Updating post from Reddit.
I am hoping I can get some advice/opinions if that is ok. We are in Wales. We are 'accidental landlords' in that the house we purchased had an attached coach house which was converted to a one bedroom cottage a long while ago.
We have had tenants in there for about 3 years now. When the wife moved in, I was under a general impression that it would not be forever and that once she brought her husband and daughter over from Sri Lanka and were settled more, the would find a better place that was more appropriate.
Now their daughter is 10 years old and as it is a one bedroom property, they are by one definition in an overcrowding situation. However, since there is another main room, they are also not in an overcrowding situation.
The cottage is an old stone cottage and since the beginning, they have had issues with damp and mould. I have explained repeatedly about some things they could do to help remove the moist air from the house, like open windows. I have given them a dehumidifier and a few hygrometers to keep track of humidity. However, every time I go over, the dehumidifier is not on, even though I explained to keep it plugged in and set it at a certain humidity level and it will only turn on when it senses that level. There is mould again in the bathroom, which had the door always closed. As we are attached, I can see they aren't the best at opening windows. He says they do both but I do not overly believe them.
The reason why is that a few weeks ago, I unintentionally realised I was connected to the hygrometers through the app I use for my hygrometers (same brand). And the data I saw was bad. For about two-thirds of the time, the humidity is above 70%, sometimes as high as 85%. I am not sure I am allowed to see this? Is this a data/privacy issue? It was accidental but now I keep checking and even in the nice weather where you can open windows and such, it still gets up to the 80s for humidity.
I don't want to have difficult conversations with them but I think I am at the point I need to.
Either they are not doing enough to lower the humidity or the house is just not fit for that many people (or a combination of both probably).
So my question is: What would you do? Should I tell them they need to start looking for a more appropriate property where the daughter can have her own room (she needs it at her age). I am worried if we keep going like this, someone will get sick from the mould and we will also be in trouble for 'allowing' it. I can't think of anything else I can do myself to help them with the humidity/mould issue.
Thanks and sorry for this being so long!
Install Continuous Mechanical Extract Ventilation (MEV) fans in the kitchen and bathroom, fitted with humidistat boost. These are much more effective than a dehumidifier, use much less energy, and don't rely on tenants to be operating them correctly.
Normal extractor fans come on for short burst, but this isn't enough to properly manage moisture. The continuous MEV ones run slowly and quietly most of the time, but this sets up an air flow of fresh air through living rooms and bedrooms, extracting stale moist air from the wetter rooms. And after a shower or when someone's cooking and humidity rises, they go into a faster boost mode until the air has dried out.
An alternative is Positive Input Ventilation, where a fan pushes air into the house, but the moist air can end up causing mould issues inside the walls, it's better to extract the moist air with a MEV system.
Housing associations who have installed them have had great results tackling mould. Really the Building Regulations should require them (or the heat recovery kind of ventilation) but they still let you have intermittent extractors and trickle vents, which just isn't enough ventilation unless it's a warm and lightly occupied house.
We just had a MEV fan installed in the basement of the cottage (accessible to us). I will look into that. The tenant has previously told me he doesn't like to leave the extraction fan on longer than 20 minutes due to being dangerous. I feel that is his reason for not doing a lot of what is required living in an old stone house in a damp country.
But it still leaves me with the overcrowding issue. I am not sure we will rent the cottage out once they leave. It is too stressful. Then I will just have to figure out how to avoid having to pay council tax on it as it may be empty for a bit until we can afford to fix it up. We may bring it back onto the main house deed (removed due to mortgage reasons) also.
Thanks for the thought on the MEV. I didn't realise they helped so much.
Dangerous? What alleged danger so they see? Air moving?