Mildew and Mold After Water in Snellville, Georgia

Mildew or mold: what the owner will see

Mildew is usually the flat, surface growth on a damp finish, while mold can work deeper into porous material.

Owners often use the words interchangeably, and the difference matters less than the damp that caused them. Mildew tends to show as a gray, white or green film on paint, grout, fabric and the paper face of drywall. Mold is the broader term for the fungi that grow in damp material, and it can be dark, fuzzy or staining, and it can work into wood or a porous board.

Neither is judged by eye alone. A clean-looking wall can hide growth behind a baseboard, and a dark spot can be a stain with nothing alive in it. The owner is better served by knowing where the damp is and how long it has been there than by trying to name the growth from the photograph.

Why a Georgia summer speeds the growth

Warm, humid air keeps wet material wet, and a closed room that never dries gives growth the time it needs.

A house in Snellville in July is holding a lot of moisture in its air. A wet loss that would dry in a few days in a drier climate can stay damp for a week in a closed garage or a lower room with the door shut. The material is warm, the air is close to saturated and the surface never fully dries between afternoon rains, and those are the conditions in which growth establishes quickly.

The practical answer is not to close the house up in a hurry. Air has to move across the wet material, the dehumidifier has to remove water from the room, and the readings have to show that the material is back to its normal level. Until they do, the room is treated as still wet, whatever it looks like.

• Keep the room open to the house while the material is still wet
• Run air across the surfaces so that the moisture can leave them
• Use a dehumidifier and record the water it removes each day
• Judge the room by the readings, not the look of the surface

Where it hides in a Snellville house

At the lowest course of the wall, in the joists over a crawl space, in the back of the closets and behind furniture set against a wet wall.

The growth goes where the water went and stayed. The bottom few inches of the wall, where the water wicked up from the slab, is the most common place. Behind a baseboard or a cabinet toe-kick the moisture has no air moving across it, and the growth can run along the wall plate before it shows on the paint.

Crawl-space framing is the other common place. Joists that sat in damp air for days can grow mold on their undersides and at their bearing points, and the growth is out of sight until the floor above is opened. Closets at the back of a wet room and the backs of stored furniture against a wet wall are also common, because the air in them barely moves.

When testing helps, and when it does not

Testing is useful when it answers a specific question, such as whether a suspicious area is growing or whether a room has cleared, and it is read alongside the readings.

A test is a sample of the air or the surface taken at one moment, and it tells the owner what was there on that day. It does not tell them what will grow next week, and it does not replace the moisture readings that show the material is drying. A test is most useful before the walls are opened, to show the state of a suspicious area, and after the work, to show that the room has cleared.

A test is not needed to decide whether to clean a surface that is plainly growing. Surface growth on a damp wall is cleaned and the source is fixed, and a test adds cost without changing the decision. The owner who asks for a test should know what question it is meant to answer and who will read it.

• Before opening a wall, to record the state of a suspicious area
• After the work, to show that a cleared room has settled
• Not needed for a plainly wet surface that is cleaned and dried
• Read together with the moisture readings, not on their own

Who does the work, and what to ask for in writing

The scope should be in writing, the containment and the clearance check named, and the people doing the work identified.

This page does not name a state license for mold or restoration work in Georgia, because none is named in the research behind it. An owner who hires for mold work should ask the company what credential its crew holds and who answers for the work if it is not done properly. The answer should be in writing, and it should be checked against any paperwork the company provides.

The written scope is the document that matters most. It names the materials to be removed and the materials to be kept, the containment that will be set up to stop spores moving into the rest of the house, the cleaning method and the clearance check that will show the work is complete. A scope that says only that the mold will be removed does not give the owner anything to check.

• The materials to be removed, and the materials to be cleaned and kept
• The containment set up to stop growth spreading into the rest of the house
• The cleaning method for each surface and who carries it out
• The clearance check, what it measures and who reads the result

The owner's checklist after the work is done

Keep the room dry and ventilated, keep the readings going for a while and keep the record with the claim.

Once the mold work is finished, the owner keeps the room dry. Humidity is controlled with a dehumidifier and by moving air across the walls, and any new damp spot is checked straight away. A room that is closed up again without this check tends to show the same growth in the same place, which is the most common reason for a second visit.

The record is kept as well. The scope, the photographs, the readings, the clearance result and the invoice belong together, and they are what an insurer, a buyer or a later repair will ask for. This guide does not say what an insurer will pay for mold work, because that depends on the policy and the insurer, and the owner is advised to check the policy's wording.

How the humid season changes the follow-up

Recheck the room in the weeks after a storm, because the damp can return with the next run of rain.

A room that has been dried and cleared in the spring can show new growth after a wet summer. The owner is advised to look at the same wall, the same closet and the same joists after the next storm, using the photographs from the first record as the comparison. A new stain in the same place is the sign that the source has not been fixed, and the source is the thing to fix first.

The follow-up is simple: a look at the room after a heavy rain, a note of any new spot, and a reading if the spot is damp to the touch. Those few steps tell the owner whether the drying held, and they are much cheaper than opening a wall that has been growing behind the finish for a season.