Checking Home for Mold

Ted

Ted

The pilot formerly known as Twin Engine Ted
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We've been having sicknesses, generally respiratory/sinus infections, going around our household since November. It goes through cycles where we'll be sick for a few days to a week, better for a couple weeks, restart. This seems to have been a bad year for illness around the office, plus the kids are now around other kids 4 days a week (and thus exposed to their germs), but the consistency of the illness has us suspecting mold as well.

A quick Google seems to indicate the home mold tests are a waste of money. Any suggestions on a meaningful check? The house is pretty new (11 years) and in good condition overall, however some idiot put carpet in the master bathroom, making that a potentially suspect location.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
We've been having sicknesses, generally respiratory/sinus infections, going around our household since November. It goes through cycles where we'll be sick for a few days to a week, better for a couple weeks, restart. This seems to have been a bad year for illness around the office, plus the kids are now around other kids 4 days a week (and thus exposed to their germs), but the consistency of the illness has us suspecting mold as well.

A quick Google seems to indicate the home mold tests are a waste of money. Any suggestions on a meaningful check? The house is pretty new (11 years) and in good condition overall, however some idiot put carpet in the master bathroom, making that a potentially suspect location.
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Ted, I don't know about testing for mold, but it won't survive without moisture. You can buy a $10 relative humidity meter on Amazon or at Home Depot to check humidity in the house. You can also buy or borrow a contact moisture meter to check the carpet with a contact probe. That's how woodworkers do it.

A reasonably low moisture level would largely rule out mold.

Out of curiosity, are on a slab, a basement, or a crawl space?
 
We have a basement. The humidity in the house is low with the exception of the master bathroom, which gets high humidity during shower time. And, with carpet, you end up getting water on the floor when walking out.

The basement doesn't "feel" musty/mildewy.
 
Weren't most mold problems from houses that had undetected leaks or past flooding?
 
I forget the number, but there is a relative humidity below which black mold isn't supposed to grow. A basement dehumidifier, if necessary, can handle that.

Orher than that, it can grow inside walls and insulation if it gets wet (roof leaks or broken caulk lines).

I don't know if the carpet will get wet enough from dripping on it unless you are not using a mat. It's possible the shower pan might be leaking. It might be a simple job to peel back a little of the carpet and padding if you suspect it.
 
The only way to be certain the home is mold free is to have a professional come in and test the air in various rooms for mold. Air samples will be taken and then tested . Visual inspection will find some mold but will not find it inside walls and or ac ducts. There could be a leak allowing water into a wall that does not show up inside the home until there is major damage to the structure. Have a professional mold remediation company come in and test and find the source if mold is found.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
We have a basement. The humidity in the house is low with the exception of the master bathroom, which gets high humidity during shower time. And, with carpet, you end up getting water on the floor when walking out.

The basement doesn't "feel" musty/mildewy.
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Unless you're not toweling off, you're probably not getting an appreciable amount of water in your carpet.

One thing though. Give all of your shower/tub caulking a close look. You'd be surprised what a small pinpoint leak can do over time.
 
Vaflier said:
The only way to be certain the home is mold free is to have a professional come in and test the air in various rooms for mold. Air samples will be taken and then tested . Visual inspection will find some mold but will not find it inside walls and or ac ducts. There could be a leak allowing water into a wall that does not show up inside the home until there is major damage to the structure. Have a professional mold remediation company come in and test and find the source if mold is found.
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Been there, done that on two houses. No mold issues, though. Only structural damage that I repaired.
 
Mold tester people generally charge $200-300, and can give you a report that tells you how much mold is in a place and what types it is. That will let you know if you have any and if its dangerous.
 
I am thinking it has more to do with young school age kids with developing immune systems. BTDT, they love to share germs. It will get better in 5 years or so.
 
There is nothing more toxic and deadly than a human child. A single touch can kill you!
 
Get a mold test if you suspect it. All you have to lose is two or three hundred. And get that nasty carpet out of a wet environment! It has a pad underneath it you know ....

Having kids is tough because they're exposed to so much but there is one thing you can do that will alleviate 90% of most maladies ... Wash your hands before you eat. Like a religion. Mama was right all along.

I've been washing my hands before I eat no exceptions and I have not been sick in like forever. Also, when you exit a public restroom DO NOT touch the door handle after you wash up. Use a paper towel or your elbow or anything but your hands. You have to start visualizing that anything in public that people touch is a germ infested feces infested sewer hole. Because that's what it is normally. We've all seen 'that guy' who comes out of the stall after taking a dump and walks straight out without washing. Some people are ****ing nasty. :drool:
 
txflyer said:
Having kids is tough because they're exposed to so much but there is one thing you can do that will alleviate 90% of most maladies ... Wash your hands before you eat.
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If it were mold, I don't believe you'd get better, I think you'd just be sick all the time. Since I've made a conscious effort to wash my hands often and not touch my face with my hands I haven't been sick in years. It's possible the daily zinc supplement has helped too.
 
Regular hand washing....several times a day is suppose to be the healthiest thing to do. If you're not seeing evidence of mold I doubt that's the issue.

You could try replacing your furnace filters with a better grade hepa filter and see if that helps.

Do you burn wood for heat?.....another thought.
 
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Has your home been checked for radon? Respiratory problems are a main sign of it.
 
While checking for mold is good, this has been a bad year for sinus and bronchitis infections. I had a sinus infection treated with amoxicillin, the symptoms went away towards the end of that course. I had a few days of peace and then the coughing hit hard (hard enough to vomit during one episode).

Went back and acute bronchitis with fluid in the lungs. Big guns this time, rocephin shot in the rump along with ten days of levaquin. THAT finally killed it.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
The basement doesn't "feel" musty/mildewy.
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Musty/mildewy rooms have a characteristic smell.

My vote is to put the blame on the kids. Once kids are playing frequently with other kids, they bring the bugs home in quantity. Kindergarten and First Grade teachers get every disease known to children... and frequently!
 
You don't have to have an musty (or other) odor to have toxic mold. The only sure fire way is to test things. While reaction to mold may open you up to other things, it's not the cause of bacterial or viral infections.
 
Ted,

If it makes you feel any better, whatever I've had for the last couple of weeks is probably similar to the symptoms you are feeling, too.

--

And referencing another post:

My experience with Radon in these parts: the county I live in has a high incidence of high Radon readings in basements. I *think* all house sales pretty much require a Radon test. Ted lives in the next county south of me, and that county may not have the same issues.
 
If you want to be sure,have an air quality inspection. Well worth the money.
 
Checkout_my_Six said:
Regular hand washing....several times a day is suppose to be the healthiest thing to do. If you're not see evidence of mold I doubt that's the issue.
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The more I'm looking at it, the more I think it's a continued bacterial/viral thing.

You could try replacing your furnace filters with a better grade hepa filter and see if that helps.
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I only put the top-end filters in already. :(

Heat is a heat pump with resistive electric backup.

JB1842 said:
Has your home been checked for radon? Respiratory problems are a main sign of it.
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I hadn't realized that respiratory problems were a sign of radon. I have not checked the house for radon, but I do know that certain areas around here do have radon, so it's been on my priority list. A coworker of mine checked his house a few months ago since he was about to start spending a bunch more time in the basement (building his RV-14) and said that the levels came back pretty high. So he installed the radon mitigation system, problem solved. I had the same issue in PA.

Bill Jennings said:
While checking for mold is good, this has been a bad year for sinus and bronchitis infections. I had a sinus infection treated with amoxicillin, the symptoms went away towards the end of that course. I had a few days of peace and then the coughing hit hard (hard enough to vomit during one episode).

Went back and acute bronchitis with fluid in the lungs. Big guns this time, rocephin shot in the rump along with ten days of levaquin. THAT finally killed it.
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Bill, what you're describing sounds the most in-line with what's been going on with us. This started right around Thanksgiving. For the whole month of December, Laurie and the kids were sick. Somehow I mostly escaped that round, other than a few days. Laurie and the kids had some low-grade antibiotics that seemed to kill it (after the doc said on the first appointment that it was sinus and thus viral, not bacterial), but then it's come back. What I have now definitely feels more like bronchitis.

Aside from hearing other reports of it being a bad cold and flu season, this all basically started about the time the kids started spending much more time around other kids (from virtually zero time around anyone but mom and dad to 2-3 hours a day, 3-4 days a week in various settings with other kids and lots of germs going around). So, obviously that's going to impact things some.

Minimizing germ transmission with small kids is, well, tough at best, impossible at most likely.
 
We've been playing cold and sinus infection roulette since Thanksgiving as well.
 
flyingron said:
You don't have to have an musty (or other) odor to have toxic mold. The only sure fire way is to test things. While reaction to mold may open you up to other things, it's not the cause of bacterial or viral infections.
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My thought as well.

Matthew said:
Ted,

If it makes you feel any better, whatever I've had for the last couple of weeks is probably similar to the symptoms you are feeling, too.

--

And referencing another post:

My experience with Radon in these parts: the county I live in has a high incidence of high Radon readings in basements. I *think* all house sales pretty much require a Radon test. Ted lives in the next county south of me, and that county may not have the same issues.
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My friend referenced is in Spring Hill, so not too far from my house, but about 6-7 miles due north. A radon inspection wasn't required when we bought the house, although I should've done it for good measure. Kit ordered, so I'll do that. Like I said, was on the list anyway.

I'm thinking that the bad cold/flu season with small kids is the most likely culprit.

But you know, south Florida sounds like a great idea this time of year. The warm salt air would do us all good! :yes:
 
GeorgeC said:
We've been playing cold and sinus infection roulette since Thanksgiving as well.
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I won't say good to hear, but it is helpful to know that we're not the only ones in figuring out most likely causes.
 
Kids, preschool, travel, weather fluctuations... take your pick :)
 
Vaflier said:
The only way to be certain the home is mold free is to have a professional come in and test the air in various rooms for mold. Air samples will be taken and then tested . Visual inspection will find some mold but will not find it inside walls and or ac ducts. There could be a leak allowing water into a wall that does not show up inside the home until there is major damage to the structure. Have a professional mold remediation company come in and test and find the source if mold is found.
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This ^^^

It's a couple/few hundred for a good professional test. And well worth it.

The other thing to ask about/be aware of is some other type of indoor pollutant. There were many houses built with Chinese wallboard that was toxic - and some of the finishes in houses emit anything from formaldehyde ('Brownie, our temporary home after Katrina smells funny") to hydrocarbons.

And the efficient-home energy standards have made the problem worse as there is far less air exchange with fresh air than there used to be.

I think I'd be asking the mold testing company for a full analysis of your interior air.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
Bill, what you're describing sounds the most in-line with what's been going on with us. This started right around Thanksgiving. For the whole month of December
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I basically got sick around Thanksgiving, was ok for a few days mid December, then it hit hard again. I got the shot and stronger oral antibiotics right after Christmas. Doc says the upper respiratory stuff is very tenacious this year.

from virtually zero time around anyone but mom and dad to 2-3 hours a day, 3-4 days a week in various settings with other kids and lots of germs going around
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First two years in daycare was hell, but after that the kid rarely got sick. It just takes about that long for kids to be exposed to most of the bugs. It WILL get better.
 
Occams razor would suggest a combination of winter and marvelous disease vectors.

One of my buddies married a teacher. For the first couple years she was always sick (as was he) but she finally got immunity to it all.
 
Ted DuPuis said:
My thought as well.



My friend referenced is in Spring Hill, so not too far from my house, but about 6-7 miles due north. A radon inspection wasn't required when we bought the house, although I should've done it for good measure. Kit ordered, so I'll do that. Like I said, was on the list anyway.

I'm thinking that the bad cold/flu season with small kids is the most likely culprit.

But you know, south Florida sounds like a great idea this time of year. The warm salt air would do us all good! :yes:
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http://www.city-data.com/radon-zones/Kansas/Kansas.html

Home Depot and Lowes sell radon detectors. The Miami Co extension office might even have them. It's basically a kit with activated charcoal. Leave it open, in the area you want to test (basement), for 48(?) hours. Seal it back up and use the prepaid mailer to get it back to the lab. They'll send you a report in a couple of weeks. Radon levels rise and fall during the year as groundwater levels raise and lower and displace the gas upward into the basement. If you get a high reading, then you know. If you get a low reading, that doesn't mean it won't rise again in the spring. When I tested ours, multiple tests about 6 months apart, both tests were considered above limits. I checked with a remediation company and asked if they do tests in order to verify my own readings. They said they only do post-remediation testing, too many times they've been yelled at when their pre-testing doesn't match what a homeowner's test showed and they get accused of trying to rig the game. Post testing showed our levels were "OK", but the guy that did the test wasn't satisfied and they came back and did some more work. Follow up tests afterward showed basement levels were then the same as outdoor levels.

In my case: basement slab was ventilated by a 2-3" hole, a PVC pipe was dropped in and sealed around, and it leads to a constantly running exhaust fan that keeps a lower air pressure under the slab than above. The sump pump cover was replaced with a Lexan cover (see-through), then sealed with RTV all the way around to prevent airflow from inside the basement being pulled back under the slab. This forces the system to only draw from under the slab. The follow-up tests showed a drop in radon to an OK level, but not as much as the guy thought it should have been. Our garage floor under-slab is partially exposed to our basement so that HVAC ductwork can be fed to the upper floors. He suspected radon was seeping into the basement from underneath the garage floor. So they drilled another hole in the side of the basement wall, under the garage floor, and added a T to the radon exhaust stack. That follow-up test showed levels matching outdoor.

I'm not sure about radon contributing to respiratory problems, but I think a high radon level is thought to be a contributing factor to a higher than average incidence of lung cancer. I'll have to double-check.
 
We went through this last year. Everyone in the house seemed to be getting sick for a week, better for a week or two, and then sick again. We found out that it wasn't mold that was the problem but that the humidity in the house was too low. We had a really long stretch of cold weather and were constantly running the pellet stove. The stove was drying out the air to the point where we were below 30% humidity. This was drying our sinuses out and both giving us sinus headaches/infections and making us more susceptible to catching colds. We added a whole house humidifier that we turn on each time the pellet stove goes on and it cured the issue.

Keith
 
More good info, thanks.

The too low humidity is another issue. We have a whole house humidifier, but it doesn't work. I need to figure out why. That's been another thing on the list. We have a humidifier in the bedroom, but that still doesn't seem to do a great job overall.

Right now, our humidity (according to the bedroom humidifier) is in the mid 40s. However it has been in the low 30s per its reading, and quite likely actually below 30, at least in other parts of the house. Pretty sure there were readings in the 20s at some point.
 
Our whole house humidifier works OK. It's an AprilAire model that's pretty basic. It doesn't have an automatic humidistat setting, you have to adjust it yourself.

The filter pads are a real pain, they have been really cheapened over the years from a metal mesh to a paper mesh.

If they don't work, there seem to be two reasons: The saddle valve that's attached to the hot-water line coming out of the water heater is either clogged up with mineral deposits, or closed. And at the inlet side of the water solenoid valve (at the humidifier) there is a small orifice that can get clogged and needs to be removed and cleaned with a fine wire. Other than that, you should be able to turn it on and turn the humidity setting up and down and hear the valve click as it opens and closes. This will only work when the furnace blower is on.
 
I think the issue with the humidistat is that it's not detecting the humidity properly. The valve does work, I can put it in test mode and water comes out of it, works fine. But it only does it for a few seconds and then shuts off.
 
GeorgeC said:
We've been playing cold and sinus infection roulette since Thanksgiving as well.
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every one in our house, our office, and close circle of friends have been fighting cough, sinus and upper respiratory infections for a couple of months now. Doc office says it's rampant here.
 
All my students are sick, I'm surprised I've not yet caught anything. Amazing I lived to puberty, not having a house humidifier, a shoulder harness in the car or a helmet for when I rode my bicycle.
 
Hey Ted, be thankful you aren't married to a nurse working at a hospital. She brings home all the very best bugs for me to catch. After all these years, I don't catch many but when I do, man they're whoppers. Freaking Petri dishes, schools and hospitals.

I honesty try not to mess with her scrubs too much in the laundry room whether it's a warranted phobia or not. Nursing has a definite "gross" factor.
 
Last time I reviewed the data, the cause-and-effect of mold- illness is /was tenuous at best. Clearly there are people more sensitive (read allergic) to mold and there are some real fungal pathogens out there; the dreaded "black mold" thing is IMHO a racket perpetuated by a multimillion dollar industry - pay someone to test for something that you'll pay them even more to "eradicate". Do what you're most comfortable with, but I urge caution.
 
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