Would You Live In Your Basement?

Posted by Andre & Erika Lacroix on

Ask yourself this question: “Would you live in your basement?” Your answer is probably a hard “NO!” Basements are notorious for being “icky”–damp, musty, and full of spiders.

Did you know that the air from your basement may be exactly what you’re breathing all day, every day? This is due to stack effect, the process of warm air rising upward in a building. (This is because warm air is lighter than cold air.) Stack effect will cause the air to flow from a basement into living spaces upstairs, bringing airborne pollutants–mold, moisture, radon, chemicals–right along with it.

So if you’re lining up the home improvement projects for the coming summer months, think about starting where it matters most: in the basement!

Healthy Air Starts at the Bottom

How to make your basement, and your home, healthier:

  1. Manage the moisture. Improve exterior drainage to prevent water from leaking into your basement. Manage indoor humidity levels below 60% to prevent condensation.
  2. Test your home for radon. Install systems to reduce the radon if the test result is above EPA-recommended acceptable levels.
  3. Clean. Accumulated dust and dirt can trap moisture and grow mold. Throw away unwanted items–especially old paints, chemicals, and pesticides.
  4. Evict Pests. Trap unwanted visitors: ants, mice, rats, squirrels.
  5. Weatherize. insulating and air sealing your basement can reduce the impact of stack effect and save you energy dollars too!
  6. Ventilate. Below grade spaces require ventilation to exhaust harmful chemicals, toxins, allergens and to create air exchanges for a safe and healthy air quality.

 

Learn More About Moisture Control

Learn More About Basement Ventilation

Learn More About Crawlspace Ventilation

Written by Andre & Erika Lacroix

We are a 2nd generation family owned and operated business that has been working in homes with basements and crawl spaces for over 35 years.  We have been waterproofing and sealing about 500 foundations a month during that time as the largest Waterproofing contractor in the Midwest with 15 locations servicing 8 states.

20 years ago we would seal a foundation and recommend a standard dehumidifier to address the additional water vapor (humidity in the air) inherently found in below grade environments, such as basements and crawlspaces.  Back then, dehumidifiers were the industry standard to help with this problem. However, many of our customers were looking to us as the “foundation expert”, asking…

“What else do you have? I really am not getting results with this messy, expensive dehumidifier. My foundation is dry, walls are dry, floor is dry, so why does it still smell and feel like a basement?” 

We needed to find something better. Our company’s core values include offering world class customer service to every customer, every time.   So, we challenged our Research and Development department to find a real solution for our customers to combat not only the moisture, but also the odors, pollutants and unhealthy environment our customers were concerned about. We found, tested and installed a ventilation product for a period of three years. We private labeled that product as the EZ Breathe Ventilation System. The feedback in those first three years from our customers, as well as our installation crews, did not live up to the standard of quality to be included in our waterproofing process that offered a life time warranty. Once again, we needed something better.

We valued not only the results, but what we were learning from our customers. So, we went back to the drawing board, took matters into our own hands and made quality improvements to that first generation ventilation unit.

Our own EZ Breathe Ventilation System was born…reengineered, redesigned and much improved! We quickly learned that our crews were thrilled with the quality improvements, ease of operation and installation, but more importantly, our waterproofing customers loved the new, improved EZ Breathe unit as well.

Their feedback told us the air in their basements and crawlspaces felt better, but their entire home was benefiting from their EZ Breathe as well. We received countless letters thanking us because their whole house felt different, less odors, fresher air upstairs too, family members were feeling better, needing less allergy medicine, husbands were no longer snoring, children were no longer coughing as much, the home and it’s family were living healthier lives!

It was time for us to move beyond simply offering this innovative technology to just our waterproofing customers. Our passion and commitment to helping people improve their indoor air environments is what drove us to incorporate EZ Breathe Ventilation Systems as an independent company in 2003. We strongly believe that homeowners everywhere deserve a healthy indoor air quality.

We have spent the last 15 years dedicated to learning about the relationship between our home and our health; indoor air quality, the home as a system, building science and how it relates to indoor air quality as well as the challenges our modern day practices pose to the quality of air we breathe in our homes.