Mold in basements

[riverrat56]

A friend recently purchased a house that he got for a steal, well I found out why today when he showed me the basement. There is solid mold on all the walls from the floor up to 4' (basically on the bottom peice of sheet rock. Apparently when the house was empty the sump pump was pumping water out and back into the egress window, leaving 3-4" of water in the basement for a long period of time.

Obvioulsy all of the sheet rock is coming out and the walls will be treated with something (he seems to know what he needs to do) but I need to question if it will ever completly be gone/will the basement be safe to live/have a bed room in?

I ask because I may be moving in with him later this year and do not want to get sick from any remaining mold.

Thanks guys.

[nofishfisherman]

Mold makes me nervous. Miss a few little spores and it can come back.

Once he has cleaned it up to his satisfaction I would suggest he got the air tested before covering the walls back up.

[Farmboy1]

You need to verify that the reason the mold grew is gone. Mold does not grow where it is not moist. He needs to find the root cause of the moisture, or all the work is for nothing. The sump pump backing up may or may not be the real problem.

You are a number of commercial products available to treat mold, but a bleach solution mixed 1/3 bleach to 2/3 water will kill it. Spray it on, let it sit, do a few times over the course of a few days and it will die. There are also some mold sprays that place a sealer on the framing to help stop any residual mold spore not get out.

He also needs to verify that he gets the moisture out of the framing behind the sheetrock. This is not easy to do, but a commercial dehumidifier will suck moisture out of the air and will really help. Just don't seal up the walls immediatly.

I would also recomend having the air tested for resale of the home. If he bought it moldy, that will show up for people looking to buy it years from now, and he needs to have tests to prove the issue was resolved.

[crothmeier]

Ive done some clean-up on moldy houses. Rip everything out, open the windows, bring in the fans and let er dry out for a week or two. Do the bleach spray thing once a day for a few days, letting it dry, and spray EVERYTHING. every nook and cranny, crack and crevice. Then we always bought a 5 gallon pail of the zinsser mold-resistant primer coat stuff and sprayed or rolled that on all the walls. let that dry out completely then re-studded rocked and finished.

Always have a reliable dehumidifier in the basement. it will do wonders.

[JeffB]

Make sure he wears a good mask and goggles for the clean up.

[crothmeier]

i thought of that when i was typing but forgot to put it in. the cheapo dust mask will not filter out mold spores. the best thing is the respirator type.

[Jim Uran]

First things first would be to make sure he has the proper drainage for that sump pump, if all it was doing was recirculating the water from the basement. Did he have some sort of blockage in the drain? If we have problems in any of our rental units we do the bleach thing and dry them out and go over the basement walls with drylok masonry paint.

[Whisker Trout Slayer]

Call Service Master. We called them when water backed up in my mom's basement and they did an awesome job. You could save yourself some money by having all the drywall and anything wet already disposed of when they get there.

Service Master cleaned everything then sprayed some stuff on the affected areas and then had their fans and dehumidifiers run and then cam e abck and used some type of meter and checked the air quality. Well worth it.

[nofishfisherman]

It might not be a bad idea to have it to by a professional. Mold can be pretty nasty stuff. For sure get the air tested before sealing everything back up atleast.

I'm guessing by the time you get the good fans and dehumdifiers, etc, you might not be saving yourself that much money in the end compared to having a professional do it.

[chad austin]

Keep in mind that the heat runs my have mold in them also

I would pull a couple apart and take a look, also in the past

we have sprayed the whole basement (floor joists,underside of the subfloor, walls, floor, with a good primer after the mold clean up.