Are Home Mold Testing Kits Accurate?

5/14/2018 (Permalink)

Your best option to test for mold is to find a qualified environmental hygienist.

When you suspect you have mold in your home, you may try an off-the-shelf home mold testing kit. The problem is that no matter where you go in your home, the kit returns a positive and doesn’t help you find where the mold is — if you even have a mold problem. So are home kits really accurate, or are you better off finding a Stillwater, OK, mold remediation specialist?

Why Home Testing Kits Don’t Work

The truth is that off-the-shelf home mold testing kits don’t have what it takes to accurately test for mold. They just aren’t made to the same standard or with the same capabilities as professional mold kits. DIY mold remediation often doesn’t work because:

• Mold is everywhere in your home, even if the spores haven’t propagated into an active infestation. They’re still present in the air at all times, and a home mold kit will detect this.
• Home mold testing kits aren’t sensitive enough to differentiate between concentrations of mold spores that would indicate a heavier infestation in one particular area.
• Home kits often can’t sense mold in isolated, secluded areas.
• Home kits may tell you that you have a mold problem when you don’t, or they may tell you that mold spore saturation in the environment is so uniform that you don’t have a problem. In actuality, you could have hidden mold waiting to spread throughout your home.

So How Can I Test for Mold?

Your best option to test for mold is to find a qualified environmental hygienist. Environmental hygienists possess professional training and sensitive equipment capable of detecting mold in ways a home mold kit cannot. The techniques they use for mold detection can uncover hidden infestations in surprising places a home kit would never pick up on. Environmental hygienists can also provide accurate information on safety and mold remediation, as well as mold prevention. For more information, visit http://www.SERVPROstillwaterguthrie.com/.