The humidity in my house is ridiculous.

[WolvesOfTheCalla]

Moved into a Grade 2 Listed cottage in a conservation area about a month ago.

Unexpected inheritance from my Grandmothers sister - never married, no children, I assumed she’d leave it to my Grandmother who would sell it; have been a life long renter and expected to always be, have lived in plenty of shitty houses but never one with a humidity issue.

It’s around 80% in every bloody room. Single glazed, wooden frame windows that are first on my list to repair and eventually replace when I’ve figured out what the council will/won’t allow/what my budget is.

There’s other stuff too but it’s mostly cosmetic, she kept up with the building itself fairly well considering her age.

I've always slept like shit but this is something else; it’s like my hay fever has become year round. Itchy eyes, scratchy throat, sneezing etc.

A friend dropped off a small 2 litre dehumidifier which has been running in my bedroom (the smallest, has the most features and is beautiful) since 3pm. So far it’s gone down from 82% to 71% and the difference in the feel of the air is huge.

But there’s two big bastard bedrooms to deal with (1 DD in each) a decent sized bathroom, a fourth bedroom that wouldn’t even fit a toddler bed so it’s my teen DDs study room/my office, and downstairs is a living room, dining room, kitchen diner(ish - 2 seater table under the window), shower room, laundry/boot room.

What are my options here? I’ve got a £300 budget (and hanging fire for Black Friday), would prefer an energy efficient one (or two?!) with a smart app or similar so I can automate it, don’t care how loud it is as I sleep with white noise on the Alexa anyway, don’t care what it looks like either.

Google blew my head off and I’m extremely fucking low on spoons right now, between work(ing from home, which I hate), medical appointments for me and DD1, unpacking, driving to two schools each morning (school buses aren’t sorted yet), studying for my Masters, and discovering the many, many quirks of the property that I have many fond summer memories of but had no clue what a fucker it would be to live in I am wiped out and have no brain cells left.

There are companies who will remake your wooden frames and use an ultra thin double glazing panel that work in listed buildings. In the meantime you will be amazed at the difference a good joiner can do at removing and replacing the worst of the rotting sections, filling and sealing. Chat to your neighbours. My local jobbing joiner will charge £500 a day but include small pieces of wood/ filler and whizz round the outside getting all the little jobs done in one go.

Its a massive learning curve I bought an old place nearly 10 years ago having always rented city based flats. Ventilation, cleaning (wash down any previously mouldy areas with mould and mildew remover and heat. You really need to heat through the fabric of the building, so fires swept and lit. Slow burning briquettes take up much less room than logs and can be stored indoors in a cupboard.

FWIW it had been very humid lately anyway.

I just checked a meter we have and in my 15 year old house it hasn't really dropped below 70% humidity in the last month - and that's with goo central heating and open windows. So a good part of what you're experiencing is down to the very damp air, I think.

But yes: ventilation and heat is the key.

And photos. Take photos of the house now so that as you spend the next few years making it a lovely home, you can really see how far you've come - it's easy to forget what a house used to be like when you moved in

We bought a Meaco MeacoDry ABC Dehumidifier (Black) 12L - Ultra Quiet Dehumidifier for my son's room last year. It wasn't cheap (it's £215) but it works very well.

Congratulations on the house! I can definitely understand the feeling if owning a listed building as your first home being very overwhelming. As someone else mentioned, I would avoid damp specialists as many are extremely unsympathetic to old buildings, and in the medium to long term can do far more harm than good.

Keep on with opening windows as much as possible, it's a good habit and the house will benefit massively from the improved airflow. Meaco make the best dehumidifiers, so I'd go for the best one your budget allows for. The Kärcher window vac is one of my favourite modern inventions so I'm glad you've got one. We use ours on the windows and also in the bathroom after showering. It works a treat on shower glass and tiles and means the bathroom dries out far quicker. I always shower with the window open regardless if the weather, but if you have any health issues when it's very cold you can leave the window open after your shower. We can't have an extractor fan installed but the combination of window + window vac seems to work well.

Wherever possible, don't dry clothes inside. It's so bad for the house and you as well. I know it's so tough in this gross wet country to avoid it. We ended up getting a heat pump dryer which is brilliant and surprisingly great with energy usage. It might not be something you can afford straight away, but just an idea incase someone else offers you a generous present in future!

A Karcher window vac and a dehumidifier will make a difference quickly. Agree with pps that you will need to put heating on a bit. It's very very damp atm

We had a Nuaire ventilation pump fitted in loft- makes a huge difference to whole house!

Congratulations on your new home. Sounds beautiful. I agree with the previous advice about airing the house out, and you have to heat old buildings a bit of they just get very damp and stay cold. An hour or so every day will be enough.

I live in a listed building in a conservation area and the basic thing is that you need permission for anything where you are changing"the fabric of the building" i.e. walls, windows, etc. The only exception is if you are replacing like for like i.e. old timber window with new identical timber window. In a conservation area you probably also need permission to make any changes to the outside of the building, which can include painting your front door, trimming any trees and changing garden fences/ hedges.

Good luck. It will feel much nicer once you get to spring and can dry the house out a bit more.

I have a listed stone built house - just wanted to pop in to say we have solid wall insulation, double glazing, a damp course, and many other things noted as impossible on this thread without a sniff of damp or humidity. It's expensive to retrofit sympathetically though and will depend on your house construction (e.g. we have no internal exposed beams, so solid wall insulation is ok).

The advice on dehumidifiers, open windows etc is the perfect medium term/quickly affordable solution.

I have nothing useful to add that others haven't already suggested, but I just wanted to say that your Aunt sounds like a wonderful woman OP and you are very deserving of her generous gift. She obviously loved you very much.

Once the house has got used to being "lived in" again you'll have many more happy memories there.

I'd spend the £ on a second hand bigger dehumidifier and someone to clear and check chimneys.

Once you can fire up the open fires that house will not be anywhere near as damp. The bedrooms will get heated via the chimney stacks and the air dried too. You'd be amazed how different it feels as the fire will draw the air in the house up and out, it'll transform it. Old houses were designed to do this and not using the fires really encourages damp.

In the meantime I think an epic clean, the bigger dehumidifier and opening windows etc will help.

Congratulations on the house it sounds gorgeous!! Best of luck xx

It won't help that it's been shut up for a year. Once it's regularly ventilated and heated it may improve by itself to a degree.

Unfortunately, opening windows on damp cold days can mean that you introduce air that is even more humid than what's in the house--although the air current will help to lift condensation. We always sleep with a window open, however.

We have a Meaco 20l. It arrived just over three weeks ago and it is still coming on automatically because our humidity doesn't stay below 60% for long. We don't dry washing on radiators, cook with lids on, use extractor fans, etc. It has been very wet where we live, though.

We are slightly worried about the electricity bill but the warm air coming out of the unit is probably saving us oil, as is the drier air in the house, as apparently dry air is more efficient to heat than wet air.

For example, the Met Office app says humidity outside is currently 88%. In my house it is currently 58%. I have just opened a window to air a spare room but the dehumidifier will probably click on automatically as the moister air hits its sensor.

Well damp proof courses don't work in stone buildings for a start.

Did you get listed building consent for the works?

Hi OP - great to read all the useful advice on the thread already.

My 2p's worth is BEFORE YOU DO ANYTHING ELSE; get the chimney sweep over and get yourself sorted to light the fires.

It'll do more to combat the wet air than the best dehumidifier could.

I am tempted by the Meaco ones though having read this! Thanks all.

We've lived in old houses for years- including half timbered and listed.

My first job would be to get a chimney sweep in to clean/ check the chimneys and then get a fire lit. Choose the one nearest the middle of the house- the heat will spread out.

If you are rural/semi rural there will be wood available locally, ask around.

Loft insulation is an absolute must. You need a good thick layer of fibreglass up there otherwise you are just heating the sky!

If it's listed you won't be able to just swap the windows and doors for new ones- the conservation officer may insist on the old frames being repaired and no double glazing unless it's secondary fitted on the inside.

There may be grants available depending on your situation- well worth having a look:

www.government-grants.co.uk/home-insulation-grants/free-insulation/

It sounds beautiful- it won't be looking at its best right now, but it will be worth it!

So sorry for the loss of your aunt. The house sounds lovely. Great tips on here, I think I need to buy the big Meaco - our small Argos one isn’t cutting it. We moved into a Victorian house recently so a different concept to previous 1960s. I have already got the chimney swept booked for the one remaining open fire.

Apart from electrical options, you could get the unibond plastic contraptions that you put a big tablet in which does absorb a fair amount of water from the air. There are different sizes and you could put a few in different rooms to get started. I think the smal one is called the pearl. We use a larger one for the main bedroom and a smaller one in the spare bedroom (aka my office) but they can be moved around as needed.

Yes all the consents. Damp proofing is only in part of the building. The rest was deemed Unsuitable.

Actually both the council's conservation team and our neighbours were really helpful for tips on managing our property, it's worth asking around locally.

You mention the boiler was done in 2007. So 15 years is getting on for a boiler lifetime.

The issue is probably that you have moved 3x people into a house that only used to have one. 3x people generate a lot more in humidity - think showers cooking and breathing out water vapor.

I would start off by having a war against anything that generates humidity. So if you are used to boiling pans on the hob, try using lids, hob extractor fans to pull the water vapour out. For showers/bathrooms seal up the bathroom door with draft excluder so the water vapour can't get into the house and leave the windows open or use extraction after using them. After you have used the bath/shower try to get as much water down the plughole as possible with a window scraper. I find there is a lot in the shower tray that can be put down as well as on the glass doors and it only takes 10 seconds to do. Water that is spread out over a large surface area will evaporate the most. The window vac on the windows is a good idea. If you get a dehumidifier, use it in the room that has the most people for the most time.

@LadyOfTheFliessssss
i looked at those bags do they work as well in the car as the reviews say as I am I keen to get them my car is awful for steaming up
TIA

Not a single one of my rented houses had a boiler less than 18 years old, which is why I assumed 15 years old would be fine (for now), it didn’t need anything doing to it during the service which was probably just dumb luck, although I did have funds aside for it.

It’s by no means a small house; both the big bedrooms are 12ft by 13ft, (above living room and dining room), my (small) bedroom is 8ft x 7ft, bathroom is 10ft by 11ft, fourth (not a) bedroom 6ft by 4ft (kitchen/laundry room/toilet below those 3 rooms). Not massive either, but plenty big enough for 3 people.

I know I can’t just swap out windows doors etc, I don’t have the mental energy to deal with the council right now, they have huge backlogs and village gossip (people who have lived here for a very long time, so used to dealing with this) about trying to get planning etc is both amusing and horrifying.

There’s no damp or mould (so far) 🤞 and I’ll be checking regularly.

Extractors are in the bathroom and laundry room, none in the kitchen (nor an oven hood) and all 3 rooms have oddly small windows, but they do open and the kitchen and laundry room have external doors.

Have a few numbers to call for gutters/chimneys/fires, a tab open on my PC for the dehumidifier PPs have mentioned, if it doesn’t end up on offer during Black Friday I’ll just buy it full price.

What was my meagre “maybe one day I’ll be able to buy a house but probably definitely not” deposit of 15K (down to 12k now after moving costs/unpaid leave) is now my “what spendy item is going to crap out on me first” fund.

It’s definitely not the worst maintained house I’ve seen (have cleared out a few with friends/cousins), but the old as baws aspect makes it slightly trickier and scarier.

Log burners were installed just before I had DD1 so that’s my bet for the first thing I have to spend on.

It's good news that there's no obvious signs off mould etc. I think maybe it's just because it's been so empty for a long time.

Hopefully the dehumidifier will work and once it's heated more, it am hopefully will settle down.

Log burner will last decades. You might need new fire bricks and possibly a new baffle plate (I might just have made up that name!) but that’s a £75 job not a thousands job