Every home has its scent. A home can smell warm and inviting, or clean and invigorating, or it can smell like musty old socks. During the spring and summer, weird smells may not be as noticeable for two reasons: you’ve kept your windows open, letting in the fresh air, or you might have spent most of your days outside enjoying the warm weather and spending time with friends, socially distant of course.
As it’s getting colder, and we’re staying home more, you may have noticed a strange smell from time to time. If you’re working from home, you might find yourself slightly less motivated no matter how nice your office area is. This article will discuss two things: how to get rid of musty smells in a house and make your apartment smell good. Scents can play a big part in how we enjoy or don’t enjoy our environment. Studies have discussed the link between scents and memories and how smells can affect our health.
The right home fragrance can make you feel energized, relaxed or even seductive. So having a home that smells good, smells great, can make you more productive, help you sleep better, and possibly get it on a bit more.
How to get rid of a musty smell in your house or apartment
Funky odors that mess up your home’s vibe can come from a few sources. The most common believe it or not, is not cleaning your apartment or home frequently. Dirt can build up and create its own unpleasant fragrance. If you have a house that smells musty, it could have gained that odor from a damp basement or damp walls.
Related Stories
Visible mold in a bathroom or basement can also be a reason why a home smells “off.” If a home has poor ventilation, the air circulating inside isn’t refreshed, and a musty or strange smell may seem like it’s hanging in the air. If there’s a washer and a dryer in a home that doesn’t have proper ventilation, the damp air from wet clothing and the heat from the machines can contribute to having a home that smells musty or stale.
We found various products that will help you get rid of any gross, dusty, dense odors in your house and make it smell much better.
1. TruSens Air Purifier with UV-C Light + HEPA Filtration
BEST OVERALL
This air purifier has a 360-degree DuPont HEPA filtration system that grabs pet dander, dirt, dust, viruses, allergens, and bad smells from the air and defeats them. Nasty germs that get trapped in the filter are killed with Ultraviolet light. In other words, gross, smelly air goes into the purifier, and clean air comes out. It comes in three models: Z-1000, Z-2000 and Z-3000. The smallest is the Z-1000 and works best with rooms sized 443 square feet or less. The next size up is the Z-2000 and it is best for rooms up to 668 square feet. Lastly, the largest Z-3000 can pull mold, dust, bacteria, and germs in rooms of up to 1,425 square feet.
2. DUDE Bombs Deodorizing Toilet Freshener, Fresh Scent- 40 Pods
The smells that can ripple out of a foul-smelling bathroom can sometimes reach halfway through a home. Prevent that wretchedness by dropping a Dude Bomb in the commode before any action takes place. The fresh scent lingers for hours.
3. GreenTech Environmental pureAir FRIDGE
This machine works great in small smelly spots. The GreenTech pureAir FRIDGE was created to kill bad scents in the spot we overlook the most — the fridge. It works by creating activated oxygen and that gas kills it all — bacteria, pollutants, and weird aromas.
4. DampRid Fragrance Free Refillable Moisture Absorber Four Pack
As mentioned earlier, if an apartment or a home has a bad odor due to wet weather, or an unfinished basement that’s captured water, or a any type of leak, DampRid draws out the moisture from the air, and gets rid of the attendant stench. It can be used anywhere in a home, garage, or outdoor shed.
5. Aspen Clean All Purpose Cleaner & Cloth Kit
A house or an apartment can develop a bad aroma from dirt buildup. The best way to stop that from happening is to create a weekly cleaning schedule. An easy way to tackle cleaning your space is to do a few rooms a day, so it doesn’t seem like an insurmountable task. Aspen Clean products are used by professional home and office cleaners. The company is EWG-certified, and their products are children and pet safe. This kit contains an all purpose cleaner that works on every surface and a matching microfiber cloth to pick up grime and gunk. The set has the clean scent of grapefruit and lavender that brightens up rooms for hours after they’ve been tidied up.
6. Resolve Urine Destroyer
if your pet is peeing everywhere except where they’re supposed to be, the accumulated, layered aroma can add a sharp tang to your environment, not to mention destroy flooring and rugs. Pet owners across the country rely on Resolve to neutralize pet pee and its fabulous perfume.
7. Kenai Life Charcoal Air Purifying Bags
Charcoal naturally absorbs odors, and these 200 gram bags of activated charcoal work to both eliminate and prevent malodors from overtaking your home. Each bag comes with a rope attached so they can be hung in a closet or even over a kitty litter bin.
8. Indigo Wild Y.U.M Zum Mist Doggie Spritzer
Gets rid of wet dog and funky pet smells from car interiors as well as your home. It can be sprayed on furniture, and fabrics. The spray’s scent is a mix of lavender, lemon, and Patchouli essential oils. Additional natural ingredients used in the doggie scent spritz are water and glycerin. Indigo Wild doesn’t any chemical emulsifiers to their products, so they’re safe for pets.
9. Fabreeze Heavy Duty Crisp Clean Scent Air Freshener
When you need to quickly neutralize foul-smelling air, a spritzes of Fabreeze’s heavy duty air freshener works immediately. They also have a matching fabric refresher that can make the moldiest socks smell like they’re clean.
10. One Fur All Pet House Pumpkin Spice Candle
If you’d prefer to use a candle to rid your home of persistent pet odors, One Fur All has a line of them. Made in the USA with natural soy wax and no parabens, phthalates and completely dye-free, this long lasting candle in everyone’s favorite scent gets rid of 99% of it. This nine ounce candle burns for 60 hours, and its jar can be reused.
How to make your apartment smell good all the time
Now that you’ve gotten rid of nasty, overpowering, overripe and plain gross smells in your home, you’re ready for phase two: making your home smell welcoming and creating an enjoyable environment. When choosing home scents, remember that fragrances for the home are similar to fragrances that you wear, in that they can accentuate your home’s personality just like a cologne does that for you. If you’re looking for scents that uplift and revitalize you while you’re working from home, choose bright citrus-based (lemon, orange, grapefruit) ones or upbeat floral or herbaceous tones like mint, vetiver, lemongrass, or moss. To relax, try home fragrances that include lavender, eucalyptus, vanilla, rosemary, cinnamon, sage and sea scents. To set a romantic mood, look for fragrances that include rose, tobacco, amber, musk, and the like.
Home fragrances can really set the mood, and while candles are always a great option, you do have alternative products to choose from. Traditionally, diffusers are jars or bottles that use porous reeds to distribute the bottled juice throughout a room. You can also find battery, USB operated or plug in diffusers that either come with a kit of scents, or you can use essential oils or formulas made specifically for electric diffusers. Room sprays can be also used on bed linens and soft furnishings like pillows. Depending upon the formulation, room sprays will last for hours or days. There’s incense wands and cones, and even fragrant woods that you can burn.
If you’re looking to create a specific feeling for a room, you can layer products. For example, if you want to stay motivated while working from home or working on your home, use a mix of bright scented products. If you’re having friends over for a meal, try cinnamon, pumpkin and apple-scented candles and diffusers to set the mood. Having trouble sleeping, then use a lavender or eucalyptus room spray on your sheets and use a matching diffuser to set you to dreamland. And for romance, mix up different rose, amber and musky scented candles, and the like.
Diffusers
Diffusers work best in small spaces, and can refresh a work space by placing one or two on your desk. They are great for half-bathrooms, or placed on a nightstand. If the fragrance appears to have stopped being distributed by the reeds, simply flip them over and re-insert in the bottle.
11. M.M. LaFleur The Passport Diffuser
M.M. LaFleur’s 100ml bottle is a mix of sandalwood, juniper and cypress; a woody green scent that can keep you on track when working.
12. CHI Egyptian Aromatherapy Ultrasonic Essential Oil Diffuser
Plug in CHI’s diffuser and you can set the LED light to rotate through its seven different shades, or pick one to add ambiance to a room. It has a 235ml capacity and distributes essential oils via a very quiet mist. It’s small and light enough to be used in a hotel room, placed on a nightstand or in the living room.
13. RITUALS Private Collection – Savage Garden Oil Reed Diffuser Set
Rituals products take their inspiration from the Far East, and their elegantly designed diffuser is a great example of their aesthetic. This large diffuser bottle (15.2 ounces) is fragranced with Clary Sage oil. It’s a scent that helps de-stress and relax you. Some people use Clary Sage to help them fall asleep.
14. Lifetherapy Mini Diffuser
Lifetherapy is a line of home and body care products whose mission is uplift your mood. The company has created four signature scents: Grounded (fresh citrus, heliotrope, dry amber, calming rose, and vanilla), Energized (jasmine, red orange, marsh grass, and peach skin), Inspired (gardenia, palm bark and musk), Loved (bergamot, water flowers, coconut, muguet and rose), and Transformed (Polynesian coconut, white orchid, warm sugar, and sandalwood). The mini diffusers are two ounce bottles that come in those fragrances. They can be used together, like placing Energized and Transformed on your desk, or place Loved and Inspired by your bedside table.
15. Canopy Humidifier
One of the things that sets the Canopy humidifier apart from the rest is that to clean it, you pop it into the dishwasher. It comes in four colors: blue, white, green, or pink, and can be used with aromatherapy products or essential oils to flavor a room. The humidifier has UV lights that gets rid of 99.99% of bacteria in the water before dispersing into your home, and it has a paper filter which also stops impurities.
16. Guru Nanda The Light Globe
While it looks like a sculpture, this essential oil diffuser uses ultrasonic technology to deliver fragrance without creating heat. It can also be a humidifier that goes 18-hours before needing to be refilled. It has an automatic shutoff, two mist modes (constant or intermittent), is BPA-free and has seven different lights and modes of usage to add to the décor of your room.
Candles
Candles come in a wide variety of sizes — votive, one-wick, three-wick, jar, pillar, and tub. And they come in every scent you can think of, and some that you don’t want to know about. Aside from incense, candles are the quickest way to set a mood. You can group similar scented candles to create an olfactory experience of being in a forest, or field of flowers. One well-fragranced candle can turn a room into Provence or make it seem like it’s the inside of a men’s club by using tones of leather, tobacco, cedar, and sandalwood. However you want your home to smell like, you can find a candle for it.
17. Skeem Design Sweet Balsam Three Wick Candle
All of Skeem Designs candles are made with a soy and vegetal mix here in the US. The company uses as little packaging as possible to keep down their carbon footprint, and they use pure fragrances to create their exclusive blends. Their Sweet Balsam fragrance is a mix of pine cones, evergreens, and a dash of grapefruit, patchouli oil and pine. It’s like having a festive holiday tree in your home without the fuss and dropped pine needles.
18. Indigo Wild Zum Glow Votive in Lemongrass
Votive candles may be small, around 2.5 ounces, but their scents can warm a room. Indigo Wild Zum Glow votive in Lemongrass is a sprightly, cheerful fragrance that can beat back the gloomies on a rainy or snowy day. The candle is made with soy wax, and Indigo Wild Zum uses only essential oils in all of their products.
19. Spongelle Lavender Botanica Candle
Hand-crafted in Los Angeles, this candle has a wooden wick and was made for days when you’re stressed to the eyeballs. Light up the candle, and you room will have the mix of a lavender, rosemary, musk and cardomom scented wave floating through your house. Breathe deep and relax.
20. Olive and Cocoa Summer Candle Set
The scent of summer on a cold winter’s day can reinvigorate you and remind you that summer’s just around the corner. Olive and Cocoa’s summer-scented candle uses citrus and outdoor elements to give you a boost. The set is comprised of a candle, coordinated matches and a crate.
21. Blossom & Stone The Signature Candle
Hidden inside this amber, vanilla, and sandalwood scented candle is a surprise. As the soy candle slowly burns, moon-charged rose quartz crystals will emerge. According to ancient mythology, rose quartz is supposed to protect the wearer from harm and also bring love into their life. This candle has a wooden wick and a cork lid.
22. Perry Boyce Fireside + Chill Candle Medium
Black-owned, and women run Perry Boyce is a newcomer to the home fragrance field, but is quickly becoming a favorite for the cognoscenti. Warm and seductive with notes redolent of clove, amber, sandalwood, and patchouli. It’s in the same scent family as Maison Margiela Replica by the Fireplace, but is a tad more luxurious and elevated.
23. Outdoor Fellow Outdoor Fellow X DD Fuego No. 21 Spicy Margarita
Get out of that funk and get into a party mood with Outdoor Fellow’s cool candle collab with drag queen superstar DD Fuego. This candle is bursting with personality and good-time fragrance notes like Argentina lime, lemon, jalapeño, cardamom, and green bergamot.
24. Dossier Floral Rose Candle
Dossier has made a career out of creating fragrant doppelgangers. Loved Tom Ford’s Tom Ford for Men or Creed’s Aventus, but almost gag at the price tag? Dossier’s version of those scents is so spot on, no one would know that you’re wearing theirs. Their products are made in France and cruelty-free. Their vegan candle is the replicant and inspired by Le Labo Fragrances’ Rose 31 Perfume. Light the wick, and your home turns into a field of wild roses.
Room Sprays
Room sprays are a fast way to give a room personality. A few spritzes and you’re sniffing romance, seduction, or an energizing fragrance. Many room sprays can be sprayed onto to bedding and pillows, so try lavender or eucalyptus ones to help you zone out.
25. Caldrea Tangelo Palm Frond Linen and Room Spray Air Freshener
Made with orange peel and eucalyptus, this is a zingy spray to help you wake up.
26. Northern Lights Cinnamon Room Spray
Zippy cinnamon is a uplifting, happy scent that can make a home smell like a bakery and give it a festive, holiday feel.
27. Doctor Aromas Room Spray -Terra
Change your room’s mood with a spritz or two of this room spray that offers up a scent of vetiver, orange and black pepper. Doctor Aromas uses essential oils in their concoctions and doesn’t use parabens, sulfates, mineral oils, or phthalates.
Incense and other things
There are other ways to make a house smell good, like using incense sticks, cones, wood and even a coffee maker.
28. Skeem Design Palo Santo Small Jar
Palo Santo is a vivacious, bright fragrance that comes from the Palo Santo tree resin. Sustainably sourced, Palo Santo has been used instead of smudge sticks to “clear a room of bad vibes” and to make a room feel especially inviting. Light one of these sticks, blow on it, and let the embers slowly release its scent.
25. Essential Oils Peru Pink Pepper Essential Oil
Essential Oils Peru is a collection of 10 essential oils that are vegan, gluten-free, organic, soya free, and hand made. The company works with small, independent farmers. Their pink pepper essential oil comes from the tree of the same name in Peru. It’s an energizing woody scent. You can add this essential oil to diffusers, humidifiers, and if you have an old fashion radiator, place a few drops in a baking pan filled with water, and then sit it on top of the radiator. The heat will warm up the concoction and will release the scent into the air.
26. Peugeot Paris Coffee Press and Mill
This is such a genius idea, it’s surprising that no one thought of it sooner. The top of the press is a mill, grind the beans and they fall neatly into the glass container, and voila! Coffee. The reason why this is in this roundup, is that when you grind coffee beans, the incredible aroma shoots through rooms at the speed of light. Not only are you making coffee with this device, you’re making your home smell incredible.