How to cope with a musty, mould-prone house over winter?

[TheSecretOfCake]

Short of moving, as we can't

Our house is a bit odd, no central heating and fairly scruffy throughout (paintwork, finish, fixtures and fittings as cheap as possible etc)

We have gas fires in every room but generally only use the one in the living room as it's all open plan with upvc windows and doors, so heats up pretty well. Never use the gas fires upstairs as worry kids will fiddle with them, also they heat up the rooms too much and it gets sweltering.

The upstairs rooms are pretty prone to mould/mildew in winter, both outside walls can't have any furniture against them or the walls and furniture start to smell musty.

We have radiator covers over both gas heaters upstairs, both painted and varnished but as they are on this outside wall they smell so much that it's all I can smell when i go in the room. No visible mould or mildew, just an ingrained musty smell.

One end of my bed was against the outside wall, mattress is fine but the wood of the bed has now caught the musty smell. Argh!

I'm struggling to think of ways to keep on top of this. The windows already need a weekly scrub to get mildew off, now this, its bloody exhausting! Not to mention unhealthy..

Should add, we have a dehumidifier for the (windowless) bathroom, and electric plugin radiator things for the two bedrooms.so it shouldn't be too chilly or damp

More dehumidifiers I reckon! Our house has some damp we can't have treated (apparently) but the smell goes when we have the dehumidifier going. It also seems to warm it up, as the air is drier.

I live in an ancient damp farmhouse. Get the windows open as often as you can. Put the upstairs fires on periodically when you know the children can't play with them.

Do you tumble dry your clothes or dry them over clothes horses/heated airer? Indoor drying is awful for increasing damp.

Do you open your windows daily? It is often as simple as that.

Open windows wide as early and for as long as possible during the day but closing before it starts to get dark- i would close around 3pm in depths of winter.

Squeegee windows each morning and soak up all moisture. Make sure the sills and frames are bone dry.

Dehumidifiers in affected rooms but only on when windows and doors closed - so i would put them on when you shut the windows.

Heaters on in each room for at least a short while every day.

Do you know how the walls are insulated?

Agree Pumpkin..don't dry clothes indoors if you can help it. I line dry whatever the weather but occasionally finish off in the tumble.

Oh yes! Dry washing outside as much as possible. Or if you have an airing cupboard or tall cupboard you can fit a tower airer and dehumidifier in this will dry your laundry without adding to the problem. This is how i dry mine.

bear Gah.. I can't afford to buy or run more dehumidifiers, which is pants but I think I need to don't I!

pumpkin Aaah we do, a lot. Have given up tumble drying as it just makes things hot and wet, rather than cold and wet! But we dry stuff on airers all the time as the tumble dryer is useless and the weather is crap! What else can we do with it though?

scurry will try that! uPVC is sometimes too efficient, we get so much condensation on the windows. They're the only part of the house that works properly!

Ok, general consensus is that laundry is to blame.. hmm! We do a load a day, on average so a lot to get dried. Our airing cupboard is not that big, and we have a manual control for the water heater. It's not constantly on (yay to cold water for 22hours a day!) . We just turn it on for an hour each day so the airing cupboard (where the water heater lives) is only warm for a couple of hours. Pants! !

When it gets a bit colder we dry the clothes over the gas fire (draped over the fireguard, not dangling in the open flames!) and it dries quickly, but would that still cause as much damp?

No idea about insulation. . Judging by the rest of this house, probably snotty tissues! But we're mid terrace and both sides have proper central heating which keeps us toasty warm!

Cake I know what you mean about the washing/weather. We have a small house & no room for a tumble dryer. We dry everything outside in summer. In winter, it all goes on the line or on airers in the yard till as dry as possible, unless it's actually raining. Then it comes in to finish drying, it will dry a bit even on a cloudy & cold day. Even if there is snow on the ground, as long as there is nothing falling from the sky!

I realised that the dreadful sore throat I had for a few months last winter, was due to black mould allergy - we are a lot more careful about keeping the house dry now.

Suspect your UPVC windows are partly to blame. They don't allow the same ventilation as older timber windows

Also ss there a source of damp/a leak coming in from somewhere? Not always easy to spot. But it could be this which is creating damp conditions in your house and if so, needs to be fixed so the house can fully dry out.

X post. OMG the dry in front of a gas fire - yes definitely stop doing this if possible! There is lots of water in a wash straight out of the machine, if you dry it inside your house, all that water is staying inside your house. That's probably why your house is damp.

heating and airing.
can you get oil filled electrical heaters for gentle constant heat or fan heaters for short bursts?

air the whole house every day. try to open all windows as far as they go for a few minutes a couple of times a day.

plus all the usual moisture prevention measures (cook with lids on pansm us extractor fans, dry outside or in tumble dryer as much as possible, shorter cooler showers)

OP do you have outside space? Would it be possible to build a small open sided but rooved shelter for drying the laundry even in bad weather? Something with a corrugated plastic roof type thing.

PigletJohn would be the one to talk to about this issue as he is very knowledgeable.

If you cant dry outside then i would start hanging laundry from hangers on curtain poles and have windows open wide then to finish them off when it gets too cold for windows open hang them in the smallest room with dehumidifier on and door closed.

The cupboard you have- could you make/buy one of those pulley airers (are they called sheilas?) and fit it to the ceiling of the cupboard with a dehumidifier on the floor? Dehumidifiers also give out heat so are good in very small spaces for laundry drying. Mine dries an 8kg load in 12 hours.

If i could put a pulley airer on the ceiling the washing would dry more quickly so i am looking into that.

Got it! Will stop drying indoors as much as possible - I'll throw it on the line and clear more space in the airing cupboard to finish it off in there. Thanks for all the advice Actually I should do two loads tomorrow and fling it out during the hurricane - should help!

We don't have problems with damp in any other areas of the house, the bathroom is windowless but tiny with a powerful extractor fan and our dehumidifier so it's much much better than when we first moved in. The inside walls of the bedroom are perfect, not damp or musty smells, it really just is these two outside walls. The kids room is much better as they get all the sunshine, whereas ours is on the dark side, which really doesn't help. I'll rotate the dehumidifier between the bathroom and our room and make sure the heater is on the external wall and as warm as possible. Wish me luck!

Oh and when your wash cycle is done give it another spin in the fastest spin setting to get more water out.

Also look into any treatments you could do for the external walls to reduce damp. There may be companies doing special offers or competitions. 'Like' all the energy companies you can think of on facebook and email them a to ask about what offers they have/ what treatments you would need/ free quotes etc.

Thanks for all the ideas everyone, feel far less defeated.

Love the idea about covering a part of the garden. We rent, but I'll see if there's anything I can build/do. And I will try your method diaduit for drying indoors and see if I can pimp up my airing cupboard. Just stuck my head in it, and it goes from waist height all the way up to the ceiling - never knew that, thought it stopped above the water heater!

Oh, last question - any ideas what I can do about our musty smelling radiator covers? They're just mdf, painted and varnished - any way to get the musty smell out or are they buggered??

(also, we need a pigletjohn klaxon!)

Ooh diauit will do the spin thing!

Can't do anything about the external walls unfortunately as we're renting and our landlord probably won't do anything (he's had this house for ages, we've been renting 3 years and we have to nag and chase before anything happens.)

and it goes from waist height all the way up to the ceiling - never knew that, thought it stopped above the water heater!

This sounds promising! You could probably make a basic version of the pulley airer yourself to fit the space. I'll bet there are tutorials on youtube or instructions on some money saver webblog etc.

I didnt realise you rented- i am in the same situation- LL wont do any repairs so i do what i can without spending a fortune. Its very frustrating but i love my home and would rather stay.

I'll try and think of any more tips.

Unless you are already at the jumpers-and-coats-inside stage, then I would let the house stay colder in order to pay for another good sized dehumidifier. If you put it on a central landing and run it all the time except when windows are open, it will make a huge difference.

OP if you do rig up a pulley and dehumidifier in the airing cupboard you will be amazed at how much heat builds up in that cupboard. When my laundry is dry i switch dehum off and leave the door open so the heat spreads into the bathroom which is directly opposite. I have timed my laundry now so that the laundry is dry for the time when DCs are due a bath. So i take laundry down and leave cupboard and bathroom doors open- heat travels to colder bathroom while i fill the bath then shut bathroom door to keep heat in there. It's a science

Blimey DiaDuit I need your skills!

Ok, just been digging through our random pile o' stuff, and have come across an extending tension rod that fits in the airing cupboard, and seems strong enough to take quite a few clothes on hangers. Joy! Trying to work out how to get the dehumidifier in, as the door is a tight fit - would it matter too much if I left the door cracked open a bit to get the cable in? The airing cupboard is in our bedroom, which is the coldest, so any heat will help in that room

Also worked out we can fit an airer in the bath, so could use that as drying space with the door closed, and extractor fan and dehumidifier on.. Getting quite excited about trying this out now!