Picture yourself relaxing at home after a long week of hard work, enjoying a delicious dinner. While you’re eating, you start to smell a terrible odor filling the room. Not only is your relaxation disrupted, your dinner no longer seems appetizing.
When you’re dealing with a smelly crawl space, it can only get worse with time. Attic Projects Seattle wants you to be aware of what could be causing the smell as we can provide expert ways to get rid of it.
Sewage
A sewage backup or leak into a crawl space not only stinks badly but also introduces dampness under your house and is extremely hard to clean. Take precautions to avert a sewage crisis and protect your health. Toxins in sewage can make you feel sick if they are breathed in.
Mold
While mold does not produce aromas by itself, any mold that forms on wood support beams or organic compounds will produce mildew and emit odors. If you go down into the crawl space and if it feels damp, you’ll know that you’re exposed. Mold can also produce mycotoxins, which are exceedingly harmful to one’s health.
Flooding
Do you live in a cold environment or an area that experiences a lot of rain or snow? Flooding and the onset of mold during the winter season are extremely common. Make sure your home is properly weatherized to prevent this from happening in the first place.
If you find signs of mold after flooding, remediation should be handled by a professional as soon as possible. Failure to act could weaken or even destroy your home’s integral structural members.
Animals
The odor of cats, rats, vermin, and insects can be unbearable. Look for minor cracks or openings in the walls of the crawl space that could allow rodents entrance. If a pen can slip through a hole, a mouse should be able to as well.
The urine and excrement of rats will pervade the crawl space, leaving a foul odor. If you see one mouse or rat, you’ll likely see more if you ignore the situation.
Soil
Because of its organic material composition, soil can have a distinct odor. Any exposed dirt can cause a musty odor in homes without sealed floors. If the earth is wet, any organic matter in the earth will decompose and create odors.
As moisture constantly makes its way to the top of damp earth, it’s a good idea to seal the crawl space. Ensure that no dirt or soil from a rural farm is used in crawl spaces, as there’s a strong probability excrement will be incorporated into the soil.
Where Is Your Home Losing Energy?
Many people think that the crawl space is to blame for a home losing energy. Believe it or not, the attic can lose up to 85% of a home’s heat. In fact, given the current level of under-insulation in attics, the US Department of Energy believes that increasing attic insulation can reduce heating expenditures by 10 to 50%.
Call the Professionals
Attic Projects in Seattle can not only help improve your home’s energy efficiency with services such as attic insulation inspection and air duct sealant and repair, but we can also help with a stinky crawl space.
Whether it needs a simple clean-up, mold remediation, or humane pest removal, we’re here to help. Give us a call today to make an appointment.
