Removing Mold - Basement Remodel Adventures
We were planning to remodel our basement, but not quite yet.
We bought our house with a finished basement - at least, they claimed it was finished. It even looked finished, at first glance. But since that time we have come to realize that we will probably have to do everything, except for the new bathroom (we hope), over.
We've lived here two years, and during that time, we've had water leak out of the air conditioner four times. The HVAC is located in an unfinished utility room, just on the other side of what we have been using for our children's playroom. One of the first projects I did after we moved in was paint a huge mural of a farm scene on three walls of this room. One of the walls has now been saturated at least four times with water from the AC.
The playroom (and most of the basement) is carpeted with a tan shag rug. It has now been soaked through numerous times. But this time was the worst.
This time, it seems that the air conditioner actually froze up, causing us to have the biggest puddle of water ever to seep through the wall and into the carpet, pad and concrete below. It also spread out across the playroom floor, getting an expensive farm-design area rug wet, and ruining books and toys.
And, because we didn't catch it for who knows how many days because we have been so busy landscaping outside... all that wet stuff began to grow mold. The whole basement stinks like mold.
If you aren't familiar with the problems mold can cause, they are primarily respiratory related. People can develop an allergy to mold, causing sinus and bronchial problems, and it is especially bad for people with asthma (like me). And it's even worse for pregnant women (like me).
So what can be done? Well, the mold has to be removed. I am not going to risk leaving even one spore of mold down there to be given the chance to multiply if ever the conditions are favorable again. And we've done all we can to make sure this never happens again, namely by having the air conditioner repaired and recharged.
But more importantly, we are going to remodel the basement correctly this time. The previous owners did not use treated lumber for the floor plate of the stud walls. They did raise the drywall high enough off the floor. And they did not use a vapor barrier under the carpet. Frankly, using carpet in the basement at all was a bad choice in and of itself.
Here's what we (especially my DH) will do:
STEP ONE - MOLD REMOVAL
- Remove all carpeting and pad.
- Throw out furniture that got wet and/or mold on them (we don't have any pieces we really loved down there anyway)
- Cut off the part of the wall that got wet. Drywall with mold growing on it has to be removed. The non-treated lumber bottom plates have to be replaced with treated, and so will any of the studs that got wet.
- Scrub the floor with Spic-n-Span, and rinse (Spic-n-Span has no ammonia so it's safe to use in conjunction with the next step of mold removal)
- Scrub the floor with bleach water and allow it to stand wet for 15 minutes
- Dry the floor completely using dehumidifiers, fans, and all the AC vents open
STEP TWO - Remodeling the Basement Correctly
- Replace the wet wood and walls with new studs (little frames inside of the existing stud wall to replace the sections we cut out)
- Replace the drywall we removed
- Paint over my mural, since it's now pretty much ruined anyway. This will mean a good coat of primer, and probably a couple coats of a nice warm gold color
- Install bead-board style paneling on the lower part of the wall as wainscoting. Paint this white.
- Install white chair rail to finish this off.
- Install laminate floor using a vapor barrier which will go up the sides of the walls a couple of inches, hidden under the baseboards.
STEP THREE - FINISHING TOUCHES TO OUR CORRECTLY FINISHED BASEMENT
One of the reason we lost some of the kids' toys and books to the water and mold was that their playroom was horribly disorganized. Even though we had installed lots of shelves, they didn't have an appreciation for where things were supposed to go, or that you should put things away when you're done with them.
In fact, they probably never play with 3/4 of their toys because they are sets that lost parts and pieces and don't work without them, etc.
So this time, the playroom shelf system will be modified. I want to put in stock cupboards from Lowe's or Home Depot, and install locks on them, to store the nicer games or sets of things (like dominoes), as well as kids arts and crafts supplies. This way, I can control when the kids are allowed to have crayons and markers, in hopes of saving my newly painted basement walls.
I also want to move a table that is currently sitting in what is supposed to be our kitchen nook, to the basement. It is an old, round oak table that was originally from a preschool, but in the nook it just gets covered with junk instead of being a good place for the kids to play and do art. Hopefully in the basement it will give them a nice surface to play on, set puzzles, etc.
Another strategy is to use lower cupboards to store toys. If they cannot see so many toys at any given moment, maybe they won't take EVERYTHING out at once. If necessary, we can lock these cupboards up too, and just leave a portion of their toys out on open shelves at any given time. It'll be like Christmas when we take out a new batch of toys (meanwhile stashing away the ones that were out previously).
We are also going to install a TV on a bracket in the corner of the room, rather than having an entertainment center piece of furniture taking up space in there (and one less thing to worry about in case water ever does spill in there again). All in all, this remodeled basement playroom will be brighter, less cluttered, have more kid-friendly furniture in it, and will be a safe place for the kids to play: mold-free!
