How often should you wash your windows and swap the screens?

Grumpty's answer

Every 6 months

Why bother

Clear views, and bugs kept outside. A thorough-tier job. Skippable when life's busy, worth it when it isn't.

What the job involves

Wash the glass with dish soap or a vinegar-water mix, then pull it dry with a squeegee or a microfiber cloth. Do the outsides on an overcast day, or the sun bakes it into streaks before you've finished the pane.
Pop the screens out and hose or brush the mesh clean. While they're out, clear the tracks and the weep holes at the bottom of the frame, because that's where the grit and the dead bugs end up.
Swap winter storm panels for bug screens in spring, or the other way round in fall, and reseat each one in its own window so it actually latches.
Check every screen as you go for tears, dents, or spline that's pulled away from the frame. Patch or re-screen the bad ones before they go back in.

Do it yourself, or pay someone?

Yourself on a single-story home: soap, a squeegee, a cloth, and re-screening a torn panel runs about $15 to $70 per screen in materials. Hire out the second-story and the awkward reaches where a ladder or a lift comes into it; a pro wash averages around $221 a visit ($150 to $302), with screens and tracks usually billed on top.

What skipping it costs

$150 to $500 and up per screen for a like-for-like swap, and an etched pane that needs glass restoration or a new sash runs higher than that. Mostly dirty windows are just comfort and curb appeal, but there's one real bill hiding in it. When mineral-laden water dries on the glass cycle after cycle, sprinkler overspray, hard tap water, runoff off a filthy sill, the deposits stop sitting on top of the glass and chemically etch into it. Once it etches, no amount of scrubbing brings it back, and pros reckon it can set in within 12 to 18 months of repeated unwashed exposure. A bucket of soapy water is the cheap end of that.

Signs it's overdue

Cloudy or hazy spots that stay put after you've cleaned them. That's the line between a hard-water stain, which still comes off, and etching, which doesn't.
A white, chalky film building along the bottom of the glass, where sprinkler spray or runoff dries in the same spot every day.
Screens with tears, holes, dents, or mesh sagging away from the frame, so the bugs get in and the panel won't latch right.

When to start thinking about it

A few days' warning does it. Grumpty grumbles 3 days out, then leaves you alone. Mark it done and Grumpty sets the next one, every 6 months, so you can go back to forgetting it exists.

Questions people ask

How often should I wash the windows and swap the screens?

Exterior glass twice a year, spring and fall, suits most homes; the insides can stretch longer. Screens get swapped seasonally if you run storm windows, or just pulled and cleaned once or twice a year otherwise. Near sprinklers, hard water, salt air, or heavy pollen, do it more often. That overspray is the bit that risks etching the glass.

Can dirty windows actually wreck the glass, or is it just cosmetic?

Plain dust and fingerprints are cosmetic. The damage comes from mineral deposits, hard water and sprinkler overspray, left to dry on the glass over and over until they react with the surface and etch it. A hard-water stain still comes off; true etching doesn't, and the only fixes are professional glass restoration or a new pane. Pros say it can show up in as little as 12 to 18 months of neglect.

Cheaper to re-screen a torn screen or buy a new one?

Re-screening, new mesh in the frame you've got, is the cheap route at roughly $15 to $70 per screen in materials. A full replacement screen averages about $317 and runs $147 to $515. So if the frame's bent or corroded, replace it; if the frame's fine and only the mesh has gone, re-screen it.

ThoroughSpring checklist Summer checklist Exterior checklist

Related jobs

Stop keeping this one in your head

This is one job. Your home has dozens more, each on its own clock. Grumpty is a free home-maintenance app: add a job once, it tracks the date, grumbles when it's due, and rolls it forward the moment you mark it done.

No card.