When it comes to keeping your home clean and free from mold, most people forget to check their garage. However, mold can infest your garage just like any other area of your home and turn into a nightmare quicker than you think. Luckily, preventing it doesn’t have to be a difficult task and the same process works essentially the same in every space. (Related topic: Spencertown garage doors, Chatham garage doors, Austerlitz garage doors)
Mold will spread in any moist, dark and stale environment, so keeping your garage dry and properly ventilated is key to prevent mold from making an unwanted appearance. Bear in mind that mold problems are common, and everyone can be affected; not even the most thorough homeowners are safe from it, especially when taking into consideration that the problem might be concealed and unnoticeable until it’s too late.
To make your garage mold-proof, the safest bet is building your garage from scratch and doing so with materials that mold will find inhospitable. The first step to construct a mold-proof garage is going for metal studs instead of wood. However, metal studs require somewhat different skills and tools, but any general contractor with experience using metal studs should be able to build you a quality garage, nonetheless.
Pre-coated aluminum or vinyl siding for the walls of your garage are also the best choices, and, in general, choosing materials other than wood will eliminate the possibility of mold growth, not to mention that you won’t have to deal with any wood-eating pests that could damage your garage.
If building a new garage is not an option and you have to work with what you already have, you’ll have to take a rather meticulous approach to keep mold from infiltrating your garage. The top priority, in this case, is reducing the moisture content of the air as much as you can. Installing an air dehumidifier is a good start, and you can follow up by keeping the garage properly ventilated.
Of course, the roof of the garage is one of the weakest spots, and you need to make sure that yours is in good condition. You need to keep fresh air circulating and a well-maintained garage structure to have the best chances of protecting your garage from mold. Sunlight is helpful too when it comes to hindering mold growth but, unfortunately, it won’t do the trick on its own.
For those of you who already have a mold problem, garage mold removal is a project for the professionals. The presence of mold causes respiratory problems in people who have a sensitivity to general contaminants, and the removal process implies stirring mold spores that could seriously harm the health of the people around. In fact, some local codes require that mold removal is handled by a licensed professional. On the flip side, if the mold is only in your garage, removing it is generally easier than doing so in any other area of your home.