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Need advice: My rental is NASTY.

brinaroze1brinaroze1 member
in Health & Exercise

My husband and I moved into his father's old house in May. My father-in-law was the previous renter and helped us get into the house because we were having some financial problems. While all of this was going on, I found out I was pregnant.

My father-in-law had lived in the house for six years. He allowed smoking inside and the family had two large, old, smelly dogs. Because of our messed up situation, the landlord didn't get to clean and paint before we moved in. The carpet stinks and the walls are sticky with tobacco residue. Every surface of the house is either dirty, smelly, old, or falling apart.

My husband and I have done a lot of work to clean up the place. We spent the first week in our new "home" scrubbing, painting, and trying to get rid of the smells. My biggest concern is the carpet, though. My husband has cleaned it about three times: twice with a home carpet shampooer and once with the machine that you rent from Home Depot. While that's helped, the carpet still smells like old, dirty dog. This, of course, makes me worry for the health of my unborn child. 

I think about how the dirty carpet is going to affect my baby once s/he starts crawling. We can work on doing more painting and cleaning, but we're kind of stuck with the flooring. Aside from asking the landlord to replace the carpet, which could go either way, I don't know what to do. If they say no, how do I keep my baby from getting sick or developing allergies from the carpet?   

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Re: Need advice: My rental is NASTY.

  • pantsarellapantsarella member

    I would suggest getting a professional carpet cleaner to come in. See if the landlord will pay for it, they might. If not, pay them yourself if you're really concerned. Professional cleaning equipment is much stronger and gets the water much hotter than the Home Depot cleaners. That should help a lot. If it's still a problem, put down new area rugs in areas where you're going to put the baby on the floor. It's a temporary solution, but it will work for a while.

    That said, I don't see why the dog odor would be a hazard to your child. As long as the carpet is clean, your child shouldn't get sick from it. And there are tons of studies that show that being exposed to allergens early help prevent kids from developing them later on. It doesn't make it an ideal living condition, but it shouldn't be harmful.  

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  • brinaroze1brinaroze1 member
    Thanks for the advice, Pantsarella. I have heard that it's good to let your kids be around dogs and other allergens and that it helps build immunity. Thank you for the reminder. I guess I'm a little worried, because in my head it is SO bad. True, not an ideal living situation, but probably not as awful as I think it is. A professional cleaning is definitely something to ask the landlord about. The worst they could say is no. If that doesn't work out, we have several area and runner rugs around the house already, and once the baby is crawling we can always put down more. Thanks for the comment!
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  • KarlieeAnneKarlieeAnne
    I defiantly agree with PP, and want to add that you can open the windows in the house to try and let some natural air in and carry out the odor. We went through the same thing with our current rental (only it was my brother-in-law) and his two dogs who DESTROYED the house. We ended up having to replace the carpet, but after going through the house with the landlord, he agreed and paid for it. I would do a walk through with your landlord. ALSO, to cover the tobacco smell and stain, we used Bear Premium Ultra Duel (pain and primer) and it worked REALLY well! It was a little bore $$, but worth it when we saw not only the tobacco stains covered, but the odor was eliminated! If you are painting, make sure that you are in a well ventilated area, with the windows open to be safe of fumes! There are also lots of cleaners for tobacco stains/smells, but we stuck with good old 409 and that did the trick with EVERYTHING! Good luck!
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