Provided is an apparatus for treating clothes which includes a foreign substance removal unit for removing foreign substances from a filter unit. The control method includes a cycle starting step (S10) for starting a drying cycle of the clothes treatment apparatus and a filter unit cleaning step (S13) which is performed at least one time before the drying cycle is finished. For that, the control method includes a finishing time point determining step (S11) in order to determine a finishing time point of the drying cycle. It is therefore periodically identified whether a present time point is a predetermined time point before a finishing time point of the drying cycle (S12). The filter unit cleaning step finished when the drying cycle is terminated (S14). Prior to starting the drying cycle (S10), it may be identified whether a former drying cycle ended abnormally (P1) and a filter unit first cleaning step (P2) may be carried out based on the result of said identification step.