Professional mold testing can be important in improving your home's indoor air quality or, in severe cases, dealing with a potential health hazard. However, all homes will contain at least some mold. As a result, home testing kits can often be inaccurate or difficult to interpret since the average homeowner may not know when mold spores pose a real health or air quality hazard.
Working with an expert avoids these issues and can provide more accurate information about the mold in your home, but when should you hire one? For most people, annual or routine mold testing may be too expensive, but there are certain situations where it's necessary. Keep reading for three scenarios where you may want to bring in a pro to test your home for mold.
1. You've Never Tested Before
While every home will likely contain at least some quantities of relatively benign molds, some homes may have more dangerous mold colonies lurking in hard-to-spot locations. You can check under sinks and in your basement, but it's not always easy to know when you have a problem. You may also not notice musty odors and other telltale signs if you've lived in your home for a while.
Although you don't need to schedule an annual mold test, hiring a mold testing professional may be a good idea if you've never had your home tested before. At a minimum, a professional test can help rule out more harmful molds and provide you with information for future remediation efforts. When it comes to mold, more information is always better than less.
2. You've Spotted Existing Mold
Spotting mold in your home can be scary, especially if it pops up in an unexpected place like a closet or a bedroom. The sudden appearance of mold on walls or ceilings often indicates a leak or another moisture problem, so it's critical to deal with the underlying cause first. However, mold can still linger, even after repairing the initial cause and cleaning the affected areas.
Hiring an expert to test your home for mold after you've taken these immediate repair and remediation steps can help determine if you have a larger issue in your home. In many cases, this information can allow you to deal with your mold problem before it becomes too severe. Ignoring the issue may mean discovering more mold in your home in the future.
3. You've Suffered a Flood
There's no question: mold testing is critical following any flood, even a relatively minor event that only caused a few inches of water to pool on your floor. Water can quickly flow into hard-to-reach and hard-to-notice areas, allowing moisture to soak into structural framing elements, beneath carpets, and many other areas you might not expect.
Even if you've fully dried and repaired the areas affected by the flood, you should still hire a mold tester to check your home for additional problems. This extra step will help you fully resolve the damage from the flood instead of allowing it to become an ongoing issue that can affect your home's air quality and your family's health.
For more information about mold testing, contact a local company.
Share21 November 2022
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