Mold inspection in Elizabeth, New Jersey
Most mould in Elizabeth homes is found by smell before it is found by sight, because the majority of it grows where nobody is looking.
Why Elizabeth housing holds moisture
Much of the city was built before 1940, a great deal of it multi-family, and the sewer system in the older sections carries both storm water and waste in the same pipe. When a heavy rain overwhelms that capacity, the water has to go somewhere, and in a two- or three-family house the first fixture to give way is a basement floor drain. The Elizabeth River flooding during Ida made national news for the worst reasons; the routine version, the one that happens several times a year without making news, is a few inches in a basement that holds a boiler, a panel and whatever the family had stored down there.
The moisture matters more than the species
The EPA does not recommend routine sampling to identify what is growing, because the recommended action does not change based on the answer: remove the growth, and fix the water feeding it. An inspection that maps moisture is generally more useful than a test that names a species.
Where a lab report does earn its cost is when you need documentation rather than information — a sale, a landlord dispute, or a claim where somebody else will read the file.
Where it hides in Union County homes
- Behind panelling in a basement finished decades after the house was built
- Under carpet laid directly over a concrete slab floor
- Inside the wall behind a laundry connection
- Above a ceiling below a second-floor bathroom
- In the joist bay a central air condensate line runs through
- In the shared basement of a two- or three-family house, which nobody inspects
It usually starts with water
A basement that took water and was dried with a couple of fans, a supply line that seeped behind a wall for a season, a foundation that gets wet a few times a year and dries slowly — each leaves material damp out of sight.