How much of your spring cleaning have you gotten done so far? I know that I am definitely not as far along as I want to be, especially given that I’ll start cleaning and then get bored of it or just start watching Netflix about ten minutes in and then give up for the rest of the day. Anyway, if you have a garage, it’s important that you clean it out, especially in preparation for the summer. If it was messy all winter, then you, of course, had to brave the snow, but who wants to brave the heat and then wait for the car to cool down, when you could have had it in the garage in the first place? Check out our guide to cleaning out your garage and then get to work. You got this.

The very first thing you want to do is to take EVERYTHING out of your garage. Literally everything. Car, junk, trash, stuff you need… get it all outside into the driveway or onto your lawn and leave your garage totally empty. Then you should start to sort everything you’ve just taken out into two piles, one for things that you want to keep and one for things that you’ve been meaning to throw away or just forgot about. Throw those things away right now. Dispose of chemicals like paint safely, but just get it out of there forever.

With your garage empty, you should sweep and vacuum the floor and dust the corners. If it’s a nice day, you could even hose down the floor! If you’re feeling super adventurous, consider applying an epoxy garage floor kit. It’s a lot of work and a lot of waiting, but it’s worth it if you’re looking for a really serious makeover.

With the space clean, it’s time to take a critical look at your current storage solutions. If you don’t have shelves or wall storage, consider getting some! It’s a great space-saving hack to store things vertically. You can even store bikes on wall racks, which saves a TON of space.

Finally, get everything back into your garage, organizing as you go. You’ll probably spot some things that you thought you wanted to keep but are really junk that you can just go ahead and throw away. You don’t need that in your life. When everything’s back in place (or has found a new home), park your car back inside!