My husband and I live in a 4 bedroom, two bath house we bought from his father’s estate. His family is the only family that has ever lived in the house since it was built in the late 50’s. A hall leads from the entrance area/living room, with two bedrooms off each side and a bath at the end. There is an additional bath off the master bedroom.
Moisture collects in the hall, and lately had gotten worse - to the point water actually drips off the wooden attic access in the center of the hall ceiling. I just mopped the ceiling and upper walls of the hall with a sponge mop and collected enough water to be able to wring it out of the mop.
We both turn on the vent fans when we shower/bathe, and leave them on until the bathrooms are dry. (One bath has a shower, the other a tub) Water does not collect in any other rooms. The house has a crawl space under it, but not a full basement.
Any ideas? What can we do?
I would start by going up in the attic and checking for moisture up there coming down. Leaky or condensating pipes could be the culprit. Both of which are an easy fix. After that I would want to know (well this would probably be a preliminary check anyways), is the ceiling just dripping (as in moisture is condensating on it) or is it wet? Could you push your hand through it (even if it took a bit of force)? If it’s wet, you’ve either had this problem for a while or it coming from above. If it’s just condensating from something. Does this happen in winter? Are there any AC vents blowing at that area, or are there any ducts above that area that could be condensating? I could keep going, but first, I think we need to know if the water is only present on one side of the ceiling, or is it wet both above and below the ceiling?
I think we’ve figured out part of the problem. The vent from the hall bath doesn’t vent to the outside as does the other bath vent. It vents into the attic. There is an intake for the airconditioner in the hall, so the damp air gets sucked into the hall by the airconditioner, and condenses in the much cooler hall. We are going to redirect the vent so it blows outside and weatherstrip the attic access, and see if that helps.
The plaster walls and ceiling are still firm, so its just condensation. I hope.
Hmmm, if it’s vented into the attic, how is the cold air return pulling it into the hallway? I can’t imagine it’s pulling it BACK through the vent (I doubt it would be strong enough, and even if it was the vent should have a ‘check valve’ on it). As for the vent though, could you just route it over to the other one and kinda join the two tubes?
Or are you saying that after using the vent, the AC pulls the steamy air from the attic down though leaks in the ceiling (leak is the wrong word, places where air can get though, like around the attic door). Until you get that straightned out, I’m not sure what you should do. On one hand, I would say block off that return so it stops bringing the damp air down. OTOH I would say keep it like it is, the less moisture up in your attic the better. But since it’s always been like that I guess I would leave it alone until you fix the vent. In the mean time just keep those walls as dry as you can, and check your attic for damage from all the humidity.