing a steam vac is a good investment. I haven't rented a steam cleaner in over 20 years!!! I've own two and they work perfectly. You don't have to worry about rushing them back to the store or getting one that doesn't work properly. Brands that I've had were Dirt Devil and Euruka. Hoover also makes a good one. The price can ranch from about eighty dollars to three hundred. It depends on what you're looking for. So check them out you willn't regret it.
Get one! We have 3 kids and have to use our at least once a week! something is always getting spilled. You can clean it up whenever you want. You don't have to wait to get it done professionally. It will really help your carpet to stay looking nice for years!
We recently purchased a Hoover steam cleaner (I can find out the model if you want). It's a bit big and bulky, but we are sooo glad we have it! Our son never spit up as a baby, but he seems to throw up a lot more as a growing toddler, plus we have pets that are getting older and have had a couple of accidents. We were tired of renting a steam cleaner each time. We used the cleaner 3 times in the first week we bought it, so we feel it was well worth the extra cost.
Good luck!
M.
I have the same problem with carpeting. The men in my house use it to wipe their shoes! We purchased the little green machine, it's great, but for small areas. My other solution was to get laminate floors with nice throw rugs.I now have that in my living room & spare bedroom. I have carpet on the stairs & have had them cleaned by Stanley Steemer, then covered then with stair protectors.
We have a Hoover Steamvac with the rotating brushes, and I don't know what I'd do without it! We've had it for about 8 years, and with 2 dogs and 2 small kids it gets a lot of use. It's very easy to use, and works great. I do the high traffic areas regularly, and try to do the whole house (one room at a time) yearly. It's not bad to take it out for potty training mishaps or spills. It's like an upright vacuum, except that you have to add water and soap and rinse it out after. I spray stain remover on spots before I clean it and most have come out of our light colored carpet. It is a great investment! And when you see how much dirt carpet can collect, you'll be glad you have something to clean it with, and you'll feel better about your baby crawling around on the floor.
