How do you clean smoke/dirt off of walls?

Warm water and multi-purpose cleaner. Rinse and repeat multiple times. I bought my house from a smoker and it took a lot of elbow grease.
 
The best results for me has been from using TSP (tri-sodium phosphate) and warm water. You can buy it at any hardware store or paint store. Comes in an orange box with blue lettering......this works good on floors too.
 
Don't smoke in the house.

And do what my parents did when they bought a hoouse from a smoker...

paint everything.
 
[quote name='David85']Don't smoke in the house.

And do what my parents did when they bought a hoouse from a smoker...

paint everything.[/QUOTE]Yeah, that's probably what I'd do. If it's bad enough that it's not coming out with washing, I'd just prime and paint over it all. Why waste your time on something that probably won't end up satisfactory in the end anyway?
 
[quote name='eaglebeak']The best results for me has been from using TSP (tri-sodium phosphate) and warm water. You can buy it at any hardware store or paint store. Comes in an orange box with blue lettering......this works good on floors too.[/quote]I'll second this one. It'll work well, though it depends on how much smoking went on in your place. The best solution is to paint over it with something that'll lock away the smoke. The TSP only did so much in cleaning off the walls on my current place, because the previous owners were heavy smokers and lived there for 15 years.
 
[quote name='jmcc']Yeah, that's probably what I'd do. If it's bad enough that it's not coming out with washing, I'd just prime and paint over it all. Why waste your time on something that probably won't end up satisfactory in the end anyway?[/QUOTE]


Exactly. My parents didn't like the so called color choice anyways, the house was pretty much an off white with smoke stains. So my mom just gave it a quick clean to get the dirt off and painted over it. It looks fine considering it's an old house and the walpaper now has at least 6 layers of paint on it.
 
[quote name='me2evil13']if you choose painting go with killz primer, it cover up everything. go with oder free.[/quote]

If you need to cover the odor of paint, try mixing a tablespoon of Vanilla extract in a gallon of paint....smells a lot better while it's drying.
 
killz primer paint overs up everything, and it comes in 2 types, reg and oder free. the reg version is really very stong. just a warning.
 
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