Mold Damage and Your Tallahassee Home

5/16/2017 (Permalink)

Mold comes in many colors and textures. Call SERVPRO to investigate and/or remediate the damage.

SERVPRO Technicians Focus on the Factors That Lead to Excessive Mold Growth in Your Home

Your home has many different elements to it, making a house into your place of refuge and safety. Intruders are easily kept out, for the most part, but the smallest unwanted guests are already present inside your home. These tiny trespassers are mold and mold spores, and they live everywhere.
 
Tallahassee homes are safe from mold damage, even though mold is always present unless certain situations develop that permit mold to grow profusely. When these conditions are present, mold can quickly become a costly nightmare for even the best-kept and cleanest of homes. Until then, mold can only lurk and wait while causing no harm.
 
Excess moisture must be present in sufficient amounts for mold to grow and start creating damaging problems for your home. Moisture can become elevated in localized areas of your home or throughout your home, depending on the source of the moisture. An overly damp basement can make an entire home damper, while habitual wetting of the floor outside the tub from showering or bathing without a mat can create elevated moisture levels in the bathroom. There are other aspects that also must be present for mold to grow – excessive humidity is not the only requirement.
 
Darkened areas, free of natural sunlight, are needed for mold to flourish. Sunlight slows the growth of mold, which is why placing items in the sun outdoors can help prevent mold growth. Short periods of sunlight are not sufficient to completely stop mold from growing, but it can slightly slow it down.
 
The other environmental presence required by mold to grow is also what is usually damaged by that same proliferation of mold growth – food! What you see as your home's walls, floors, furnishings, and many of your personal belongings – books, clothing, and the like, are considered to be a plethora of food sources to mold. This is because most of these items are made of, at least partially, cellulose, which comes from plants.
 
The plants used in the building materials used within your home vary, but wood is from trees, linen is from the flax plant, just like cotton is from the cotton plant, and drywall has a paper covering, which is another product derived from trees, as are the pages in books and magazines. Sometimes, materials that are otherwise non-organic, such as brick or concrete, have cellulose trapped in their crevices, allowing mold to grow there, also.
 
Living things in your home can also become affected by mold. Houseplants can become affected by mold, and providing them sufficient water for their needs can also provide moisture for mold to thrive. Your food (fresh fruits and vegetables, cookies and bread, cheeses, even dried pasta) can also grow mold and become unpalatable. This is because of both high moisture and cellulose contents in these items.
 
Because there is no such thing as 'mold-elimination' in a home, SERVPRO concentrates on both removal of excess mold and the materials that suffer from mold damage, and the control and reduction of moisture inside the home, instead. After the amount of mold has been reduced and excess moisture is brought under control, air scrubbers can further decrease the number of airborne spores.
 
We at SERVPRO of North Leon County want to help make your home healthy once again. Mold damage can be ugly, and also reduce the strength of your home's structural framework. Because mold is often located in hidden places, we are available at (850) 536-6599, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

For more information about the County of North Leon, Florida visit: http://cms.leoncountyfl.gov/