COME CLEAN
Filthy House SOS team overhaul woman’s cluttered-filled home to make it look like a whole new pad
A PAIR of professional cleaners overhauled a woman's cluttered home and it ended up looking like a completely new pad.
Appearing on 5STAR'S Filthy House SOS, 41-year-old Geraldine lives in a three-bedroom house in Sheffield with her three children.
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The single mum has lived in the house for the past 13 years and struggles to give away things that are no longer needed in her home - something she inherited from her mother.
She joked: "I do keep hold of certain things. Everyone knows if you go to Geraldine's house, if you haven't got it - she'll have it."
At the start of the television experiment, Geraldine's living room is also functioning as a kitchen and laundry room while her landing is covered in countless piles of clothes.
As well as having a random clothes rail in front of the door, Geraldine's fridge is kept in her living room as she didn't want it ruining the look of her new kitchen.
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Coming to Geraldine's rescue, professional cleaners Brennan and John moved into her home for three days to help her sort through the mess.
Describing how her home got so out of hand, Geraldine explained how she created storage areas to hide some of the clutter.
She added: "It just moves around the house. It doesn't go anywhere.
"I don't want my children to end up being in situation like me when they get older. If I can do something about it now then hopefully they'll realise they don't have to keep hold of everything all the time."
Having seen the cluttered living space for the first time, John said: "Everything was so out of place. It doesn't feel like a home."
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Meanwhile, Brennan added: "There wasn't anything I'd say was clean in there."
Throwing themselves into the challenge, the pair started by hiring a skip and tackling Geraldine's son's room - which is overflowing with clutter.
With his single bed pushed up against the far wall and clothes, games and controllers covering the floor, it's no small task.
But when her son has mates over, Geraldine says she ultimately "doesn't want his friends looking down" on her.
In total, it takes two and a half hours to go through the 10 years of clutter taking up every spare inch in the cramped bedroom.
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The next big task the mum-of-three has to undertake is going through all the random items in the living room - including the fridge.
With John and Brennan's guidance, Geraldine takes all her possessions and puts them in the garden before going through each and before categorising them into 'keep', 'charity' and 'bin' bags.
Although it's an enormous task (which lasts well into the evening), Geraldine admits: "It will make me happier in the long-run, [I'll be] less fed up and more cheerful."
Meanwhile, the mum also gives away her daughters' old toys to charity which have been taking up valuable space in her bedroom.
While she was tackling this, Brennan pulls out all the stops to sort out Geraldine's carpets.
Not only has the house suffered from the amount of clutter everywhere but the cleaners find years' worth of dirt lurking in the corners and hiding in the upholstery.
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Referring to it as "the beast", Brennan rents an industrial upholstery cleaner to treat the battered carpets.
After going over every corner of the landing, the cleaner then pours out the water and is horrified to find it's turned black.
He said: "You can actually smell the body sweat in that."
Showing off the grime that has solidified in the cleaner, it is then revealed that carpets can hold up to FOUR TIMES their weight in dirt.
To ensure Geraldine and the kids stay on top of the cleaning from now on, Brennan designs a rota for them to stick to.
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Explaining how surfaces need to be cleaned everyday, the professional also recommends tackling certain rooms on designated days of the week.
Coming round to the idea, the mum said: "We can do something little and often, everyday as a family - that will help us maintain the house."
After three days of hard work, Geraldine's formerly cluttered home is virtually unrecognisable.
The pair have moved her fridge back into the kitchen, got rid of the rail and given the living room a deep clean.
Alongside this, they also changed the set up of her son's bedroom by moving the bed to the other side to make the room look bigger.
Meanwhile, the mum's room finally looks like it belongs to her after she donated her daughters' old toys to charity.
Admiring her freshly cleaned carpets, Geraldine joked: "No one is going upstairs in shoes every again!"
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