How can I get Rid of Mildew Odor?

I understand what it is like to have mildew odor as we have had water in our basement several times.

Once we get the water out we always turn on the ceiling fans as high as they will go for a few days. We also like to run a dehumidifier in the basement to help keep the moisture out of the air.

One thing I have found that really works on getting rid of the odor is a natural germicide cleaner I bought from a health company.

This works better than bleach and is a lot safer. It also has a pleasant odor and I don't have to worry about breathing it in when I am spraying it all around the room.

It also comes in a concentrate form, so just by mixing a little bit in a spray bottle of water goes a long ways.

I experienced what mildew can do firsthand. I noticed that my allergies were worse than usual, and I seemed to keep a constant sinus infection. I did not know what was wrong until I found the mildew on the baseboards of my house.

I had been keeping the interior of the house pretty humid because of my sinuses. I had a humidifier in every room so that I could breathe better, but it didn’t seem to be helping. What I had done was provide good conditions for the mildew to grow.

I was afraid that dealing with the mildew myself would aggravate my sinuses further, so I hired someone to come in and treat the wood. The man told me that it would help to only have one humidifier in my bedroom to help me sleep and to only turn it on at night, and he said that I should keep it cooler in the house to discourage further growth.

I’m not sure what he used, but it got rid of the odor as well as the mildew. I will probably always leave this to the professionals, since my nose is so sensitive.

@cloudel - The house I rent had a room full of mildew, too. Instead of on the walls, it was in the carpet.

I removed the carpet and bleached the floor beneath. The odor lingered, though. I knew I couldn’t put down new carpet on top of that, so I came up with a way to make it smell better.

I covered the floor of the entire room with cedar chips. Their smell was so pleasant and intense that it seemed to soak up all of the bad smell.

I left them in there with the door shut for a week. After that, I swept them up. That was four months ago, and that room still smells like cedar! I will probably be putting down new carpet soon, since it seems the mildew odor is gone for good.

When my husband and I moved into a rental home, we found that one room’s wallpaper was covered in mildew. Since I hate wallpaper anyway, we ripped it down and sprayed a solution of bleach and water onto the bare walls underneath.

He told me that the reason for the mildew was that whoever put up the wallpaper got it too wet before sticking it on. That water couldn’t dry while trapped under there, so mildew formed.

After the bleach had soaked in for a few minutes, I scrubbed the mildew with a brush. It came off so easily.

Since it was warm and dry outside at the time, we opened the windows in that room and turned on the ceiling fan. I think that helped a lot.

@rugbygirl - The sun is the cheapest and best way to eliminate mildew funk. Before I hang garments out to dry on the clothesline, I like to spray them with an scented odor absorbing spray that takes the odor with it as it dries up.

It leaves behind the fresh scent of newly washed towels. Sometimes, garments dried in fresh air can take on an earthy smell if you don’t use something on them.

Since I have a ton of white towels that need airing out every few months, I don’t mind if the sun bleaches them. Generally, the smelly garments are old ones that we use to exercise in, so we don’t care too much if their appearance is a bit faded.

Mold and mildew remediation (cleaning up mold) is not an easy task. It can take a long time to rid a house of mold and mildew entirely and even longer to get rid of the odor. It definitely requires patience.

I know about it because my brother used to run a cleaning service and I used to help him there from time to time. The hardest thing to work with was mold because it can be so stubborn. We often finished up a job thinking the mold was gone, only to be called back the next week to clean it again.

The best way to get rid of mold, mildew and their odor, in my opinion, is borax. Borax is a natural mineral (also called sodium borate) that is really great for absorbing odor. We used to sprinkle this all over furniture and carpet that has mildew odor, let it sink in and stay for about a day, and then vacuum it. It works really well, I recommend it to folks out there who are having trouble with mildew odor.

And it's affordable too, you can get it in the detergent/cleaning product isle of most large grocery stores.

@letshearit-- A steam cleaner might be a short-term solution, but if the problem repeats, it will be too expensive to do this all the time.

Baking soda and vinegar is a good and cheap way to clean out the mildew odor from carpets and people have already mentioned them.

I think if you want a long-term solution, you should first thoroughly clean the carpet from any mildew that's growing inside. Then, you need to avoid humidity and heat that's causing mildew to grow in the first place.

I think continuously using products that absorb humidity- like a dehumidifier, or leaving out cat litter open in a box near the carpet to absorb moisture is a good idea. You should also vacuum often to make sure there is no re-growth in there.

@manykitties2-- That is a great tip! I don't know why I did not think of that before!

I don't like using bleach or any house cleaners with chemicals in them. I have a mischievous and very active toddler in the house so I want to stick to natural products. I actually use a mixture of vinegar, water and baking soda to clean the mildew from my bathroom walls and bathtub. It works great and the baking soda is wonderful for the mildew odor.

I'm sure it would work great for clothes too, I have to give it a try sometime! Thanks for the tip!

There is a really bad musty smell in my house and I am not sure where it is coming from. I suspect the musty smell may be coming from the carpet in the front hall as it got damp awhile ago from an unexpected down pour.

We've already spent some time cleaning mold up from around our home in hopes that it would help kill the musty smell but it hasn't done much.

What is the easiest way to remove a musty smell from carpets? Do you think we should rent a commercial steam cleaner, or is there something simpler and cheaper we can do?

@drtroubles - There is no reason for you to throw out the stinky towels as mildew odor removal can actually be really easy. All you need to do to refresh your towels is to load them into your washing machine and add a couple of cups of white vinegar to the wash.

The white vinegar should be used without any products being put in, and you should use the hottest water possible. Once your towels have been washed through once with the vinegar, wash the towels again as you normally would. Finally, put the towels in the dryer on the highest setting possible and they should smell as good as new when they come out.

My family and I really like going to the beach but we find our beach towels always end up stinky, so we really need help with removing the mildew odor from our stuff. Does anyone know an easy and natural way to eliminate mildew odor from your towels?

We have already tried washing our towels with just detergent and drying them but the odor is still there. It is actually quite gross. My wife is suggesting we throw the towels out and get new ones, but I feel like this is a huge waste if we can find a simple odor eliminator.

Washing machines these days do not use as much water as they used to, and as a result they do not always get out odors as well. I have a front-loading washer and I've discovered that my husband's exercise clothes, for instance, stay stinky after washing. And if I get busy and let my towels get a little "funky" between cleanings (hello, mildew), that doesn't come out, either.

Laundry boosters may be necessary. For white items, bleach is your friend! other items may benefit from Oxy-Clean; it does a good job of odor removal.

What really works the best for odors caused by body odor and by mildew (these are both caused by living organisms - bacteria and fungus), though, is the sun! It might lighten bright colors, but not as badly as bleach. Simply put the stinky item in full sun for an hour or two, and the smell will be gone.