What Every Home Owner Needs to Know About Mold

What Every Home Owner Needs to Know About Mold (McGraw-Hill, May 2003; $12.95 Paperback by Vicki Lankarge) is the complete guide to dealing with mold in your home – the asbestos of the new millennium.

Toxic mold infestations in personal and commercial real estate are now in the forefront of public awareness. Erin Brockovich’s struggle to fight this health crisis and Ed McMahon’s experiences in his own home have further publicized mold’s links to a host of serious health problems. Currently there is no federal law that sets strict standards for acceptable mold levels indoors and few laws requiring home sellers to disclose mold problems.

Written by award-winning reporter Vicki Lankarge, this is the first complete home owner/home buyer guide to dealing with mold. Clearly and concisely, Lankarge acquaints readers with the latest findings about mold infestation and arms them with everything they need to know:

* Successfully detect the presence of mold
* Prevent, control or eliminate mold
* Deal with mold-related health problems
* Work with insurance companies on mold-related cases

The book supplies checklists of warning signs, symptoms, prevention and routine maintenance tips, what to do after you’ve spotted mold, from cleaning to dealing with insurance companies and policies, what to look for when you’re house-hunting, and where to turn for help from government agencies and the Policyholders of America.

The book also contains a full list of state departments of health, state departments of insurance, corresponding phone numbers and web addresses, and a comprehensive list of websites and story links relating to mold prevention and safety.

Where should you look for mold?

* Basements or cellars that have been flooded.
* Underneath kitchen and bathroom sinks.
* Underneath or behind refrigerators.
* Behind walls that also house plumbing.
* Stacks of damp or wet newspapers or cardboard boxes.
* Around air-conditioning units.
* Wallboard around windows that leak.
* Under carpeting that may have become wet.

Danger signs from the Insurance Information Institute:

* Sunken areas in baseboards or trim.
* Indentations appear when mold has consumed the wood behind the paint. The paint itself is often cracked or peeling.
* Separation of the baseboard from the wall or floor.
* Whitish mats under carpet, linoleum, in cabinets or even behind furniture.
* “Fruiting bodies,” or mushroom like growths on rotten wood on the underside of flooring or cabinets.
* Staining, swelling or crumbling of plaster or sheetrock.
* Discoloration (blackish staining) around air conditioning vents.
* Vine like branches from the soil to the foundation called rhizomorphs. (Pg. 19)

Allergic symptoms that may be related to mold:

* Nasal and sinus congestion.
* Coughing.
* Wheezing or difficulty breathing.
* Skin and/or eye irritation.
* Upper respiratory infections, including sinus.
* Difficulty concentrating, memory loss.
* Nosebleeds or coughs that produce blood.
* Symptoms that ease or stop altogether when you or a family member is away from home.
* Ruling out other causes or allergies.

What Every Home Owner Needs to Know About Mold
(Lankarge; McGraw-Hill; $12.95 Paperback, May 2003; ISBN 0-07-141290-5)

Mold in the News:

“Mold has become a huge legal and financial problem for homeowners and insurer, not to mention a significant health concern. How it is turning into a big headache at commercial properties – from apartments to hotels to shopping centers.

“Goldman Sachs is being sued for bankrolling super-luxury condos said to be full of mold…

The condo board was dragged into court by an owner at 515 Park for allegedly allowing the shoddy construction to cause deadly mold, that his sickened his entire family.

The suit alleges that the Zeckendorfs allowed the building to go up without proper insulation on walls or pipes, and permitted foundations that leaked. Concrete slabs and mortar used in the project was also not in compliance with code, the suit claims.”

New York Post – January 29, 2003

The fungal growth, found in damp or wet conditions, has been blamed for a number of health problems, including breathing difficulties, nausea, gastrointestinal ailments, skin rashes, severe allergic reactions and neurological damage. Mold-related expenses cost companies that underwrite homeowners’ insurance $1.3 billion in 2001, a number that is expected to grow this year, says the Insurance Information Institute, a New York-based trade group. The problem has been most severe in California and Texas.”

Wall Street Journal, December 4, 2002

Insurance companies didn’t worry about mold until last year, when a homeowner won $32 million in a lawsuit against Farmers Insurance. A jury declared that Farmers had acted fraudulently and in bad faith when fixing water damage in Melinda Ballard’s 22-room mansion in Dripping Springs, in central Texas. Ballard, who founded Policyholders of America in January to help homeowners with similar mold claims, says the company delayed fixing a relatively small water leak, which turned into a giant mold problem.

The case, under appeal, spawned an insurance crisis in Texas as mold-related water claims began to proliferate. The state’s top insurance carriers saw their mold claims skyrocket to more than 37,000 last year from 7,000 in 2000, according to the latest figures from the Texas insurance department. Settlements paid on those claims climbed to $854.3 million last year from $152.7 million in 2000. USA Today, June 19, 2002

Preface from
What Every Home Owner Needs to Know about Mold:

I first heard about the word “mycotoxins” in June 2001. I was scrambling to finish writing an article for insure.com about the insurance implications of a mysterious illness that had killed more than 500 thoroughbred foals in Kentucky. Scientists suspected that mold-based toxins in pasture grasses had caused the mares to spontaneously abort.

By the following day, my story was posted on the Web site and I was ready to write something new. That something turned out to be an article on a jury’s $32 million verdict against Farmers Insurance Group for failing to cover the necessary repairs to a water leak, thereby allowing toxic mold to invade a Texas family’s 22-room mansion. I didn’t know it at the time, but toxic mold was about to become what lawyers are calling the “asbestos of the new millennium.” I was also about to witness the unhinging of the Texas home insurance market, an event that has sparked consumer ramifications nationwide.

When news of the verdict broke, I was writing mainly about health and home insurance. I was naturally curious about a fungus that could not only damage your home but also weaken your immune system. And let’s face it, this story had everything: A wealthy but ailing family forced to flee their contaminated home with only the clothes on their backs; a PR-savvy businessman who had the chutzpah to launch a full-scale holy war against her insurance company; and, later on, toxic mold lawsuits waged by activist-turned-celebrity Erin Brockovich and former Johnny Carson sidekick Ed McMahon, who says the fungus ruined his home, made him sick, and killed his beloved sheepdog, Muffin.

Since 2000, insurance companies say they have suffered heavy financial losses due to mold and water damage claims. Horrified, home buyers and sellers watch helplessly as their carefully negotiated deals crumble just hours prior to closing as previous mold and water damage claims come back to haunt them. And then there are the men, women and children who have no other option but to flee their homes or suffer the headaches, wheezing, and coughing associated with mold exposure.

I wrote this book out of respect for their losses and with the hope that it will help you protect your most valuable asset: your health and your home.

Vicki Lankarge
Award-winning reporter Vicki Lankarge is an accomplished journalist, business writer, editor, and non-fiction author with more than twenty years of experience covering consumer issues. Over this time, she has adapted her talents to a variety of forms and formats while researching and publishing definitive pieces of work on an extremely wide range of topics. She is an accomplished journalist, business writer, editor, and non-fiction author.

Vicki graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of Massachusetts. She began her career as a writer in 1985, working as a reporter for the Daily Hampshire Gazette/Hampshire Life Magazine for a period of twelve years. Ms. Lankarge wrote news and feature articles on topics including education, government, technology, small business, and healthcare. Her feature article on oncologist George Bowers, M.D., won first place in its category at the 1988 New England Associated Press News Executives Association Annual Awards. In 1997, Vicki left journalism and launched her freelance writing career, working as a consultant with a marketing firm and founding her own Web development company.

In 2000, Vicki was hired by insure.com, a consumer-oriented insurance industry portal Web site. Vicki immersed herself in learning about the industry, taking some advanced training and using her skills in rapid research, analysis, and synthesis to produce cogent state-of-the-art articles published on the Web site. Her work required her to understand and balance complex scientific, financial, regulatory, and political aspects of topics in the dynamic healthcare field. One of her articles on medical privacy was entered into the Congressional Record in 2002.

Vicki was promoted to Senior Editor by insure.com in 2001. In this role, she served as a lead spokesperson for the site in major media appearances while continuing to produce new articles and manage the efforts of other writers. Through media joint ventures, her work appeared on such major sites as America Online, CBS Marketwatch, and MSN.com.

From her work at insure.com, Ms. Lankarge became an internationally respected subject matter expert on the topic of mold.

CONTACT:
Vicki Lankarge (860) 570-0360
vlankarge@attbi.com

For more information, contact:
Ann Pryor, Publicity
212-904-4078

Topics Carriers Texas Homeowners