How to get rid of sour smell in the house
You must start with the basics first; Chances are, if you’ve gotten to the point of seeking help getting rid of bitter house odors on the internet, then you need to do some serious cleaning. Set aside a day or weekend specifically to clean.
If you are unwilling or unable to do it alone, enlist the help of the people you live with. Maybe you can also ask your friends for help. Bribe them with pizza and beer or kabobs and wine if necessary. Then use the following tips to get rid of the odor in your home and keep a fresh, fragrant, or at least breathable living space.
Sour house odor removal
* Dry the rooms first and then clean your basement so it is emptied of anything that can hold moisture and runs down as well. Remove the cardboard boxes.
* If you have a ducted forced air heating and cooling system in your home, have the ducts checked. Homes that are decades old can have mold, lots of accumulated dirt, and other unpleasant things that can cause a bad smell. Your ducts can also rust now so you may need to change them.
The newer ducts available on the market today are much more energy efficient. You will save air conditioning costs this summer by purchasing new ducts. You can also hire a duct cleaning company to inspect the ducts you have at this time. Some have a camera that can show you what’s in your ducts. Be careful who you wear! Use a reputable company and check with the Better Business Bureau. Ask them for references. Some just clean a little and spray on a deodorant. The estimate for cleaning your ducts can be hundreds of dollars less than buying new ones.
* Check your carpets. Sometimes rugs are unprofessionally steam cleaned and a lot of water remains. This causes mold and a related musty smell.
Remove rugs and install hardwood or similar flooring with rugs that can be cleaned outside the home and dried before returning to the area. If your rugs are ten years old, it doesn’t hurt to remove them.
* You may have some type of mold growing on your carpet or behind your wallpaper. Create a bleach solution (1:10 to start, then 1: 4 if it doesn’t work) and gently wash all walls and mops. Rent a hot water carpet cleaner and put a bleach solution in the reservoir instead of the soap they are trying to sell you. Add a drop or two of dish soap, but don’t add more. It is the water that cleanses, not the soap. Adding too much soap will make the carpet dirty because it doesn’t rinse and the soap sticks to the dirt.
* Although chlorine bleach is well known for discoloration of many things, you can risk using it for jobs that smell a lot, even on dark carpets. If you are still in doubt, there is always oxygen bleach. It kills “everything” that may be causing a bad odor, and cleaning with hot water also helps allergies.
Keep babies away from rugs, as breathing chemicals of any kind is especially bad for them. If the smell comes back faster than you think it should, get a dehumidifier.
* Never run a dehumidifier where you have an open window or it will dry out the immediate atmosphere in your home. An air conditioner works even better because of its filtering system, but if it’s too cold where you live to keep using one, stick with the dehumidifier.
* To remove the not-so-fresh smell from your linoleum or wood floors, simply mix a 3: 1 solution of warm water and white vinegar in the mop bucket and get to work. Remember to open a window or two. Vinegar has a good clean smell, but it is strong.
Products to eliminate sour house odor
* Buy a large Febreze pump as it works on everything. Smelly baskets, sticky cars, sleeping bags that stink of camp fire … whatever the smell, Febreze can suffocate. You can get it in most supermarkets.
Another idea is to use a citrus odor neutralizing spray; It is so effective that estheticians use it in salons to get rid of the permanent smell.
* An ozone generator or airborne hydrogen peroxide device may also work, but they tend to be expensive and may not get to the root of the problem. Covering or filtering odors is always more expensive than removing their source.
* If you want something a little cheaper, you can try Ozium Air Freshener, it is the best way to keep the air in your home or workspace clean and smelling fresh. Ozium does not cover the odors associated with smelly houses, it removes them!
Ozium, the original air purifier, is a chemical agent that actually eliminates unpleasant odors and reduces bacteria in the air. Actually, ozium cleans the air through a glycolized action. Ozium’s glycolized formula acts directly on odor-causing particles in the air.
* Electrostatic air filters are good at removing dust buildup, but they can be bad if they don’t work properly. Electrostatic air filters work by ionizing the air that passes through the filter, collecting dust from the air creating an electrostatic field, much like a comb collects particles after passing through dry hair fast enough.
Why are electrostatic dust collectors bad for you? If they don’t work properly, they can produce ozone, which is a respiratory irritant. So be sure to do your research before investing in one of these air filters.
* Try Renuzit, in any aroma. If you can, try to find the Super Odor Killer fragrance. The fragrance in SOK (introduced in 1972) is not easily identifiable, because SOK uses a mixture of perfumes that were left over when fragrance manufacturers produced too much for another company’s orders.
Not only is this blend good for masking a variety of odors, it can be used lightly at higher fragrance levels without overwhelming the user. The popular and more affordable Country Kitchen scent will also suffice.
* Fresh Wave has a variety of natural, non-toxic and environmentally friendly products for laundry, upholstery, flooring and ventilation that are designed to attract, capture and neutralize bitter odors in the house.
Sour House Odor Prevention
* The best way to prevent sour house odor from building up is by cleaning as you go. Put things away as soon as you are done using them. Throw things away as soon as you know you won’t be using them. Daily maintenance is the key to a livable and breathable home.
Be presence of mind when it comes to cleanliness. Create a small space for things to be donated and recycled and clean it up as soon as it is full. Limit your storage space and “junk” drawers so you don’t have a chance to just dump clutter in a closet and forget about it.
* People will tell you that the best way to get rid of mold, one of the main contributors to household odor, is to use an ionizing air purifier to help remove contaminants and mold spores from the air. Well, they are half right.
An air purifier isn’t a bad idea for preventing mold growth, but those ionized air filters can cause health problems if they’re not built properly. Sometimes if an ionizing air filter is not well built, it will spit out ozone which, as scientists will tell you, is good for the atmosphere and bad for the lungs.
Serious complications can arise if you are using the wrong air purifier. Choose wisely and be sure to buy from a reputable company.