Our Asbestos Adventure: What NOT to Do When Remodeling - Part 1

As you may or may not know, we had a little incident with asbestos during our basement remodel.

And it wasn't pretty.

It made such an impact on us that it's taken me nearly 2 years to get up the guts to actually share this on the blog. So, I've relived all the horrible memories, because I want to share our story with you, so you can:

1) be entertained at everything us new-and-completely novice homeowners did wrong in our first remodeling project,
2) continue to be astounded at the horrible abuse previous homeowners subjected our house to, and
3) hopefully pick up some tips on proper mold and asbestos handling, but mostly know what NOT to do if you ever run into it.

Laugh. Cry. Empathize. Pity. Rejoice. Learn. Whatever your reaction to our most harrowing story and experience, I hope you enjoy reading about and experiencing our adventure.

So, without further adieu, I present to you: our asbestos adventure.

The story goes as thus...

Shortly after purchasing our new home and moving in, we noticed, as the weather outside got warmer and more humid, that the basement smelled. BAD. It was like it was giving off noxious gas fumes, and - I kid you not - we would get headaches after being down there for 15 minutes.

Obviously not good.

After a few days, we couldn't take it anymore (and neither could our health). We figured out that the carpet in the basement was probably full of disgusting mold (ew), thanks to (our best guess) the water heater breaking and the basement flooding (we found some water damage to prove it). Hence the new water heater we had inherited.

Well, once a carpeted area of a home floods with water, what SHOULD be done is either 1) hire a professional immediately to professionally clean and air-out the carpet, or 2) replace the carpet as soon as possible. Guess what happens if you don't? Mold spores start to grow in the carpet.

So can you guess what the owner did when the basement flooded?

Yep, that's right, nada. They did nothing. Thanks alot, previous homeowner.

So, after we deduced all of this, that carpet had TO GO. Like, immediately.

We armed ourselves with some carpet cutting blades, and set out to get down n' dirty with the moldy carpet - without, might I add, eye goggles OR respiratory masks. BIG mistake!

Some molds are seriously dangerous - and although the majority of them aren't really harmful, no molds are really good for a person to inhale or come into contact with. When dealing with mold, always take the proper precautions. This we know now.

Anyways, we grabbed our carpet cutting blades and set out to get down to work. We sliced up the carpet in spots, and then grabbed a corner and started pulling... and was astounded at what we found.

Read Part 2!

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