How to prepare your home for pest treatment

Successful pest control requires collaboration between pest control specialists and homeowners.

You may not know it but as a homeowner, it does not end with merely calling for reliable pest control services. You have to do a little bit of work to prepare your home for the inspection.

Why Should You Prepare Your Home for Pest Treatment?

In general, pest control services do not cover the preparation of your home for the treatment. Such includes storing your food, clothing, furniture, and other obstructions away from the problem area. But, nevertheless, a reliable pest control company should be able to give you advice, walking you through the dos and don’ts in preparing your home for the treatment after performing a site risk assessment.

The goal here is to make sure the treatment goes without a hitch, but more importantly, to ensure that you cover all your bases and no spot is left untreated. Otherwise, poor preparation can yield unsatisfactory results or worse, increase the risks of re-infestation.

What to Do Before a Pest Control Treatment

Clean Up

Regardless of the type of infestation, the first step to prepare your home for pest control is to clean it—and for at least three reasons:

• Ensure the areas of your home easily accessible for the pest control specialists
• To remove any food sources that can attract the pests; and
• Eliminate hiding places, nests, and any visible pests as possible
• Vacuum the carpets, scrub the floor and kitchen surfaces to remove any food crumbs
• Move everything that can get in the way during the treatment—dirty laundry, dirty dishes, and trash. The same goes for your furniture.

Diligent housekeeping and cleaning of your home helps prevent pest harbourage

Move Furniture

Move your furniture away from the walls to make sure the pest control specialists have easy access to all the areas that may be home to pests (e.g. their favourite hiding spots: under the stove, behind large appliances, beneath your furniture, etc.). This will also give them more room to apply chemicals in hard-to-reach and neglected places and areas, which if left untreated could only result in re-infestation.

Store Food Items Away

Clear out your countertops of any food to prevent contamination. Your utensils, plates, cutlery, drinking glasses and other small appliances should also be stored away during the treatment.

However, if you have to leave them on the countertop, make sure you cover them fully with plastic wrapping before and for some time after the treatment. Aside from the bathroom, your kitchen usually attracts the most pests, so expect some serious spraying in it.

Bathroom attracts pests due to its water source availability

Relocate Your Pets

Pets are usually sensitive to chemicals so it would be best to relocate them somewhere else for the duration of the treatment temporarily.

Store their beddings, cages, and toys from the treatment area. Meanwhile, if there are fish tanks within the premises, cover them with a towel or plastic, while making sure that the fish has enough food supplies with oxygen. You might as well have your pets checked for ticks and fleas to make sure that you are getting rid of all the potential sources of pests in your home.

Vacate the Premises

As for you and your family’s safety, it is advisable that you vacate the premises for a minimum of 4 hours or after the completion of the treatment.

In particular, if someone in your household is pregnant or suffering from allergies and other respiratory problems. The same goes for babies and young children, particularly those who are still at the crawling stage.

How to Prepare Your Home for Pest Control, Room by Room

Living Room

• Cover paintings with plastic
• If you have indoor plants, move them out in the open. This prevents damaging your plants with chemicals.

Kitchen

• Unplug your fridge. If possible, finish off any perishables and discard your leftovers.

• Do not cover your kitchen sinks. It is likely that they will be sprayed on during treatment.

Bathroom

• Empty out the bathroom completely
• Pay special attention to your toothbrushes, soaps, shampoo, and any other items that directly are exposed to you.

Bedroom

• Seal clothes in clean bags and keep them away from the treatment areas.
• Remove all your beddings and wrap them tightly in plastics—mattresses, bedsheets, covers, pillows, cushions, etc.

What’s Next? What to Do After the Pest Control Treatment

The preparation you do for the treatment is just as important as the steps you have to take to make sure that you get the best results from the service.

• Keep all doors and windows closed for approximately 4 hours after misting. Make sure to vacate the premises for the time being.
• Ventilate your home by opening all the entries for about 30 minutes to an hour, 4 hours after the treatment.
• Clean your home thoroughly by wiping tabletops and all the other surfaces that your skin may have direct contact.
• In the days following the treatment, make sure to keep an eye out on the trouble spots for dead pests and clean them immediately before they could attract new pests into your home.

Have a pest problem?

Rentokil Singapore offers an integrated pest management program (IPM) that involves the most comprehensive pest control methods to address whatever infestation you may be dealing with.

It provides homes and businesses with effective and eco-friendly pest control solutions tailored according to their needs. It involves on-site review, consultancy, monitoring, and comprehensive reporting to give you the best results.

We also offer advice on the importance of pest prevention maintenance, along with some tips on how to keep them at bay:

• Why we should not procrastinate housekeeping
• Learn more about importance to invest in home maintenance (repair leaks, seal cracks and all the other potential entry points)
• Observe proper food storage can help minimise pest attraction
• Store garbage in sealed containers and regularly dispose them. Importantly, do not leave trash uncleared overnight.
• Engage a pest control professional for regular monitoring and inspection

Always remember to store food in well sealed containers

Did you find this information helpful?

Learn more about how much a pest control treatment would cost you. Get in touch with us today for a free quotation. Contact us at (65) 6347 8138.