Mold Inspection and Analysis
Here is an analysis of the mold testing I have done for my apartment. If you participated, you will be able to see and compare your results in the table.
Photographs
First, the images:
Bathroom
Guest Room
HVAC System
Kitchen
Bedroom
Utility Closet
Outside (Supposed control, but I believe not applicable)
Office (Definite control)
Parent's Home
Quinn's Apartment
Data
Next, the counts. For this, I'm using three highly generic (but often used) color-based categories to describe the types of mold present. My baseline for normal mold levels is still in flux. I see levels expressed as 'spores per cubic meter' online, but I need this translated to 'spores landing in 3-inch Petri dish in 1 hour', so I'm sticking with my own controls for now.
| Location | Black/ Green Mold | White/ Gray Mold | Orange/ Yellow Mold | Totals per Room | % Elevation |
| Bathroom | 5 | 2 | 7 | 80% | |
| Guest Room | 0 | 1 | 1 |
2 |
0% |
| HVAC Sys. | 2 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 0% |
| Kitchen | 2 | 5 | 6 | 13 | 325% |
| Bedroom | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0% |
| Utility Closet | 20 | 0 | 4 | 24 | 600% |
| Outside | 31 | 12 | 22 | 65 | N/A |
| Office | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 0% |
| Parent's Home | 0 | 11 | 13 | 24 | 600% |
| Quinn's Apartment | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 0% |
Plan
Finally, gotta hit em with the heat map:
Conclusions
The results help confirm my suspicions that mold is thriving somewhere around the wet wall between the bathroom and utility closet, and possibly the ceiling, or even the wet wall that is shared with the adjoining apartment.
Reasons for my suspicions included:
1. Neighbor had a leak in the ceiling in their utility closet, adjacent to mine, so we know infrastructure is aging.
2. I could hear a drip in the bathroom wall for some minutes after my upstairs neighbor ran the water in their bathroom.
3. The bathroom and utility closet have always smelled different than the rest of the apartment—not quite like mold, but different. After checking out another apartment in the complex where these rooms smell completely normal, I now believe that different smell was simply mold.
4. Whether or not the mold levels are elevated may not be the correct question here, but rather the types of mold we are seeing in my indoor environment. Some species are much more toxic than others, and it may be that one of these toxic species is thriving in my apartment that is simply not present outside.
Note: I will fine tune these results, specifically the baseline for how much mold is considered "normal" as results come in from family.