Oh - one thing - you said IAQ expert was in attic - did he/she check out the rest of the house, and was the smell noticed/identified by that person ? Indeed, why does this product have such a mind-blowingly strong odor?! The thing that throws me, and why pool/spa chemical or hazardous waste or sewer gases coming from the street or odors from some business (or neighborhood illegal drug lab maybe) drifting into your property moved to the top of my list, is the long-term persistence - because for the odor to persist and permeate your possessions, it would normally have to be active - meaning liquid or gas from usually unless it really pearmeatedthe entire house (like fire or cigarette smoke does) - and something done 3 months ago I find that hard to believe in usual cases unless gallons were poured into the drains or ground or such. It doesn't smell like bleach exactly, but like strong cleaning agents. The disinfectant usually dissipates within a day to a week per their website, but trapped in the ceiling drywall under a vaqpor barrier could obviously go much longer - though the descriptions of the smell is doctor's/dentist's office/hospital smell, not bleach. Per saperne di più. Room smelled afterwards. We used it in guest bedroom when tennis student left their smelly gear there. Common contaminated surfaces cleanup modes for your sort of case, assuming an in-house contamination source (as opposed to groundwater contamination or buried waste or drifting-in contamination or such): 1) commonly, a bleach or hydrogen peroxide or solvent or borax (depending on chemical) cleanup protocol is used, using "wet-wiping" techniques - like mopping all surfaces, commonly with either a second person following to wipe up the excess liquid after a short exposure time, or sometimes vacuuming the remnant up - usually followed by normal detergent wash using TSP to remove residual and the cleaning chemical. Chlorine smells can come from several different sources and can get on furniture, clothes or skin. It was on an exterior wall creating a vapor barrier. Have you had an upper respiratory infection this winter or other allergies? Use Figure 1 to locate the source of the … Answered by Member Services: Hi, This is James in Member Care. Neither is definitive as to the specific chemical present though - that requires sealed samples taken to the lab for detailed chemical analysis, as I previously described. It sucks. And you used an Oxford comma. For example I will have a terrible reaction to lavender, or to paint that nobody else smells or nobody smells it very strongly, it but we can always hunt it down and find the source. It didn't smell like bleach. Thanks for your interest in Angie's List! Not even allergies can take away the pleasure of grammar. We use unscented everything. My husband who is allergic to dust mites and mold has no symptoms at all. However, reduced Os is stable in strong non-oxidizing acids. Chlorine poisoning has been known to occur in individuals over the years, so diagnosing it usually isn’t difficult. No visible mold but slimy smelly. I am really somewhat at a loss, because since you did not notice it during how ever many times you were in the house before closing day (initial viewing, home inspection, etc), but did notice it on closing day - has to be something from outside, something inherent in the house itself, or something you moved in before closing (assuming you had not yet moved in and were not living in the house at that time) - so if it was a bare house that really narrows the list of possible sources, and there are very few in-house things that could cause this for months without either dissipating or burning out, so I am tending toward: 1) the pool (yours or neighbors) or any spa/hot tub/sauna having excessive disinfection (or an ozone or ultraviolet disinfection unit), 2) chemicals in the sewer system getting into your house, or. Cat litter is super absorbsent and can capture the moisture that's in the air--given enough time. We are open from 8am to 9pm on Mondays through Fridays and until 5pm on Saturdays. Mention that you suspect water might be getting in. Re: Cleaning are 3/4" radius sinks and improvement over zero radius? posted by peep at 11:41 AM on May 6, 2009 . I am not living there. Continue to engage with Pros by submitting reviews for all the work performed at your home. 6) You did ask (rightly) what possible worst-case scenarios after assessment are - and bear in mind, these are worst-case but FYI, as I see it, from roughly lesser to greater consequences : a) they find a very hazardous substance or chemical concentration and you have to move out for days, weeks or months till it is remediated - normally heavily cleaning or rarely stripping the affected area only like attic floor maybe, and usually all fabric wall or floor coverings and any exposed insulation involved. Weird News. The 3rd floor guest room is the only room in my house I can be in. So I don't think I have phantosmia. In hotels, I could always tell as soon as the elevator door started to open if the pool was on that level of the hotel. OMG the junk that was in there! There's something in the water on the Peninsula and it's making neighbors nervous. 20) On day of closing when you noticed the smell - I presume you had not moved in yet - but if you had or were doing so at that time, look for spilled or leaking (maybe a bottle cracked during moving) cleaning or laundry products, or garage/yard solvents or such. Commonly on the order of $0.05-0.25/SF with higher end usually being only for the directly contaminated surfaces, lower end for secondary contamination and areas where airborne odors are sticking. If you smell electrical burning, cut the power to your unit and call a technician for help.” https://www.getzschman.com/blog/whats-smell-5-furnace-odors-mean/, “ 9) if possibly ozone, rather than chlorine (the biting sharp smell some electric motors and transformers and brush-type motors put out), then check around any electric motors you have - furnace blower, water or sump pumps, "instant on" hot water recirculation pump, A/C, furnace blower, reefer, doorbell or furnace/boiler transformer, etc. It's been 7 weeks and the chlorine smell is still there. Turns out, that's not chlorine you can smell at … 3) unshippable chemicals dumped by the previous owner outside the house somewhere, or into a drain - especially if on septic, though the right solvents poured down drain could have melted through plastic pipe and caused formation of a pool of waste chemicals in, under or outside the house. I smell the second floor laundry discharge trap and no smell at all. 7) condensate line - can't see that as a cause, but will need cleaning or replacement from time to time so I would either find out where it leads to or have it replaced/rerouted to a new known drain location - if not now, maybe at next coil cleaning. I don’t know if I’ve become desensitized at this point or if that was some kind of issue with the chemicals they use to treat water, but I no longer smell it. Also of course, if it was smelled at closing date walk-through, and same smell and approximate persistence now, I would be making a strong effort (if previous owner will cooperate) to talk with any contractors or cleaners who were in the house about what they used - anything from wall washing or carpet cleaning solution to repainting. Now 4 hours later no more chlorine smell just a light sent of Pinesol. May have spilled a bottle of bleach or such during moveout that smells anuytime it gets moist (like from dishwasher venting of damp air for instance), 1) heavily used or spilled bleach or bleach-based cleanser - airing out would normally clear this out in a couple of days unless in a confined space like in the subfloor under cabinets, or drained out of cabinet under it and from there into or under the flooring, 2) bleach used to wash down bathroom, kitchen or basement walls that were growing mildew/mold - unless liberally poured on cracks in the floor or around edges of wall should dissipate in a week or so, but if poured in could be reactivated anytime the area got mosit from humid bathroom or kitchen air or such. In some cases, children may consume cleaning products that contain chlorine. Air out for days and think its dissipating, but within hours of closing up windows you can smell it again. The Angie’s List Answers forum ran from 2010 to 2020 and provided a trusted space for homeowners to ask home improvement questions and receive answers directly from Pros and other users. Answered by Thetodor: I know it's been awhile but have you been able to get rid of the problem and/or determine the cause? Also smell around outside meter box and breaker panel - overheating electrical insulation can smell like this because they are commonly (especially for your higher-voltage main feed wires, especially black insulated ones) made of chlorinated compounds in the insulation on the wire, 13) smell around in attic and basement/crawlspace for mold/ mildew, rot, or funny smell from insulation. The master br was painted with Sherwin Williams Harmony odor absorbing paint. The bleach smell stops when chlorine completely dissipates. The heat is often enough to melt away wire insulation, and soon your unit could produce electrical shorts and sparks that emit the smell. And of course because it involved land movement their homeowner's insurance provided zero coverage. goo. If that’s not the problem, vacuum and then scrub the “firebox”—the area that contains the fire at the base of the chimney. The question becomes....what do I do next??? Cleaned it several times, several ways and it still smelled. Obviously, with slight drift air across property, if stronger at property line that at house or same then almost certainly coming from outside your property. News. The reason I ask - when we moved from MA to DC I was pretty shocked by how strongly the city water smells of chlorine. its been 60 days since we closed and while i believe the smell is marginally better it is still lingering. I went to my doc's office and had to see the nurse practitioner who just told me to take Flonase. 19) on day with slight steady air drift across your property (from different direction for each side of property) stand at property line and smell if you can smell it coming onto your property from elsewhere - could be from chemical plant, refinery, water or sewage treatment plant, public swimming pool, etc upwind of you - though unless you are in an area where the wind direction is very constant you should have noticed some days with worse smell and some with near none, and of course should have been as or more obvious when out in yard or on deck or such than when inside. Where the chlorine smell is determines how to get rid of it. Homeowner Horror Story: A Close Call with Carbon Monoxide, Video: Test for Meth Before Buying a House, Indiana Meth Law Creates New Tool to Avoid Drug, Contact Us | (amorphous reduced osmium is black but it can also be a red-brown hydroxide confused as iron rust.). I see now. Is it possible that some chemical your husband uses is on his clothes? Might you be using one more often than you did previously? Glad you are too. Hot air rises while cold air falls. You can also try buying a 10 lbs bag of cat litter and filling smaller bowls of it, placing them everywhere in your home, especially near your bathroom, kitchen, and basement where moisture can collect and build up. Chlorine gas appears to be yellow-green in color. If left untended, these sparks and melting wires create enough heat to start a fire in your home. We took down the medicine cabinet and it smelled really bad. He is an attorney. Pool smell is due, not to chlorine, but to chloramines, chemical compounds that build up in pool water when it is improperly treated. Bleach smell is on the general meth or drug manufacturing chemicals list for processing and for cocaine/heroid processing too - but could as well be present if used in high concentrations to try to remove the other odors. The day we closed on the house we noticed a fairly strong chemical smell (bleach/chlorine like) in the house but chalked it up to the house being closed up. Since no one else can smell it and and you have none in your home, I would see your doctor to rule out olfactory conditions. Though I have lived in this city for 8 years now so not sure why I would have a sudden reaction to it. I happened to have an extra container of "Biocide's Room Shocker". Chlorine in drinking water can cause water to smell or taste like chlorine and can cause drying of your skin as well as unmanageable hair. The Angie’s List Answers forum ran from 2010 to 2020 and provided a trusted space for homeowners to ask home improvement questions and receive answers directly from Pros and other users. Answered by LCD: Rambled a bit as I added things - so I would recommend reading all the way through, especially to bolded part near end, before doing anything based on this input. We've had them professionallly cleaned but could the smell be ducts themselves. Not a pro but it's possible that the chlorine smell may be coming from the dry walls in your home that may have crept up from an undetected water source like a leak in the walls from a recent rainfall or from the plumbing. I have not mentioned them using a handheld Drager sniffer or similar because I have low hopes that will determine the chemical responsible nor the source, though it is possible it can identify the class of chemical - but if a bleach smell, handheld unit might just give a hit for chlorinated compounds and certainly you will still need GC or MS or GC/MS testing to identify the exact one - which unfortunately STILL does not tell you necessarily the source or the exact product, because for say a chlorinated cleanser or phenol disinfectant there are still a bundle of products which could have released that chemical. 3) If doing the investigation, i would also be looking at title data for historic ownership and uses of the land and adjacent areas - against the chance this is a leak from either a previous industrial site, a FUD (formerly used defense site), or could be getting contamination from adjacent plant or facility. So I cleaned out the opening at the furnace drain pan with a bottle washer brush but still not draining properly. Unfortunately, because this sort of investigation can run quite an expense (I have been site supervisor on commercial/industrial/military sites where even the initial source and gross class identiification ran million of $), it is normally done incrementally - a couple hour initial classification/detection run, then depending on results of that perhaps more detailed sampling with wipes, then if appropriate detailed GC/MS testing of samples in a lab, then site assessment of the extent of copntamination once the nature of it has been determined (so on-site rapid detection chemicals can be used to map out the extent), then a remediation plan done, then the remediation, then the confirmation testing to prove it has been cleaned up, then possibly some additional cleanup for areas not adequately cleaned. My husband, a mold technician, and a friend have each smelled the strong bleach smell. I live on 1/2 acre with no neighbors on 2 sides (front and back) and am shocked by how often I smell people's laundry products when they are drying clothes in a dryer. One of them is particularly sensitive to bleach too. What can be causing this smell bleach / chlorine smell? Worst case is usually ground/groundwater contamination cases where excavation around/under foundation and/or basement slab and sealing to prevent odor infiltration, and even that generally does not involve tearing down the house. This assessment, which I expect will total in the thousand or two range assuming no gross contamination, will likely (at least way I would do it) involve possible on-site wipe samples tested onsite with a "shake and bake" chemical family identification kit to determine what class of strong contaminants are present on surfaces in the attic (done with wipes which are then put in test tube with different chemicals to identify class of contaminant) and maybe in ducts and on walls as well, and possibly by using a "Drager Air Pump" or similar sampling tester which pulls air into a handheld test machine to react with specific identifier tubes of chemical to determine the class of the contaminant - this is wha tis generally used by fire departments and major chemical spill first responders to determine what contaminants are coming out of fires or transportation spills. Obviously, should smell strongest at dishwasher and unplugging it and not using it for several days should dissipate the smell. Ditto to leaking containers that rusted through the bottom of the can and is vaporizing or maybe reacting with the shelving material. Water is just going to seep in from the ground up. No central air (also, it's winter) no dishwasher, no pool. POLL: Do you use eco-friendly cleaning products? 3) flex dryer vent in clothes dryer partly disconnect so it is getting scorched by the hot air coming out and stinking (melted plastic smell). So any ozone you notice now, which does have a bit of a disinfectant odor but not really like bleach, would have to be actively generated by an electric motor in the house or powerline arcing. 2) just to be sure - you did say several people smell it, right - so it is not just one person's sense of smell gone haywire, right ? 23) large insect nests (termites, ants, beetles, bees, etc) can have a chemically smell - but presumably if people have been in the attic and crawlspace they would have mentioned an insect infestation if they saw it. A "stinky stock syndrome" coil or high-humidity ducts can smell to high heaven - hence the stinky sock name. Please respond back if you would (using the Answer This Questions yellow button right below your question) with what the source finally turns out to be - I am real curious about this one. Or is there a portable air cleaner in use ? Did you ever figure out the issue to your smell? 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