Interior mold discovered on 2nd story baseboard moulding

As I was cleaning my son’s room, I picked up his large teddy bear that sits in the northeast corner of his room which is a 2nd story room of a split level. When I picked up the stuffed animal, I observed white/gray film with spots of black mold on the baseboard moulding and where the drywall and moulding meet. I looked up the wall in that corner and did not observe any watermarks or stains, and there are none on the ceiling. There is a wallpaper border that is bubbling in that corner area that is at mid-wall level. I have observed no blackening or staining at that level in the corner.

When looking to the north, the attached garage roof abuts the north wall of the room. I went up into the attic of the garage and noticed no wet spots in the upper roof area. The north walls in the attic area have a plastic vapor barrier attached to (what looks like) drywall and then there is fiberglass insulation over that.

The 2nd story exterior north wall is painted wood that runs in a vertical direction and abuts the garage roof.

This northeast corner always seems to be very cold in the winter, and his room is always very warm during the winter, also. We close one of the two heating vents he has each season.

I know that the 2nd story attic has a ridge vent and is not excessively hot on hot days. In the winter, though, we do have excessive icicle buildup on the east side of the roof/gutters, which some roofer said would subside once he put better gutters on and added a new downspout from the 2nd story to the 1st story. (That was 4 years ago and it did not cure the problem, which became very apparent during our harsh winter.)

My question is whether this is a ventilation problem or a water intrusion problem.

Thank you for your input.

BTW, I tried to upload a couple photos but to no avail. Sorry.

Possibly no insulation in that cavity. Been called on many winter roof “leaks” usually after sub zero temps. First thing I’ll do is look in the attic for a spot with no insulation. Condensation forms and causes the “leak”
Could be one reason.
Not following you 100% when you described the area out side the leak. If the garage roof is right at or above your problem, then its more than likely the roof. Hard to diagnose without seeing the patient.

I understand what you mean about the patient. My jpg files are too big for roofing.com so I’ll see if I can share them thru Yahoo somehow. I think it will definitely help.

Thank you for your post and for taking the time to reply.
Love your user name.
I’ll try to update with pics as soon as I can, but with the nice weather this weekend I may not have time till Monday.

Use Paint to resize them down to 30%, by using Stretch/Skew and then saving the file with “Save As”, or open a free account at PhotoBucket.com and host them their and just embed the proper links in your post.

Ed

:o Thanks Ed for the helpful tip on uploading.
Here’s what I’ve got for visuals of the patient.

http://www.roofing.com/images/topics/7684/img_1240687646.jpg

http://www.roofing.com/images/topics/7684/img_1240687663.jpg

http://www.roofing.com/images/topics/7684/img_1240687697.jpg

The mold was just discovered on Thursday, and, yes, I have cleaned the room since January LOL

To explain the corner directions:
The side with the window and garage roof and garage in foreground faces NORTH.
The side with icicles hanging from the gutters and brown awnings faces EAST.

I would suspect the wall flashings, or lack of them, where garage roof meets wall
edit: Not so sure about the garage roof. After re-reading your original post, I see you checked the garage attic. Did you check the attic above the room. Seems like an awful lot of ice. Have you noticed any icicles or stains coming from under the laps on your horizontal siding? Sometimes water from ice filled gutters will get behind fascia, travel over soffit panels and run behind siding.
No matter where the leak is from, I would address the ice dam problem. How much insulation do you have up there. Is there an attic access with no insulation over it. Proper ventilation?

put your son in anothe room.
dont know why i feel that way.
just do.

gweedo.

Humidifiers, Furnaces, Exhaust Fans From Kitchens and Bathrooms, Insulation, Baffle Vents for Insulation, 100% continuous flowing open soffit ventilation and 100% continuous open and flowing roof top exhaust ventilation all need to be considered, plus any basement or crawlspace areas and their moisture content.

Hanging flowers and aquariums and non-insulated can lights in the ceilings also can contribute to the defective air sources.

Ed

also improperly installed house wrap,
lack of membrane/ step flashing application,
window flashing issues, soffit condensation melting
down wall between sheathing and fabric. water running down j channel of siding and pouring into corner of wall.

It looks like you have ventilation issues, the leak may be from ice damming.

Did you notice if the soffit was full of ice or not?

you have ice damming issues. This could be the cause, not to mention the facing on the outside walls. check the facing where the garage meet that corner of the house. There could be ice damming their too. just can’t see it in the photo though.

It looks like the gutter from the upper roof dumps onto the lower roof right in the corner you’re referring too. Make sure there’s no leaks in that downspout against the siding. Also I like bay company’s idea about water getting in the j channel right there. That is a common issue with vinyl.
If neither of those are contributing there could be a leak farther up the roofline and thats where its coming in.

[quote=“shangle nailer”]It looks like the gutter from the upper roof dumps onto the lower roof right in the corner you’re referring too. Make sure there’s no leaks in that downspout against the siding. Also I like bay company’s idea about water getting in the j channel right there. That is a common issue with vinyl.
If neither of those are contributing there could be a leak farther up the roofline and thats where its coming in.[/quote]

I was thinking that also, but felt that it didn’t explain the water stains 1/2 way up the wall in the corner.

i would look into the bottom right corner of that window sitting near the roof line., a notorious area
for inadequate membrane useage until after the water starts getting in…I weave the step flashing, vicor roll and tyvek in real thoroughly in that area, and actually, around the entire window application.

There is another thing you could do,considering the wall is covered in mold, cut the drywall out in that corner then you could probaly see the source of problem,fix and replace drywall…just a sugestion :mrgreen:

ok, I see the problem, the water is coming thru the top of the window casing of the vertical siding, and saturating the walls

looks like there’s flashing there.

I thought the problem occurred over winter. I would suspect the window more in the summer.

I agree with Kage. Your gonna wanna replace that moldy drywall anyway.

I also agree with Kage. Looking behind the drywall should tell you all you need to know.