That said, a musty smell can be an early indicator of a mold problem. Leaving your wet clothes in the washing machine is a sure-fire way to make your home smell musty. Even leaving your wet clothes in there for a few hours can already make them smell a bit off. Leave them in there for half a day, and they will be so unbearable you need to wash them again. If possible, take your clothes out of the washing machine and put them in the dryer or hang them up immediately.
Not only will this help make your house smell better, but your clothes too. Keeping your carpet clean is essential for a fresh-smelling home. Carpets work exactly like sponges, absorbing moisture, smells, and other particles that can make them smell musty. While it may take a while, places like your bed, sofa, and loveseat can start to smell musty over time. To prevent this, wash these places regularly using an appropriate cleaning solution.
Unfortunately, people keep their dish sponges way past their prime. The second you notice yours is smelling funky, ditch it and get a new on. Now that you know some causes of a musty smell in the air, how do you get rid of it? Thankfully, there are numerous ways you can make your home smell fresh again.
The only lasting way to get rid of musty smells in the house is to find the source. In this post, we'll discuss sources of musty smells in the home and how to deal with them. Note — I'm not a fan of air fresheners.
We want to eliminate musty smells, not just cover them up. Houses old and new have issues with mold and mildew. Older houses develop leaks over time, letting moisture in where it shouldn't be.
New houses are built so tight they trap too much moisture inside. As a homeowner or renter, you need to be mindful of indoor air quality.
If you feel congested or have watering eyes at home, but feel better when you're away, that's a red flag. So what's the difference between mold and mildew? They're both fungi, and both like damp conditions. Both have a funky, musty odor, but mold tends to be stinkier.
Mildew is usually powdery or downy think powdery mildew on plants. It forms a thin layer on the surface. For instance, we have a litter box for the cats down in the basement. The box is plastic, so it doesn't allow the floor to breathe where the two make contact.
We get mildew under the litter box. It's easy to clean up, but something I know I need to watch. The same thing will happen with plastic storage buckets. See Preparedness Storage for more bulk storage information. We tried keeping an area rug in the basement for a time, but found it was prone to cause mildew under the rug. Mold is usually thicker, and can penetrate into materials.
If a mold infestation is bad enough, it can cause structural damage. Black molds are commonly associated with health problems and may require professional mold remediation. Sometimes a home or basement is musty from other sources. Pet odors, VOCs and other chemicals from carpets, furniture or other items may also contribute to a stuffy, musty house. In the summer, humidity levels are often higher. Cold winter air can't hold as much moisture, plus we add heat, which dries air even more.
These higher humidity levels feed the growth of mold and mildew. Warmer temps encourage their growth, too. You may notice more of a musty smell in the basement as warm, humid air condenses on cool basement surfaces — feeding mildew growth.
If you go on vacation and come back to a musty house, odds are it's just a bit of mildew or stale bits. Open windows or kick on filters or fans to get air moving and disperse the stale smell. Moisture feeds mold and mildew growth. If your house smells musty after a rain, and it's a significant difference, rain is probably going where it shouldn't. The first spots to check are the roof and attic, but rain can seep into basements and crawlspaces, too.
Check for roof leaks, especially around any roof penetrations like chimneys. Inspect basement walls for seepage. Check all exterior walls for signs of water damage. Inside the House — Watch for plumbing leaks. Inspect air conditioning units or heating units with drain lines regularly. Even if drain hoses aren't leaking, over time outlet houses get buildup inside.
This may have a musty odor. Many front load washers retain a little water at the base of the unit. Over time, this water grows bacteria, leading to musty smells in your laundry area. We had problems with this in our first front loader. The new unit has a small drain hose, and I clear the stale water out every couple weeks.
An improperly installed drain hose may trap water in the line or allow sewer gases to escape into the home. This can also lead to a frozen drain line. Make sure drain lines are installed correctly. Windows can be a problem in a couple of different ways. First, a cold window in a warm room is a magnet for condensation, which can lead to mold or mildew growth on the inside of the window.
Second, if not probably installed, water can leak inside the window flashing and get inside the walls of the house. Adapted from Mrs Clean. Mold and mildew love to grow in those sweaty nooks and crannies of refrigerator and freezer door gaskets.
Clean drip pans regularly — especially if you'd had any spills in the refrigerator. See Best Odor Eliminators for Refrigerators for more detailed fridge care. The right plants improve indoor air quality, but plants can also be a source of musty odors.
Make sure you don't overwater plants, and allow plants to dry between waterings. Remove dead leaves and debris from your indoor plants and compost them. Give plant leaves and soil a spritz of microbial inoculant or compost tea to seed the surfaces with good bacteria and crowd out plant mildew. Not surprisingly, garbage can make your home smell musty. We have weekly trash pickup, even though we're in the country, but smelly items can get pretty ripe in six days. I try to get garbage dry before it goes in the waste basket.
If there are meat scraps and they don't end up as chicken treats , I keep them in a sealed baggie in the freezer until trash day. If the trash can itself picks up a musty odor, I treat with a surface odor remover. Often when food and beverage containers go into the recycling bin, there's a bit of residual food stuck in the container.
If it dries up or the recycling goes on its way, not a problem. If it hangs out in your house too long, that's going to stink. The same goes for baby bottles that roll under the couch, or glasses with a dab of milk left in the bottom. Like to eat on the couch instead of by the table?
Old food spoils, and it smells musty or foul. I can't walk down the bread aisle in the grocery store without smelling the faint aroma of years of stale bread crumbs. Which is why I always bake my own bread.
Sometimes items that got wet in the past can still harbor mold and mildew. If you've had flooding or other water damage, make sure to check everything that was affected. Carpeting is one of the worst offenders, but mold growth can hide in books, furniture, walls and more.
I think most of us have walked into a home where all you can smell are the pets. When you share your home with beasties, regular cleaning is a must.
Try to use washable pet bedding or bedding covers so you can simply throw them in the laundry from time to time. Use throws over sofas and chairs for easy washing.
Vacuum frequently. Consider an air purifier for the room where your pet s hang out the most, to pull pet dander out of the air. Once you've identified the source of the musty odor, it's time to get rid of it. For spot sources like plants, garbage cans and laundry, clean them up.
Moisture is the root cause of most musty house smells. If you have musty odors in the kitchen, laundry room or bathrooms, improve ventilation. We use ventilation fans with timers in the bathrooms. Switch it on when a shower starts, and it shuts off automatically. If you have a finished basement, add ceiling fans — and use them.
Moving air helps prevent condensation. Consider an air cleaner such as the Enviroklenz Mobile. We received one to test this winter after dealing with a moldy batch of firewood, and it's made a huge difference in the basement air quality. Once the unit fired up, it de-stinkified the room in short order. It sounds about the same as a food dehydrator — not terribly noisy.
For musty smells in the basement — add a dehumidifier. Old musty smells are some of the most difficult odors to remove from your home. Thankfully, our professional cleaning services can remove even the most stubborn household odors.
These 9 tips can help too! Mold or mildew in the walls is the most serious cause of musty smells in houses. If no cleaning methods work to remove the smell, this might be why. Does the entire house smell musty or only certain rooms? If the smell is only in several rooms or interconnected hallways, it might have something to do with the structure of the house, for instance there might be a leak or black damp in the walls. If the smell is isolated to one room, it might be easier to treat the smell and cause.
If the house is older and has been closed for a long time, musty smells should go away after you let fresh in and deep clean the place. A wet towel trapped behind a piece of furniture can leach out musty smells, polluting a whole room. Check for areas of moisture behind toilets and beneath sinks, even a small leak can create a nasty musty smell. Let in fresh air and keep it coming. Those musty smells must go somewhere, and for stale air to leave, new fresh air must enter.
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