The Top 5 Things You Can Do To Avoid Mold At Home This Year

Mold prevention isn't exactly a widely discussed topic—but it should be! Not only does preventing mold at home reduce costly remediation expenses down the road, but it can also help you avoid any adverse health reactions from mold exposure and poor indoor air quality. Not a bad deal.

Homes nowadays are also built with energy efficiency in mind, meaning that there's little airflow between the outside and inside environments. Saving on energy costs and emissions is a good thing, but it can keep tiny moldy particles trapped inside your home.

Deep cleaning regularly helps remove any spores and toxins that manage to make their way inside, improving your air quality and decreasing the likelihood that a spore will stumble on a nice little place to start growing.

This step includes a few mini-steps, but all are important to ensure that your HVAC unit, the lungs of your home, isn't blowing mold particles through every single room.

The first part of this process is investing in HEPA filters and changing them on time per the manufacturer's instructions. These filters are required to remove at least 99.97% of dust, pollen, mold, bacteria, and any airborne particles with a size of 0.3 microns (µm). With microscopic particles like spores and mycotoxins, the smaller the sizes these filters can catch and remove, the better. 

The focus here is to maintain an indoor humidity level between 30 and 50%1. Any higher and you risk encouraging mold growth in your home.

As noted earlier, it's impossible to completely prevent outside particles from entering your home. Cleaning is a great way to remove them, but air purifiers can also help clear out any lingering ones.

Mold growth can occur in the blink of an eye, and it doesn't always occur in visible areas. By scheduling routine inspections, a professional can come out to assess if there's a current hidden mold problem from a leak or if there are any structural issues that could lead to mold growth in the future. 

A few areas they'll assess should include the roof for any leaks or weak areas, windows for any gaps from loose caulking or cracks, and exterior doors to ensure they're sealed properly. 

Scheduling your own home inspection to check for hot spot locations for mold growth around your home is a phenomenal idea as well. Catching a problem early can help prevent it from spiraling into a much bigger issue.