Does insect repellent work on bed bugs?

If your budget doesn't allow for full extermination or you prefer the natural or eco-friendly approach, you can apply a lot of elbow grease by thoroughly saturating your carpets with Borax (a laundry detergent found in the laundry aisle for about $3/box) and vaccuuming every other day for 2-3 weeks, and bleaching every bleachable surface daily for the same. You will also need to put Borax on your mattresses and boxsprings (they don't call them bedbugs for nothing) and do the same. The worst news is you may need to actually throw out thick linens where the eggs just can't be washed out and dislodged, and if the infestation of your mattress is too great, it might actually also have to go. But everything else can be laundered in hot water and dried on hot temp to get rid of them. It's similar to the "natural" way to combat fleas.