Tips for Maintaining a Mold-Free Home
Maintenance. It’s not a word that exactly conjures up restful and calm feelings. But when dealing with mold, maintenance will always be necessary in order to stay healthy and keep this harmful substance at bay.
While living in the relatively wealthy United States certainly has its blessings and convenient perks, there will always be a curse to counter the blessing. That is, the more we have, the more we can lose. The effects of mold infiltrate their way into every living space and workplace that has a structure.
Controlling moisture is the most basic way to control mold. Mold spores cannot grow without moisture. But some moisture in our modern day way of living is inevitable. The questions are- where do you look for it? And, what do you do about it?
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Invest in a Dehumidifier
Dehumidifiers are a wise investment for any home, particularly those with high humidity. A good rule of thumb is to keep humidity at 40-50%. While mold growth occurs best at humidity levels of 80%, some mold growth can begin above 55%. Santa Fe provides commercial grade dehumidifiers that boast aggressive air filtration, which remove 98% of dust as well as pollen, mold spores, and bacteria. If this is not an option for you, any well functioning dehumidifier will help control moisture. You may just need multiple units.
Hydrometers are an easy and inexpensive way to measure the humidity of areas of your home. You can keep them in problematic areas, such as bathrooms or kitchens to see if you need to take additional measures to keep the humidity down. Once again, it’s important to make sure humidity stays below 50%.
Additionally, make use of ceiling fans, bathroom fans, attic fans, and kitchen fans to keep air circulating.
Wash Your Washer
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Along with the regular cleaning of tub and tile in the bathroom, make cleaning your laundry appliances part of your routine as well. The idea of washing your washing machine may seem redundant, but washers are a hot spot for moisture. While many washers are energy efficient and can run on cold water, cold water will not kill mold spores. Spores can cling to soap residue, so routinely run an empty cleaning cycle with hot water and vinegar, or hot water and borax, and scrub areas such as the soap dispenser. Be sure to wipe around and under rubber gaskets where moisture can get trapped. Let air circulate by leaving the door open when the washer is not in use.
Clothes themselves can contain mold spores. Just washing alone and drying will help clean mold spores off of clothing . Always wash contaminated clothes separately from other clothes. If the clothes continue to smell, throw them away. A sweater is less important than your health.
Carpet Maintenance
While carpet has its comfortable benefits, it is porous and more prone to hidden mold than a wood or tile floor and harder to clean thoroughly. For that reason, we think it's best to not have carpet or to change it every 5-7 years. However, most homes do have carpet. Frequent vacuuming with a HEPA filter can help keep carpet clean. While other filters may remove larger particles such as pet hair and dust mites, sometimes they just stir up more particles into the air. HEPA filters will remove 99.97% of the tinier particles such as mold spores that contribute to many allergy symptoms. Following this advice is especially important if you have carpet in your bedroom; where you spend several hours sleeping each night.
Clean Bedding Materials
Speaking of sleeping, you don’t get much more intimate with materials than with your bedding. Along with dust mites, mold is a huge allergen for many people and spores can stick to dust. Having a down comforter can be tricky, as it’s hard to ensure that allergens have been removed from it. Natural 100% cotton bedding is best. It’s important to regularly wash your bedding, including vacuuming mattresses and box springs, and keep your entire bedroom clean. If you can rid your bedroom of carpets and many knick-knacks that collect dust, it will make cleaning quicker and keep the air you breathe cleaner.
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Use an Air Purifier
Your entire home will benefit from an air purifier, but the bedroom is probably the most important room to ensure quality air. The Environmental Protection Agency warns that poor indoor air quality can be detrimental to your health, especially if there is mold involved.
We use Austin Air purifiers, which are medical grade purifiers that use HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filtration. As with HEPA vacuum filters mentioned above, these filters remove 99.97% of all particles larger than 0.3 microns and 95% of all particles larger than 0.1 microns, making them very effective for allergenic particles such as pollen, dust mites, smoke, and yes, mold spores. (For a reference point, mold spores can range from 3-100 microns, but can also be as small as 1 micron.) Austin Air also uses activated carbon and zeolite to effectively remove chemicals, gases, and odors. Their website recommends vacuuming the outside of the unit at least once a month. While these purifiers may be more expensive than others, their performance pays you back in the long run. The filters themselves also only need to be replaced every 3-5 years as opposed to some other models that require more frequent replacement.
Because we love to share great products, our office is a distributor for Austin Air. Please contact us for more information.
Take Action Against Water Leaks
Moisture from water leaks, often through the roof, are one of the most costly problems. Check your attic regularly for signs of water. Leaks can come through worn or missing shingles, places where nails have come loose, or through flashing around a chimney or skylight that has been poorly sealed (skylights need to be caulked every year).
If you have stucco, it’s worthwhile to have it inspected to make sure it’s properly done. It is not uncommon to have improper installation of stucco. If there is water intrusion, the stucco will need to be removed and replaced with a better siding material. Stucco is not really ideal if you are trying to keep water damage at bay. If you have no stucco issues or choose to keep stucco siding, it should be inspected by a professional every two years to catch any problems early. This can save you a lot of money in the long run.
Other causes may be from a flood, pipe leaks, gutters that haven’t been cleaned regularly, from a window AC unit (AC units are very prone to mold issues) or even simply humidity or condensation around windows . Have your HVAC inspected and ducts cleaned annually to reduce the risk of mold growth. It’s important to note that many companies will offer the use of an anti-fungal. However, we suggest not using this if you are sensitive to chemicals.
Gutters are meant to keep water away from your home. Therefore, they should be cleaned regularly year round. In warmer months, leaves and other debris can cause blockages to water flow. In the winter, gutters can back up with ice, expanding the gutter under the roof line. When this ice thaws, water can leak down close to the home, causing water damage to your home. Downspouts should extend six feet away from the home.
Sprinkler systems should be installed close to the home spraying away from the home rather than at the home. If installed spraying at your home, this can really saturate the ground around your home.
The key is to catch the moisture early to minimize mold growth. Water or moisture should be completely dried within 24-48 hours. This usually means that drywall or another material needs to be removed to allow the area to dry properly. Repairs of this type are typically less expensive than remediation. Sometimes mold is easily visible, but certainly not always. Do not assume there is no mold just because you cannot see it.
Mold Testing
If you are experiencing unexplained symptoms or suspect mold growth in your home, it’s important to test to see if mold is a causal issue in a health condition. Once again, you do not always visually see mold exposure. Not all mold can be seen with the human eye. Mold can be tested by a DIY kit that you send to a lab or professionally. There are pros and cons to every method of testing.
Petri Dish
A petri dish mold test is readily available at most hardware stores. This is an inexpensive option, and it is a good and fast option to determine mold growth. Petri dish tests are designed to grow mold spores, and since there are mold spores just about everywhere, you will likely have some growth on your plate. For this reason, to ensure proper testing, you should have the house closed up with heat and air off for 24 hours before setting the dish out. Some kits do have a follow up lab test you can do once you have growth on your petri dish. However it won’t necessarily tell you which mold spores are causing your issues or where they are coming from. For example, you won’t know if a mold spore that grew on the petri dish is from mold growth in your home or if it was a spore that came in from outside. We suggest having a control plate that is set outdoors as well. This control plate will help you determine if the mold could be water damage mold or mold from the outside. Certain molds are found inside water damaged homes. As with any DIY test, it will help determine if you have a mold problem, but it will not tell you what you should do about it. This test will give you a general idea of how much mold is in your home. If the plate has a high spore count or molds commonly found in water damaged buildings, a professional should be brought in to do more thorough testing.
ERMI
An ERMI (environmental relative moldiness index) assesses the potential for mold through dust samples in a home or work space. Though many companies that claim to test mold will do an air sample, this method is insufficient to truly determine if mold is an issue in your home or workplace. A dust sample gives a better picture. To have more accurate ERMI results, it is important to use a quality lab, such as Mycometrics. A less expensive and lesser quality lab will likely produce more false negatives. We recommend using the “ERMI- AccuCloth Kit” through mycometrics for best results. This is a kit where you wipe various surfaces of your home with a cloth and send it in to be analyzed.
HOWEVER, even with a high quality lab, an ERMI is still only designed to give you an idea of toxic mold growth in your home. Oftentimes, you will need a professional to come and take a look. If labs are positive or questionable, you need to bring in a mold inspector or an industrial hygienist to find the culprit(s).
Professional Inspection
It’s best to have your home inspected every two years by a professional. If you have had a mold problem in the past, have the home inspected yearly. Hire a trusted mold inspector. A reasonable price is about 300-700 dollars or possibly a bit more, depending on the size of your home and the samples needed. While it is more expensive, a quality mold inspector may find underlying mold that a DIY test cannot. If you would like help finding a credible mold inspector, please call our office to schedule a consultation.
Remediation
If mold is identified, remediation may be necessary. This step requires professionals who have the proper knowledge and equipment. It will include:
Containment—This is the sealing off of the rest of the building from the mold-damaged areas.
Air filtration- Using filtration equipment is a must to stop mold spores from spreading. The air should be vented to the outside and filter should be HEPA.
Removing mold- Professionals will clean or potentially dispose of mold-damaged items. In severe cases, removal of drywall or carpets is usually necessary. Drywall, in particular, is a perfect food for mold. Any porous material found to have mold growth or tested to have growth should have removal of the material(s)18-24 inches beyond where it is found.
Cleaning or disposing of furniture or items- In collaboration with a professional, decide which items are safe to keep with cleaning and which will need to be disposed of. Porous materials, such as rugs or sofas made with nylon or polyester, may need to be thrown away. (It is a good idea to wrap any affected materials in plastic before moving them through the house. If you have the option, throw the contaminated materials through a window to get them outside rather than carrying them through the building.)
Restoration—This step may need to be completed by another professional. You may need to bring in contractors to replace drywall, flooring (do not use carpet), etc. This is not the job of the professional doing the mold remediation. If you have had water damage in the past, you might consider using metal instead of wood for framing, moisture-resistant drywall and vinyl or hardwood flooring instead of carpet.
For some people, either mold remediation or simply leaving the moldy environment, such as a moldy home or workplace, will allow their systems to calm and heal. For others, like those with CIRS, more interventions are needed to restore health. Those that need more interventions fill a large portion of our practice. If you suspect you are suffering from mold illness, contact our office for help.
For Less Substantial Mold Growth
What if you just have a mold spot on the tile of your shower? What then? It is not advised to use bleach to kill mold. Not only is bleach a harsh chemical and harmful to breathe, but while it first appears to eliminate the mold, it does not get to the roots of the mold.
Instead, vinegar or borax may be a good options. You can use undiluted white distilled vinegar to spray on the area and scrub. Or you can mix one cup of borax with one gallon of water (hot water helps the Borax dilute faster). Borax is alkaline, which prevents mold growth, as mold prefers a lower pH. After spraying the moldy area, scrub thoroughly and wipe it off. You do not need to rinse off the area, but you can repeat the application and scrubbing, if needed. Make sure to wear a N95 respirator, gloves, and goggles when scrubbing away mold. Also ensure that the area dries completely. It may be a good idea to have an air purifier in the area as well to stop the spread of mold spores.
If the mold keeps coming back in a non-porous area, it could be that the moisture in the area is too high or there is mold growth somewhere else that is contributing to the mold growth. This is where testing and mold inspection can be helpful.
If you have tile in your bathroom, seal the grout every 6 months to a year. This will keep water from being absorbed through into sub-flooring.
For the PDF of our mold-free home checklist, please fill out the form below.
Taking time to simply maintain your home will hopefully save you from having to take drastic measures in the long run. Breathe well and rest easy!