Worried About Air Duct Mold? Look out for These Signs

Mold in air vents can significantly affect your San Antonio, TX home’s air quality, potentially harming your family’s health. When mold grows in your air vents, it’s not only a hidden issue but one that spreads spores throughout your home, exacerbating air quality problems. Common symptoms of mold in duct vents include a musty odor, increased allergy symptoms like sneezing or coughing, and respiratory issues such as wheezing or shortness of breath.

Mold loves to grow in areas that are warm and moist. This means that you will be likely to see it growing in your basement, crawl spaces, bathrooms, and kitchen. Be watchful of things like carpet, drywall, cabinetry and wood flooring. Another place that mold loves to grow is inside air ducts, which is even worse. That’s because with the air flowing through your ducts, the mold spores become airborne.

There is a greater chance that mold will grow elsewhere in your home. Ducts are attractive to mold because they sometimes have water pooling inside and also have debris, which is just the organic matter that mold needs to grow.

Here are some trouble signs to watch for.

Bad Smell Throughout Your Home

As we’ve mentioned, when you have a mold issue inside your ducts, the problem extends throughout your household.

That means that the pungent mildew odor that you get when mold is growing isn’t going to be localized to one or two rooms.

As the air is circulating through the ducts and through your home, you would expect to experience that noxious smell everywhere. This means that air quality is poor.

Health Issues for Your Family

Mold lowers your indoor air quality, which can make you quite sick. In fact, it isn’t uncommon for indoor air to be of lower quality than polluted outdoor air, if there is mold inside the home.

This may show up in the form of health problems. If you or your family members are suffering from congestion, respiratory irritation, dizziness or strange rashes, this could very well be the consequence of mold growing.

Visual Signs

Your eyes will let you know if you have mold growing in your air ducts. Look for stains on the exterior of the ducts, as mold growing on the interior will cause discoloration on the outside. Another telltale sign of mold is foam-like substance growing on the outside of the ducts.

If you are thinking about improving your indoor air quality, you should make getting your air ducts cleaned a regular habit. Your system will work more efficiently, your health will improve, and the likelihood of mold growing in your ducts will greatly diminish. Call us for more information.