Dehumidifiers

[teaandtoastwithmarmite]

Sorry to start another thread about them but I've got a damp house with mould in the bathroom and one bedroom and I'm wondering whether to get one. We're constantly cleaning it off well DH is. The letting agency are sending someone out. Didn't want to tell them in case the rent goes up but it's getting out of hand now. They sent someone ages ago who painted over it and it came back. Anyway could a dehumidifier on the landing help and what would you recommend. Thank you 😊

__

This thread is a bit old now, but if you've landed here looking for recommendations, we've recently updated our best dehumidifiers round-up, full of products tried, tested and recommended by Mumsnet users.
We hope you will find this useful.
MNHQ

@Gossipxox I know that doesn't help but that cannot be the sole reason for black mould. I've dried washing on radiators before and never had black mould. We were told we can't have an extractor fan due to some long winded reason and we must keep the window open. It's open all the time.

Plus it's not on when you have a baby. I have a dd as well

I just purchased a reconditioned dehumidifier from appliances direct, low energy it was £85.

OP do you have heating in your bathroom and do you use it? Do you keep your bathroom window open at least 60% of the time?

I'm trying to see if I can help as I deal with mould in my job. I would still advise a dehumidifier though, a good one. I use mine mainly during days of rain.

Well that's something DH and I hade been discussing. The radiator was off but he was saying maybe it should be on a bit. The heating in general is set to 18.5 in the day and 20 for two hours in the evening. The window is open almost all the time.
Thank you for your help ☺️

I think all the rain has definitely made it worse. It was pouring out of the guttering.

@teaandtoastwithmarmite

If the walls are below a certain temp you will get mould. This winter is going to be horrible for mould. You need to ensure it's warm enough and well ventilated, you can of course heat and ventilate at different times.

Do you shower in the morning or evening or both.

We tend to shower in the morning, the window stays open with the door closed until after lunch (or work) and then it is closed and the heating out on low.

I work in property and am dreading how much mould we are going to have to deal with. I feel sad that many people are going to end up with problems.

Shower morning and evening usually. We turned the radiators off there because of trying to save money but I guess they need to be on.

It's weird it's mainly those two rooms

I opened the windows this morning and whacked the heating up but my smart meter is already at £6 so I won't be doing that too often! I'm sad, I'm looking forward to getting the dehumidifier to see how much water it absorbs 😂

Mine arrived this afternoon. I set it up a bit in the sitting room. The amount of water already is unreal it took the moisture down from 74 to 68 and wasn't in there more than 3hrs.

My oldest is watching a movie downstairs with his friend, so I've plugged it in the bedroom while I'm awake and I can here the water dropping into the collecting bit and it's already reduced the moisture by 2%.

Very impressed with it the first few hours of it being on.

Wow that's amazing. Lots of water. I'm glad it's good.

You can also help massively by airing out the house as much as you can. What ventilation do you have in the bathroom?

Just the window which we keep open a lot

How do you dry your washing? Do you put lids on your pans when you are cooking, steam in the shower? It’s all got to go somewhere. Once that moisture is in the house it will cling to the coldest wall, usually the external wall.

Ventilation and heating will help reduce the condensation. The dehumidifier will help.

If your LL is providing your with working heating system and windows which open, it’s not their fault. They can’t be held responsible for your lifestyle. You need to address the ventilation.

Running the dehumidifier will really help and you will be shocked at how much water you can put out of the air. Good luck!

Have I understood that you sometimes have your heating on, but the radiator in the bathroom is off? That makes no sense. It is a false economy to turn off radiators (unless in a room you don't use and you can keep the door closed all of the time).

Our bathroom is quite damp after a shower, we use the extractor fan, of course, (I know you don't have one), leave the window open with the door closed until the post-shower feeling (!) has gone from the bathroom. The dehumidifier is on outside the bathroom door and all of the bedroom doors are closed (so the damp can't get in there in the first place and I'm only dehumidifying the landing, not the whole upstairs.

I also window vac all of the walls in the bathroom (and before I had a window vac I used a cloth to wipe them down) in the attempt to get the whole room as dry as possible as quickly as possible.

We have a meaco, I think it's the 12l one.

Would like to hear more about the window vac. Is this a thing I need in my life? Condensation driving me potty already and it's only November.

OP, you mentioned you get the odd slug? Is that in an area with water pipe close by? If so, might be worth the landlord checking you haven't got a leak. My DM had the odd one by the toilet in her downstairs shower room. Turned out the washing machine was leaking on other side of wall causing dampness. Paintwork has puckered since that.

There's less humidity in the air this time of year between 1-3pm, so worth ventilating the house then. Obviously needs to be done after a bath or shower.

The Window Vac is Kärcher, it's essentially an electric shower squeegy, it sucks condensation off your windows and into its reservoir. If you have a condensation problem, you definitely need one. We borrowed one from my parents first, theirs was quite fancy pants with various attachments, but we just bought the cheapest model, no attachments and it does the job fine. The rubber part does soften a bit over time (this is a good thing). We've since replaced the windows, but it still has a role in the bathroom (you can also use it for cleaning your windows, which I imagine was what it was originally intended for).

Mine arrived today, humidity was at 90% and has now come down to 73% 😱

I'm really not sure.

Wow! Mine came today but it said to leave it for six hours before using so I will use it tomorrow

@Janek I've turned the radiator in the bathroom on now. I (wrongly) thought I didn't really need it on

So the layout of the house doesn't help. Previous owners put a conservatory on but left the kitchen window in and no extractor fan. So kitchen leads in to conservatory only by a window. Then there are two doors leading to an extension so the ventilation there is not great. Upstairs I open all windows in the morning. The letting agency sent someone round who said we can't have an extractor in bathroom or kitchen as it's too much work.

I've got a Meaco. Very good machine. We live in a flat with no balcony so it helps dry our washing (no room for a dryer). It's amazing how much moisture it collects. It's more efficient than my extractor fan in my bathroom too.