Apartment Dog – 7 Tips and Tricks for a Relaxed Life with a Dog

Dogs not only bring us an incredible amount of joy, love, and unforgettable moments, but they also inevitably bring plenty of hair, sand, and dirt into our homes. Having an indoor dog often means a daily adventure in keeping your home clean! Whether it's paw prints on a freshly mopped floor or dog hair on your favorite sweater – if you have a dog, you know exactly what we're talking about.

But don't worry! You don't have to choose between a dog and a beautiful, well-kept home. With the best tips and tricks from HelloBello, you can keep your home perfectly under control and turn it into a real feel-good place for both you and your dog in just a few simple steps. Here is our path to the ultimate wow-wow dream home!

Before we get to the practical tips, we have to face a reality: A dog changes the atmosphere of your home. Especially after long autumn walks in the rain or during the intense shedding season in spring, your home can quickly be put to the test.

The good news is that with the right routines, clear boundaries, and a few smart household helpers, you can massively reduce the cleaning effort. This leaves you with much more valuable quality time at the end of the day to cuddle with your beloved indoor dog.

Here are our 7 ultimate tips for a harmonious and clean life together:

Clear rules are not only an absolute must in basic dog training, but also extremely valuable when it comes to keeping your home permanently clean. Dogs are creatures of habit. If your dog learns from the start (ideally even as a puppy) that certain areas like the freshly made bed, the expensive sofa, or the kitchen are absolutely off-limits, you protect the most sensitive areas from dirt and stubborn hair.

This not only helps keep the home cleaner overall, but also makes caring for your home much easier. Be sure to remain loving, but absolutely consistent with these rules! Clear boundaries help your indoor dog learn extremely quickly where they are welcome and where they are not. Your furniture and your home will definitely thank you in the long run!

Dog hair on the carpet, the sofa, and in every little corner of the home – for many dog owners, this is unfortunately a daily reality! Especially during the natural shedding season, it can quickly look as if your dog wants to take over the home completely.

There is only one thing that helps here: Rigorous and above all regular coat care to get on top of the flood of hair.

• Our simple trick: Take a suitable brush or comb directly with you on your walk and brush your dog thoroughly outdoors again after playing. Every hair that flies away in the wind outside will, of course, not end up in your clean home!

For dogs with particularly thick undercoats or heavily shedding coats, regular visits to a professional dog groomer can also work wonders. This not only drastically reduces hair loss in the home, but also makes your beloved dog shine and lightens your cleaning routine. 

When buying furniture and dog accessories, it pays to look for truly easy-care materials from the start. A high-quality dog blanket that can be washed at 60 degrees can quickly and easily go into the washing machine after a rainy, muddy walk, if your dog brings home a few extra mud stains again.

• Material tips for everyday use: Avoid delicate fabrics like velvet or coarse corduroy, in which hair can literally weave itself in. Smooth fabrics, faux leather, or special microfiber covers for sofas are much better suited for a household with an indoor dog.

This saves you the extremely tedious washing and scrubbing by hand and gives you much more time to enjoy the relaxed moments together with your dog on the (protected) sofa. Easy-care, well-thought-out accessories are a real game changer for a permanently clean home!

Hygiene starts right at the feeding area! Our beloved four-legged friends are true explorers. They sniff everything and everyone – and accordingly bring many bacteria from outdoors into their own four walls.

The easiest and safest solution for the feeding area? The dishwasher! Because even if you buy high-quality food, a damp dog nose can pick up unwanted companions on a walk and leave them directly in the bowl while eating. In addition, food scraps quickly form an ideal breeding ground for germs at room temperature.

Depending on the material (stainless steel or high-quality ceramic are ideal), you can put the dog bowls in the dishwasher every day without worry and wash them hygienically at at least 60 degrees. This ensures that unwanted residues are safely removed, and you ensure an absolutely clean eating ritual in your home. This is especially important if you feed fresh, natural food!

If you have an indoor dog, you have to adapt your cleaning routine. Fortunately, there are now many smart household helpers specifically designed for removing pet hair and paw prints. From a hygiene mop with special microfiber attachments to a fully automatic robot vacuum cleaner: These little helpers make everyday life with a dog much easier.

Instead of getting annoyed and vacuuming yourself every day, the clever robot does its rounds independently – so you can take a completely relaxed walk in the park with your dog in the meantime and return to a clean home.

Important warning: Not all commercially available cleaning products are safe for dogs! Many all-purpose cleaners contain harsh chemicals that can irritate sensitive paws or be toxic if licked. When choosing your cleaners, be sure to look for dog-friendly, organic products (often marked as "Pet Safe").

If your dog is allowed on the sofa after all (we know how hard it is to resist that look!) or rides in the car, there is an incredibly simple but brilliant solution for the many small, nasty hairs that stubbornly stick in the upholstery.

Forget expensive lint rollers that fill up immediately! Simply put on a standard dishwashing rubber glove. Dampen the glove slightly with clean water and stroke over the affected upholstery, car mat, or dog bed with a little pressure. Through the friction of the rubber and the slight static charge, the dog hair pulls together like magic into small, compact little rolls that you can then simply pick up by hand and throw in the trash. An absolute life hack for every indoor dog owner!