When it comes to storing extra mattress around the house, the garage typically isn’t the ideal place due to how sensitive it is to changes in temperature and humidity.
Higher values of these climatic factors means suitable environment for fungus to breed which can have serious health consequences for people that are compromised, and even for those that are in perfect health condition.
But that isn’t to say that the garage is completely ruled out when it comes to storing extra mattress around the house.
You just need to check on the factors that are within your short-run control (such as effective cleaning and packaging), and then hope for the best with those that are generally outside of it (such as climatic factors like temperature and humidity).
Everything usually turns out fine for me – which means that i’ve never run into a fungus growth on my mattress and i’ve never had issues related with quality deterioration after storing a mattress in the garage, although i’ve never stored any mattress for longer than six months in a stretch!
But still, i’ve kept tons of them in the garage, then take them out and wipe clean, and till this very day, they’re in perfect working condition– except that my 3 year old desperately craves otherwise!
Anyways, if storing a mattress in the garage is something you’re completely locked into (regardless of any triple exclamation caution from any blogger), then keep reading until the very last word because you’ll find out exactly how to do it.
How to store mattress in a garage
- Clean the mattress well to rid it off any stain, dirt and dust
- Package the mattress in a breathable a plastic wrap.
- Store the mattress flat on a perch in the garage.
1) Clean the mattress
Cleaning a mattress prior to storage is, in my opinion, the most crucial part of mattress storage. Yeah, not the storage unit itself.
If you really think about it, temp and humidity can only present their most critical effect when the drying stage of any mattress cleaning isn’t properly observed – meaning that everything still points back to the first step of “mattress storage” which is cleaning.
A properly cleaned and dried mattress can easily shake off high temperature and humidity without breeding fungus like molds and mildew, especially if one lives in an area where such organisms are adapted to breeding at a higher range of humidity than any garage around can surpass year round.
Another importance of cleaning prior to storage is that it helps to prevent further setting in of stains that are already present on the surface of the mattress.
These can be very hard to get rid of once they completely settle during the course of storage, so the earlier the better.
Cleaning prior to storage will also get rid of dust, dead skin cells, and other forms of dirt that would normally act as the breeding ground for fungus in the earlier case. Now you see why proper maintenance is key.
So now the million dollar question, how do you properly clean a mattress before storage?
It’s super easy, but first, if the mattress is brand new (still in its packaging) which means it hasn’t being put into any effective use before, cleaning really isn’t necessary. The fibers are probably in their happiest states, and the last thing they ever require is any moisture that will cause them to wither in glee.
What you need to be cleaning are mattresses that have been subject to many years of usage – having absorbed tons of body filth like sweat, blood and the rest on the list that you can easily figure out. Here’s how to properly clean a mattress.
If there are no visible stains (sweat and urine) on the mattress:
- Vacuum all sides and corners first: This will take out all the dust, dirt, dust mite and dead skin cells that have sought off from your body and are now present on the mattress surface. If you don’t have a vacuum, a soft brush is your next best bet, but it doesn’t work as effective.
- Sprinkle baking soda all over the surface: This will absorb any odor lingering around the inside and outside of the mattress. The last thing you ever want out of a garage is a bed that smells like the mustiest armpit. Baking soda acts as an odor vanishing police because of its chemical compositions that are perfectly suited at neutralizing acids that cause bad smells. After sprinkling the surface of the mattress with generous amount of baking soda, let sit for 60 minutes for the magic to happen and then use a compatible vacuum cleaner to suck out every single bit of it from the surface.
- Now you’re done, and you’re ready for the next step which is packaging.
If there are visible sweat or urine stains, you may want to start out by first vacuuming, then treating those statins before applying baking soda.
I advise that if the stains are already set in, i.e. the stains are at least one or two months old, it’s better to skip the stain removal step and move on with the rest of the task as you’ll have a hard time getting rid of the stain completely, and if you did, you’ll end up wetting the bed far too much than any 24 hours can dry it out– meaning that the mattress would take nearly forever to COMPLETELY dry out.
If what you’re dealing with are fresher stains (of sweat and urine) however, which means that the stains are less than one week old, you might have some luck getting them out with the simple DIY solution below.
Here are the ingredients and materials:
- 1 cup of hydrogen peroxide
- 2 tablespoons of baking soda
- 1 drop of liquid soap.
- A spray bottle
Method: Transfer everything into the spray bottle and swirl not shake. Then apply this directly to the spot while using a brush to gently work it in. Leave for about 30 minutes and check back, if the stain isn’t completely gone already, repeat the spraying and brushing again, the stain should be gone after the second round. If not, just embrace whatever you have and AVOID WETTING THE MATTRESS ANY FURTHER!
For other types of stains, you might have some luck getting them out using this simple solution (I’ve never had other types of stains bedsides sweat and urine), or you can perform a quick google search too learn the best and effective methods for getting rid of stains of that particular nature for your type of mattress. You’ll get tons of reliable suggestions, I promise.
After applying the wet mixture and getting results, you still have to make sure that the bed is completely dry and free from moisture before proceeding to package. So ensure to blow out the bed with a fan, take it outside to air out or put directly under the sun to fully dry. I’ll advise that you to leave at least one day interval between cleaning and packaging – but this of course will depend on the type of mattress you have. Memory foam usually takes longer to dry out than any spring or hybrid mattresses.
Next, apply baking soda to deodorize.
Now you’re ready for packaging.
2) Package the mattress
Packaging a mattress is crucial to prevent dust and dirt build up on the surfaces during storage. No storage area is ideal when it comes to preventing dust accumulation on a mattress. It will eventually happen, so the only way to guarantee that it doesn’t accumulate on the surface of your clean mattress is to package the mattress well.
To package the mattress, wrap it in a breathable plastic bag meant for it. Seal the open edge with a quality tape to ensure no entrance is permitted for dust and dirt.
In case you’re wondering, we need breathable bags because we do not want any moisture accumulation which can lead to mold or mildew growth during storage.
4) Storing the mattress in the garage
When storing a mattress, you want to keep it flat like you’d normally do in the bedroom. That’s because the structure can disintegrate when you opt otherwise i.e. storing the mattress on its side or leaning it against the wall. This structure disintegration can happen to any type of mattress but it’s most prominent with spring mattresses. If you’re storing only for a brief period, you might get away with this warning, but for long term storage the side effects of bending and skewing will definitely come out to the open and be visible to the naked eyes.
I know keeping a bed flat in the garage is not ideal, but you have to devise a way to do that. Create a perch of some sort; may be several layers of trap, paper, alignment of many even boxes, or even the mattresses’ box spring itself, and then lay the bed directly on top of this perch, and not on the bare ground, because in any case of flooding or leakage, water can easily be repelled from seeping through the breathable pores and reverse engineering all the prevention tips that you’ve worked hard for.
The garage
In the garage, there are things you must check for before putting any mattress to rest for some time, these include:
- Are there are possible leakage? If yes, then fix it first before storing an mattress there.
- Is the garage under arrest by rodent pests of other annoying ones of some sort? If yes, exterminate them first before any storage if not could mess around the bed.
- Is the garage open, if yes, then you’re highly susceptible to 1 and 2 on this list, and you should definitely check on this first or opt for professional storage.
