Here's how many days of your life you'll spend cleaning, based on your location
All those hours really add up.
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Between vacuuming every room in the house, doing the dishes each night, scrubbing the toilets, organizing the mud room, wiping down the countertops, and every other not-so-fun task on your chores list, it often feels like you spend your entire life cleaning. And while that's a little dramatic, you might spend more time than you think, according to a new survey.
Mulberrys Garment Care polled adults across the country on how much time they spend on chores each week, then calculated the number of days that total would add up to in the average person's lifetime. While it varies state by state, the results show that Hawaii spends the most on cleaning (a staggering 138 days over a lifetime!) and Mississippi spends the least at 122 hours.
Below is the entire list of states along with our cleaning guru's top tips for getting your chores done faster and more efficiently—so you can hopefully cut your number down by a few days.
The state-by-state breakdown
Alabama: 123
Alaska: 130
Arizona: 133
Arkansas: 124
California: 136
Colorado: 134
Connecticut: 135
Delaware: 128
Florida: 132
Georgia: 128
Hawaii: 138
Idaho: 132
Illinois: 132
Indiana: 128
Iowa: 133
Kansas: 130
Kentucky: 124
Louisiana: 124
Maine: 130
Maryland: 132
Massachusetts: 134
Michigan: 129
Minnesota: 136
Mississippi: 122
Missouri: 128
Montana: 128
Nebraska: 132
Nevada: 130
New Hampshire: 132
New Jersey: 136
New Mexico: 129
New York: 136
North Carolina: 130
North Dakota: 131
Ohio: 127
Oklahoma: 124
Oregon: 133
Pennsylvania: 130
Rhode Island: 133
South Carolina: 126
South Dakota: 130
Tennessee: 126
Texas: 131
Utah: 133
Vermont: 134
Virginia: 132
Washington: 134
West Virginia: 123
Wisconsin: 133
Wyoming: 130
Our top tips for cleaning more efficiently
First things first: Clean from top to bottom, says Jonathan Chan, our senior lab testing technician. "That means clean the ceiling fan first and the floor last," he explains. "You don't want to clean the floor twice because you knocked dust down when you're wiping down shelves." He also recommends tackling bigger jobs in stages to conserve your energy and make your to-do list feel more manageable. "For example, soften up your baked-on microwave stains by steam-cleaning it first," he says, noting that the Angry Mama—which we've tested in our lab—works really well for this particular task.
And as for everyone's most-hated chore—vacuuming, of course—Jonathan suggests taking advantage of your vacuum's attachments to help you save time. Not sure which one is best? Consider two of the most common ones: The crevice-dusting combination wand is ideal for reaching tight nooks and crannies (like between couch cushions) or using as a makeshift duster while the extension wand helps you get into those hard-to-reach spaces.