Murphy's oil soap is good for floors plus you can buy another brand of oil soap at the dollar store. My mom does this.  She used oil soap for laundry also sometimes. She washes wool blankets (like the hudson bay blankets) with it.   My wood floor in the living room needs refinishing so I just use a swiffer or pinesol etc.  Don't think there is a lot of finish left on it. When the kids are older we will refinish it.

Hi Brandy 

Congradulations on your new place first off!

We had old hardwood floors all threw our house in NY that had the old time wax seal on them & vingar only dulled them.   Is it possible that the finish is old & it's wax based and not poly based?   That could be your problem perhaps your landlord would know the answer.

Or could it be that someone put one of those new wonder products on they advertise on TV as a floor restorer those I believe are acrlyic(sp) based & I think like wax they probably don't do well with vinegar.

When we had the floors in NY sanded & refinished with poly the finisher advised I use a small amount of vinegar mixed with water in a spray bottle to clean the floor & make sure it was dried good with a towel or something soft.   It's worked for over 15yrs &  the floor is still shiney except where heavy traffic is of course.

The wood floors here I also do the same thing with & have no problems.  I have even been know to steam clean them once or twice out of necessity.  You have to move quick with steam & I wouldn't advise you do it often as it could effect the poly but if you must you must. KWIM

Jill

The house is only three years old and the landlord has no idea what was done to it by the past tenants.

 

 

Brandy, check out a good hardware store.  There used to be a product line called Trewax - they made a liquid floor cleaner and wax plus several specialty floor items.  The cleaner, you just put a little of the liquid on a rag and wipe the floors good.  Then I used their paste wax to hand-polish the floors.  This requires a day of being on your hands and knees, but the floor'll look great when you're done.  I only did this once a year or so, but I haven't done it for awhile.  Our floors are in such bad shape, I use anything I want on them these days, lol.  I really need to refinish them, but with all the furniture we have plus a piano...it makes me tired just thinking about it!

 Only thing, the paste wax can make the floor a little greasy if you don't wipe it up good.  Stuff smells nice, too, IIRC...Liz

Must be nice to have so much money that you don't have to worry about what a tenant did to your 3yr old floors! Yikes

I would guess that some kind of poly was used to seal them if they are only 3yrs old.  I know they used water based poly in NY but not sure if these floors here are water base or oil which makes a difference in many cases.

I believe these are also water based based on how they react to the steam cleaner  they get a bit tacky till they are really dry dry if I stay in one spot too long!  

Perhaps you could try different things in an area where it won't show.  Try the Murphy's even the Dollar Store verison & see if that works for you.  If that doesn't work I would try ammonia & see if that breaks it down.

I have some Future Premium Floor Finish you know wax for the kitchen that says it's acrylic protection but not to use it on wood floors.  I also picked up a bottle of Holloway House Quick Shine a floor finish for Wood floors but after reading the bottle closer I'm afraid to put it on!

The area by my front door is starting to show some sun damage (9yrs) the door is left open in nice weather & it gets the southern sun.  I thought maybe this would work rather then clearing the whole room  25' by 20' & coating the floor with more poly myself or calling in someone to do it I could use this but after reading online some not sure I want to start this.  It's a polmer base & I'd have to do the whole floor same as reg. poly plus I'm not sure how it would hold up. Plus it says if you want to take it off you have to use their stripper!   

If I'm going to do all that work I'd rather just put 2 new coats of a good poly on it & get it over.  My problem is the room is in the middle of the house you have to walk thru it to get anywhere  & the dogs nor DH get that you can't walk on it till its dry!   Actually I'd have more luck getting the dogs to listen then DH. LOL

 For now I have a 5 x 10 area rug down so it's not getting worst & you really can't see it, it just bugs me cause I know it's there! 

 Good luck 

Jill

p.s. maybe you could call a flooring place or Home Depot??????

It's not that he has the money to not worry. His last tenants did not leave under positive terms and he had a long list of things he did to put the house back to a nice clean condition. He didn't refinish the floors as he is already overextended with the cost of repairs and the time the house sat unoccupied.

He did tell us we were welcome to refinish it ourselves.

 

 

We have natural wood floors in the living room and hallway. Twice a year they ned refinishing. I strip them after washing with warm water and a little Murphy's. Then a stain goes down, then a wax is spread on, and buffed with a wax buffer attachment on our Kirby vacume. In between I use Murphy's and warm water in my Swiffer wet jet...I pry the top off a Swiffer bottle and pour my own mixture in. In between then I sweep and vacume.

I really want to polyurythane (sp) over them next time. The constant refinishing is a pain. But with a small house with high traffic it needs to be done.

 Michelle,

My husband spoke to the landlord about the floors. He told my husband we need to use hardwood floor wax on these floors. 

  

After testing a few things, using a few things, researching and speaking to professionals....the verdict is that even damp mopping my floor is too much for it. I can not use water or water based cleaners on this floor and it is not recommended to anything more than spot clean besides the twice yearly stripping and rewaxing.

 Nice.

This is going to kill me. I am a liberal user of cleaners and water. ARGH!

 

That's how my floors are. They dull very easily with a swiffer mop, so I damp mop VERY VERY occasionally! Sweep daily, as we have sandy soil and the sand accidentally tracked it will scratch the finish. I never feel like they're very "clean" not being able to mop weekly. But that's just how it is. And yes, paste wax cleaner needs all the windows and fans on! It's terrible. So I don't clean with it.

Yep what a pain. I hear ya sister!