The cause of mold is the damp, cold wall. Mold grows particularly well on paper wallpaper. Mold on the ceiling has the same cause: moisture and organic material. Mold in the bathroom is very common, it is always damp there. Mold usually grows on the silicone joints in the bathroom. If silicone is too wet after application, it will later begin to mold.
When it comes to mold in the bedroom, I often find mold behind the baseboards. Mold in the children’s room is a danger for the children. Since window soffits are often cold and damp, mold also thrives on the window and window soffits. A special case is mold in the sloping skylight, often referred to as mold in the Velux window (although it is not always the Velux window that gets moldy).
If there is mold in the basement, mold only moves up through open doors. Mold in the basement is usually not mold, but salt efflorescence. But it always smells musty and damp of mould: then these are the putrid gases of the mould.
Tips for assessing mold in the home:
The mold season is booming every year, and not just in winter. For me, as an appraiser for mold fungi in Santa Monica and California, the phone does not stand still at temperatures below -5 ° C at this time. Due to the damp summer and autumn, the outer walls are still damp. Due to the drop in temperatures below -5 °, the outer walls also became cold.
In the case of mold infestation, arguments about heating and ventilation begin again and again.
The landlords are usually of the opinion that they have bad tenants and they save on heating costs and ventilation. Certainly, heating and airing affects the mold propensity of the apartments. However, I often find other causes of mold growth. I am a mold inspection Santa Monica practitioner and find the causes of mold in practical things that you can touch. The sewage pipes are often defective and the cause of complete “mold houses”. This usually affects houses before 1980. A stink light is useful as a measuring device for combating mold by controlling the room air.
There are other issues to consider:
In addition, gabled apartments are still moldy. If you look closely, it’s always the corners on the outside. You can compare that with humans, we also freeze at our corners on the outside: tip of the nose, fingertips. So it is now that “our bad” tenants, who don’t want to heat and ventilate, have holed up in the attic and on the ground floor. This is not funny but fact that in the attic mold is in the top corners and in the ground floor mold is in the bottom corners. Why is that exactly? Because it’s cold there. At the top comes the influence of the cold roof and at the bottom comes the influence of the cold foundation or cold basement. If there is no warm neighboring house, the influence comes logically from the cold gable and mold forms on the gable in the cold corner.
Seasons:
August/September are among the most competitive months of the year. So, mold infestation is not unlikely in late summer. Especially if you ventilate a lot and your apartment is on the cold ground floor, the apartment is susceptible to mold.
Architecture:
Of course, we architect, civil engineers and housing experts know all this. Therefore, there is a so-called heating system regulation or heating cost regulation or heating cost allocation regulation. There it is written that the heating costs are to be allocated at 50% or 70%. This reallocation comes about because the cold flats on the ground floor, in the corners and in the attic are disadvantaged in terms of heating costs. You need more heating costs compared to the warm apartments inside. Until then, the housing industry will follow me and know that there are cold apartments. However, the landlord or owner is also obliged to supply precisely these cold apartments with sufficient heating. Here we already have the problem: there is sometimes a lack of sufficient basic heating in the corners that are too cold. Can the landlord or tenant actually do something about it if a cupboard is on the outside wall and it gets moldy there? The landlord could make sure that the outside wall could also be heated. So, he could put at least one heating pipe there. However, if there is no heating pipe there and if the heating is convection, as is often cheaply done today, the air cannot flow into all corners. You remember, there used to be tiled stoves with radiant heating and rounded corners in the old stucco buildings. Of course, this was also due to the fact that the warm air flow is guided around the corner. that the outer wall can also be heated. So, he could put at least one heating pipe there. However, if there is no heating pipe there and if the heating is convection, as is often cheaply done today, the air cannot flow into all corners. You remember, there used to be tiled stoves with radiant heating and rounded corners in the old stucco buildings.
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