How can I eliminate cigarette smoke smell from an entire house?

Question

We are about to buy a house where two smokers lived for 20 years. We need suggestions. There is carpet in only three rooms. Everything else is vinyl or tile. The walls are paneled or wallboard. The ceiling is celetex or compressed fiber type of tiles.

Answer 1

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The carpets hold most of the odors: Sprinkle lots of Baking Soda all over the carpets monthly. Allow it to sit on the carpet all day or over the weekend for two days if possible, it's harmless to pets and children. Then vacuum it with a rented or borrowed Kirby vacuum cleaner or similar industrial type(regular vacuums merely beat the carpet and have little effect-I know because I sold them over two years ago and saw what came out of carpet, I will not own a home with carpet, only wood floors because carpet is extremely unsanitary-ask any allergist or MD!)
If they left fabric furniture you'll need to dust it with the baking soda and vacuum it with the Kirby type vacuum weekly for about 3 months.
The walls and cathedral ceilings, rent or borrow a Kirby type vacuum and borrow a ladder to first vacuum the surfaces.
Take a bucket, fill it with water and a small amount of Chlorox, put gloves on, use a large sponge and squeeze it out until damp to wipe the surfaces, you'll be shocked at the brown soot that comes off!.
If you're dealing with stained wood, you might want to consider sanding it and then restaining.
Aerate the home daily or after work by leaving the sliding glass doors, windows, front door, and bedroom/bathroom doors open and run some fans throughout the house. For a nice fragrance, you can rub natural scented oils of Patchouli, Lavender, Sandalwood etc. on the fan grating so the fans distribute the favorable odor.
Did you know that Chlorox, Baking Soda, Ammonia, White Vinegar, and ordinary soap flakes will do the same thing as commercial brands of cleaners at a fraction of the cost if used in varying needed strengths?
That's all! It's worked for us, we do the baking soda on the carpets now about 2 times per month!

Answer 2

Deep cleaning will help.

Steam clean the carpets.

Wallpaper some of the more smokey rooms. (find out where most of the smoking took place).

Recarpet other rooms

The wood will be fine after cleaning, but drop ceiling panels might be best replaced in time.

You will generally notice that it will get better with time. If you HATE the house now, you may grow to like it.

My wife quit smoking inside the house about 10 years ago. We both noticed an improvement rather quickly. But we did not HATE it in the first place. So it is an attitude thing,

Oh, we bought a used car once that was smoked in alot. It never got good.

Good luck

Answer 3

There's a lot of things out there. I would shampoo the carpets, if you have drapes that were there before, wash them. Open all the windows and use a few of those citrus discs that eliminate odors. They work great. Also, don't forget to clean out all the heating ducts and filters and replace them. Another trick for the hard floors is a good vaccuming with a bounce sheet in the bag area and then clean the floors with a nice scented cleaner like pine sol lemon. Once everything has been cleaned and aired it might still take a little time, if it still doesn't go away, put baking soda packages in every room.

Answer 4

Find a professional in your area that has access to a "high concentration" ozone machine. Ozone is the BEST deodorization process, but is is the slowest. If you are going to do this you need to leave the ozone machine in the house for 2-3 days (depending on the size of the home and ozone machine).
Also, very important that you, or pets, are NOT in the home while the ozone machine is running.
Ozone will get rid of the odor, but it is slow. You have to be patient.
It does help to speed things up to wash what you can. ie: ceiling, walls, drapes, carpet, etc. . .

Answer 5

After all your basic cleaning is done, the odor remains, right? There is a way to deal with it effectively. There is a new technology called Radiant Catalytic Ionization, where a u.v. light shines on a honeycomb coated with titanium dioxide. This is installed right above your air handler, and the resulting oxides gently break up the odor-causing compounds in the air and on surfaces. Price range, $400-$500 installed. www.ecoquestintl.com

Answer 6

you can't .... Your best bet is to sell your home to another smoker .... Be sure to have the Realtor include the words SMOKERS ONLY in the listing .. I wish there was good news ...

If you have to show your house to a nonsmoker .. I would Boil Garlic and Hot peppers in a pot overnight ... Garlic can over power the smoke smell for a short time...

if you are caught off guard spraying a can of RAID in the common areas might also mask the stink..

I'm just thinking out loud ..... Good Question .. Best of luck

Answer 7

My sister bought a house that had smokers AND cats. She put bowls of vinegar with a sponge in it everywhere, left the windows open, washed everything down, and in some rooms, repainted. It worked.!!

Answer 8

i smoked for 32 yrs and i quit 2.5 yrs ago. i cleaned what i could clean, sprayed fabreez on what i could, painted the walls, pulled the carpet out and just left the windows open to air out. no one even knows i ever smoked in the house. i even bought a new car. good luck

Answer 9

air it out then wash down all that u can, paint , replace carpet or if its fairly new carpeting have it cleaned 2 smokers 20 yrs man i bet its bad probably would be good idea to have heat ducks etc cleaned out also probably a stale smell in there good luck

Answer 10

wash walls and paint them if you just paint the cigarrete tar will peel the paint off and get some air freshener that is specifically to rid of smoke odor