More often than not, the basement is cooler than the rest of your house, and conventionally, cold air cannot hold as much moisture as the warm air in other rooms.

When the hot air from the rest of the house mixes with the cool air, condensation occurs on the basement walls and uninsulated pipes, creating the perfect conditions for the growth of mold and mildew.

Leaking pipes and cracks on your foundation wall tend to be common culprits since they act as conduits for water and moisture. Besides, the rain gutters, sewer overflows, and French drains are other potential causes for your basement’s dampness.

If your basement is not waterproofed, moisture from the soil rises through capillary from the ground and finds its way to the foundation through your walls and floors. The problem becomes major if your house is built with old and porous bricks.

If you have unused taps, bathrooms, and sinks in the basement, they could be potential causes of moistness in the basement. This is because water from the pipes seep slowly over time to your basement, making it wet.

Laundry in the basement using a dryer directs most of the moisture from your clothes to the walls. With time, the moisture left in the air condenses, causing your wall to become damp.

Most old homes don’t have a subsurface drainage system. This is because there was a time when basements were not regarded as habitable spaces.

In other cases, if your sump pit is fitted with a sump pump to lift the water to the ground space, it might fail at times. The failure results in a lot of moisture in the basement hence the need for regular sump pump maintenance.