Need help with my floors - unsealed concrete tile. I think.

[North_Of_60]

We just moved into a new house on Sunday that has the coolest tile floors through out the main living areas. We think they're concrete tile (as opposed to clay, but we haven't done an acid test to be 100% sure).

The problem is that they feel dusty and gritty. Before me moved in the landlord did a lot of renovations (sheetrock repair, so lots of sanding and painting, etc). The sheet rock dust was EVERYWHERE, including the counters in the kitchen. It took a lot of elbow grease to get rid of it, so I assumed the same gritty feeling on the floor was also from sheetrock dust too.

Today I just used a stiff deck brush to scrub with sudsy pinesol water, and then rinsed with a clean bucket of water and a sponge mop. However, when I walk on the floors with bare feet they still end up looking a little grey and dusty like I've just walked on, well, concrete. (Though that's an improvement, when we did the pre move in clean our feet were BLACK from walking on these floors.)

I'm assuming they're unsealed, otherwise it has been many many years since they were.

Not sure what to do now. I'd like to get to where I can use my Clorox Ready Mop with microfiber towels and my home made floor cleaner, but it feels like I'm just pushing the dirt around when I do that. And a friend told me I probably wouldn't be able to use that anyway because of the texture, and that I should invest in a good rolling mop bucket with a ringer and get a string mop (which she swears is easier to use and works better on textured tile compared to my back-breaking sponge mop).

What do I do?

[sunnysandiegan]

I'm not sure what kind of floors you really have there. I would talk to the landlord and ask specific questions.

Meanwhile, we had a major flood back on May 1 this year and all of our flooring on the main level was removed. We had concrete floors for 6+ weeks (some areas longer than others as we did most of the work ourselves). Even after ankle-deep "clean" water (supply line to sink busted), the floors were dusty and gritty ALL THE TIME! I swept and used the shop vac and mopped each room a dozen or more times. I did it by hand; I used a friends mop; my dad did it; my DH did it. It really didn't matter who or how many times, the floors were always dusty and gritty. Part of that was because we were constantly working on that level of the house doing construction work for about 9 weeks. However, even the empty closets that had nothing in them and had closed doors were always gritty and dusty. After nine weeks of constantly cleaning concrete floors, I was sooooo ready to be done with it. Obviously, ours were not sealed and were under other flooring for years and years. I don't know how long nor how many cleanings it would have taken for the floors to feel clean, if ever.

I hope your situation is different. If not, though, I definitely recommend a string mop. I borrowed a neighbors for that time frame (returning it each time; I had easy access and permission). I saw them at the store for $10-15 and it had the built-in wringer handle. We had contracted some of the initial work after the flood and the contractors used the professional rolling bucket and mop system. It didn't do any better of a job than my neighbor's string mop, but it did take up a lot more space while they were mopping. Our home is small, so I knew I would never buy one. If you have a lot of floor space, then it might be a time-saver and easier to roll around the bucket.