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PEHSU Factsheet: Mold in the Home & Schools > Should I have my home/school tested for mold?

Should I have my home/school tested for mold?

posted on Aug 26, 2021

If you find areas that are damp, or smell musty, you do not have to do mold testing. Simply identify and correct sources of unwanted water leaks and clean up the moldy areas. Mold testing is expensive, time-consuming, and the results are not always related to health risk. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention does not recommend routine sampling for molds. If air sampling for molds has already occurred, you can interpret the results.  It is common to find mold spores indoors since most come in from the outside. Usually, indoor measurements are compared to outside.  If the molds measured inside are much higher than those outside, it suggests that there is a location for mold growth inside, usually indicating that there is an area of water leakage that needs fixing. No relationship exists between the level of mold spores and specific health problems.