Owning your own home

email to my upstairs neighbour when he brought up my specialist chosen subject:

Ah the damp. My nemesis. We had it really bad right after we moved in
with water running down the walls. It was horrible. Flower cried and
the place smelled of mildew all that winter. I may have become
slightly obsessed with trying to fix it since. Here’s what we have
learned: We can’t be sure but the damp issue seems to be a mixture
of condensation from inadequate ventilation/lack of insulation in the
walls but also last winter we seemed to have rain water getting
through the damaged brickwork in very wet weather. The works we’ve
just had done will stop water getting in directly though the walls but
they won’t help with condensation issue at all. The main problem is
that the building wasn’t designed for double glazing and now that
everyone has it, there is no proper ventilation. This means moisture
from showers, drying laundry and cooking stays in the flats. Then
because the external walls don’t have a cavity that we can insulate it
means when it’s cold outside, the inside of the exterior walls get
cold to the touch. This in turn means when the heating comes on, the
warm damp air in the flat will condense into water droplets on the
cold walls. We looked into getting the building insulated and had
lots of surveys done but for a variety of reasons, it’s just not
possible. So it’s really down to individuals to do what they can in
their flats. We’ve done a whole raft of things to try and get it under
control and seem to be finally winning the battle after two very damp
and mouldy winters. These are all the things we’ve done:

• Bought a dehumidifier which stays on pretty much full time from autumn to spring
  
• Stopped drying clothes in the flat and bought a little tumble dryer which sits in the porch and vents out the front door.
  Stuff that can’t be tumble dried gets hung up outside or by a window
  with the heating on
  
• Fitted a new bathroom extractor fan with a humidistat (which switches on automatically when it detects moisture)
  
• Fitted a heated towel rail in the bathroom which stays on all the time
  
• Fitted a “tube heater” in the walk-in cupboard in the bathroom which stays on all the time. That’s really helped. It used to
  be damp and mouldy in there and now it’s warm and dry
  
• Bought a Karcher cordless “window vacuum” with which we hoover up all of the water off the tiles and bath after we shower.
  This has made big difference!
  
• Bought a new thermostat and checked all the radiators are working properly. We have that new Hive thing which is quite good as
  you can move it around the flat to make sure the temperature is even.
  Keeping the temperature constant rather than having big fluctuations
  through the day seems to help keep the condensation under control too
  
• We try and keep windows open as much as possible although this isn’t easy in a ground floor flat. I’ve bought ventilation locks
  so I can lock them open a crack but haven’t fitted them yet though.
  Doesn’t seem to be much point when it’s damp outside too And that’s
  about it. I think we’re winning the war though. Much less black mould,
  no damp smell and the windows don’t get soaked with condensation
  anymore. The walls seem to be staying dry too. I’m sure our
  electricity bill will have quadrupled come spring but I don’t care!
  Hope that was of some help.