Open the window and turn up the music. It’s time to practice your best dance moves . . . with the vacuum cleaner? Keeping your home clean can be difficult with roommates and little time. But with the motivation, the right tools and time-saving techniques, you’ll have a clean house (with little effort) in no time.

Laura Dellutri, a.k.a. the Healthy Housekeeper, is an expert on quick cleaning. She has appeared on the Style Network, FOX, Discovery and about 100 other channels. Recently Dellutri was a guest on The View and earlier this year she released her newest book, Speed Cleaning 101: Cut Your Cleaning Time in Half. In the book she shares some of her tips for cleaning quickly and efficiently. It’s life-savibg advice for busy college students, especially when parents can show up on a moment’s notice.

The four principles of clean

Dellutri says there are four rules in cleaning. First, always clean from top to bottom because dust and dirt fall. Start from the highest point, the windows, and work down to couches and tables and clean the floor last. This way, you’re sure to pick up all the dust. Second, work around the room in a circle. Start cleaning the outer edges of the room and move into the center. Third, Dellutri says to clean in an organized way to save time. Jumping all over a room means you are more likely to forget something. She says even adjusting the way you vacuum can make cleaning move more quickly. She says to vacuum in horizontal, overlapping strokes, not randomly. She also suggests using this pattern when cleaning things such as windows. Moving in an uneven pattern can take longer and leave you with a bigger mess. When you clean a window in circles, Dellutri says, you’re more likely to miss the corners and create streaks. The last rule is to not clean what’s clean. Dellutri says more is not always better, if something is already clean or looks clean, just skip over it and move onto something more important.

The tools

Following the four principles alone can save you time, but Dellutri says the tools can make a difference too. While you can clean with a 90-cent sponge, a reusable micro fiber cloth, only a few dollars more, can pick up 40 times its weight and cleans with just water. You can cut window-cleaning time from a few minutes to about 30 seconds. Don’t worry about buying expensive cleaners; Dellutri says that 90 percent of your home can be cleaned with just a damp cloth. Kitchens and bathrooms are the only places that need a disinfectant or sanitizer. Even carpet can be cleaned with a mixture of cold water and mild dish detergent.

Roommates

Some roommates never have problems keeping things clean. It just happens, says Lindsay Douglass, Lake Forest, Ill. senior. “You should do whatever works. I’m just lucky to have a roommate that’s clean too.” But some of us aren’t so fortunate.

Dellutri says dividing housework between roommates can make things move more quickly. “I highly recommend sitting down together and picking the chores apart,” she says. “One person does the bathroom and one does the kitchen — make a chore list and stick to it.” As a rule of thumb, Dellutri says if you live alone, you only need to deep clean once a month. Deep cleaning means getting to everything—the bathrooms, kitchen and all other rooms. If there are two people, deep clean every three weeks. For three people, clean every two weeks and for four or more, you should clean at least once a week. Between the deep cleaning, just do a quick pick up. But Dellutri says deep cleaning shouldn’t take very long either. She says, using the tricks, you should be able to thoroughly clean 1,000 square feet in an hour.

If it’s hard deciding who cleans what, Kim Hinkly, owner of Merry Maids in Topeka, says to discuss your pet peeves with your roommates. If one of you really hates toothpaste on the mirror, then be in charge of cleaning it. “It’s not fun,” Hinkly says. “But you have to know the expectations of your roommates.” She also suggests if you like doing something or at

least don’t mind it, volunteer. If you don’t mind vacuuming, agree to do it once a week. It makes maintaining your house a lot easier.

Keeping it clean

To keep your home neat and tidy, stick to your plan and get rid of clutter. Hinkly says that to help de-clutter, use a laundry basket to gather all of the items in a room, throw away any trash and put the other items where they belong. She says even though your house may not be perfect, guests won’t notice any mess because everything is straight.

So the next time Mom calls and says she’s on her way, don’t panic. Just put your speed-cleaning knowledge to use. She’ll never know that two minutes before she arrived you were still recovering from what looked like a nuclear explosion.