My house stinks…. Help!

[PilgorTheGoat]

On Sunday we came back from a week away. We have 5 Cats. My “friend” was meant to be looking after them. When we got home we found the house stank.

On investigation we found that although they had cleaned the litter trays, they hadn’t cleaned around them and urine had soaked down the back into the boxes the trays live in. We cleaned this up and downstairs smelt much better.

Upstairs continued to smell. We aired the rooms and things got better but my daughter’s attic room still stinks. I’ve pulled everything out, gone round on my hands and knees to sniff the carpet and I cannot find the source of the smell.

It’s driving us mad. Any tips on getting rid of a smell when you can’t find what’s causing it?

PS…. I know 5 cats = smelly to some people but this smell isn’t cat smell and if they had made a mess somewhere it’s usually easy to identify.

Check your lights/lampshades.

We had a room that stunk. We spent days washing and sniffing everything before eventually finding the culprit was an Ikea lampshade that gave off the most awful smell when it the bulb warmed it up.

We only have one cat, a neighbour came into our house each day to stroke and feed the cat. When we got back from a week on holiday, our house stank of cat (high pissy ammonia smell) because our neighbour didn’t air the property. Open all your windows. If you have carpet sprinkle with bicarbonate of soda, leave for a few hours and then hoover away. The bicarbonate should lift any piss out of carpet/other fabric. If it’s really bad you could take down curtains and loose upholstery covers and wash them too.

I have three and my house doesn’t stink, so I can’t imagine two more cats tipping the balance! Have they maybe put up a bit of a dirty protest against the wee soaking into the boxes and gone for a tinkle upstairs?

A bit bitchy to say “friend” when she looked after five animals for you and cleaned their trays.

This is what im thinking nose blind.
My aunts house is like this she has 4 cats and a dog she cant smell anything but its over powering.

If you can't find wee then as pp have said it's prob a dead creature.
I would move everything until I located it. It could even be a bit of wee sprayed up a wall or door frame if you check there.

a UV torch will help you identify 'hot spots' of wee.

I have never cleaned around litter trays (except hoovering up litter) but if you normally do it then that suggests your trays aren't big enough or high sided enough. Might be worth changing them.

Luckily my cat would yell until you let him out, because he would stand in the tray, dig a hole, stand in the hole and hang his bum out over the edge.
Not the brightest spark.

Cat wee has a distinct smell that any cat owner would recognise. If it's centred on one room chances are that there's something rotting hidden away. Dead bird, mouse etc. can your cats get hold of food pouches? One of my furry gits managed to snaffle a full whiskers pouch. Drag it off into the airing cupboard. Half chew it open then leave it at the back to rot. Stank.

I don’t think you can expect that much from a friend or neighbour apart from doing the basics. It’s a lot to ask. Next time I would use the professional cat sitter again.

i can’t believe the Op has the cheek to put friend in quotation marks

when this friend has fed and cleared up after 5 cats whilst she’s been away for a week!

unbelievable

I paid her £15 a day to visit twice per day. I put “friend” because actually I’m really disappointed by the care she provided to my animals despite professing to be an animal lover.

They shouldn’t have been left in so much mess that they felt they couldn’t use their litter trays anymore.

The litter trays I have are smaller trays inside a larger plastic “house”. Occasionally the cats will wee too close to the edge of the tray and it dribbles down the side of the plastic house. Litter also gets kicked out of the tray into the house part so occasionally it all needs a good clean up.

Only two cats ever use the trays as the other three prefer to dig up my plants and go in the garden.

It is a lot of work to care for them all, I paid her the same rate as my cat sitter charges. She offered because she needed the cash.

I think the cat sitting element isn’t actually related to the issue here, I was just typing out all of my thoughts. There was a smell everywhere when we got home but a quick clean up sorted everything.

The smell is the attic just won’t shift. I think PPs may be right and there’s something dead in the eves that are still blocked off.

I don't think it is being nose-blind as I used to leave home for a few days every week, and when I got back, my house smelled fine.

However, I did have a TERRIBLE smell recently, and did all the airing, bicarbing and cleaning carpet etc - and then under the fridge-freezer I found a partially mummified mouse. No idea how long it had been there. So I'd get checking for dead things, OP - the smell was more like damp cat to me than decomposing body.

do you have 5 cats though?!

My Mum found a mummified mouse under a rug once.
Totally flattened to mere millimeters in the hallway.
God knows how long it had been there as she hadn't had a cat for a while 😬
Almost as bad as the time she was making the bed and realised she'd ironed a massive hippo-sized spider into the bottom sheet. It looked so grisly 😮

Do cats ho out? Is it possible that they brought in an animal and it hid behind a wardrobe and died?

😱😱

I'm a professional cat carer and I'd hazard a guess that your friend hasn't been cleaning the trays out and one or more cats have peed elsewhere. Cats are often very fussy and won't use a dirty tray. They'll then find somewhere hidden to pee as they'll know they're not meant to pee outside a tray. Beds and other fabric is often used.

The places I visit are cleaner when I leave than when I arrive and I'm fanatical about keeping the trays clean as I know what can happen if they're not attended to. Your friend probably left them until the day you were due back.

Ammonia from urine smells very different to a decomposing animal.

The lampe Berger is new to me and looks ideal. I watched a video about it and they only lit the wick for 20mins, is that really long enough?

I love candles/melts etc but am fussy about scents. It seems quite an expensive initial set up. I guess I need to find a physical shop that sells the oils.

They are honestly incredible. I light mine twice a day (First thing in the morning and then in the evening after cooking dinner).

I have 3 cats and VERY honest family members and they all say they can't smell my cats whatsoever.
Lampe Berger is perfect for completely neutralising any bad smells and also are shown to help with the spread of germs.

You light the wick (which is topped with a stone) for about 60 seconds and then you actually blow it out. The stone heats up and it keeps working.
Then after 20 mins you put the cap on and it stops everything and the stone cools down.

You don't actually want to do it for longer than this as it can damage the stone and it's not necessary as in my experience it works perfectly in that time.

There is a huge range of fragrances and scents to choose from as well, which is nice to play around with. Or as another option, they have the neutral (scentless) option so it is fragrance free. It eliminates odour without leaving a fragrance.

Make sure that the first time you use it you fill the bottle with the liquid and allow the rope part to sit in the liquid for a while before lighting for the first time.

It is an expensive initial set up, but the liquid lasts forever and I have had my actual Lampe for about 4 years now (I have replaced the wick twice in that time).

Candles and plugins are nice but I am careful due to my cats not loving strong scented things and some aren't good for them.
I also find they mask bad smells instead of eliminating them.

The Lampe Berger is (in my opinion) a must for pet owners to have beautifully fresh homes.

Scent/sanitiser bomb. Probably like me, I catch the smell of my dogs occasionally, their bed cover has regular washes but the main structure is solid and can’t go in the wash. I’m going to use a sanitiser bomb in the car we just bought because the previous owners obviously smoked in there 🤮

Thank you! I didn’t realise about the stone so that makes a bit more sense.

I'm definitely going to look into this.

We have a dog and whilst she’s not overly smelly, and I accept that my house will smell a bit of dog as, well, I have a dog! I’d be happier if it didn’t……

sorry I quoted the wrong person. This was meant for @Gilbertwasawuss

Never heard of these but they look ideal for me. I have a lung condition that doesn't like air freshners but have a cat with a sensitive tummy 😬