The previous owner of my Fit was a smoker. help me!
 

I know I am not the only anal member here. I can't stand this nasty smoke smell. What can you guys recommend to me to make this thing smell pleasant again. I am desperate!

I cleaned out a car with strong dead mouse smell by removing all the seats and using carpet cleaner on the entire carpet, and upholstery cleaner on the entire surfaces of the seats while they were on sawhorses. Not only did I use the cleaners according to the directions on the cans (dry), I used lots of water and a scrub brush and soaked 'em, then dabbed up as much moisture as I could with towels, then let them dry thoroughly in the sun and breeze before re-install. Yes, it was quite a bit more work than a normal cleaning, but all stains and traces of nastiness were gone after that and it smelled really nice- pretty much like new.

I threw a snake in the trunk of my car once. It crawled out of the trunk and died somewhere inside the car. I removed the spare, rear seats, etc. to no avail. After a week, I found it by following the flies to the driver side kick panel in front of the door. After I removed it, the car stunk like a dead snake for a full year.

My former boss bought a pickup truck cheap, because the previous owner died in it, and it had an aroma. I never rode in it.

Smoke is going to be tough. You can Febreze the crap out of it if you want, but I've had my car for about a year and a half, and every time it's warm out I can still smell the smoke from the previous owner. It airs out after a few days and I don't really notice after a while.

I'd steam clean all the hard surfaces and shampoo all the soft surfaces. Still it's tough to remove the smoke smell from the vents. I'd even go so far as to remove all the carpet and seating, shampoo outdoors and rinse with a garden hose. The foams in the seats are pretty dense and won't absorb too much water. It would dry pretty quickly on a warm day.

Use coffee grounds in linnen bags.

How about muslim bags?

If you can, rent or buy an ozone generator/air ionizer, one designed for in your house would work quickest, then leave it in your car whenever you can, over night and so on, for a week or so, they are supposed to work by causing the air to become less stable so the oxygen can bond with the oder causing compounds easier, braking them down, I know people who have done this to get rid of cat pee smell in the house and it worked really well.

2nded. A local car dealership I've bought a couple cars from does to every car, works perfectly every time.

I have used an ozonater before in an apartment and it did make a huge difference. ReI will make that my next step if my vinegar and baking soda scrub down follwed by a bath in Febreeze fails. The preliminary results smell promising.