Bathroom Ventilation

Get tips on finding the best type of bathroom ventilation system for your home. Properly ventilated bathrooms have a reduced risk of condensation after showering.

LESLIE: DeeDee in Minnesota is having an issue in the bath. What’s going on?

DEEDEE: My question is where we take a shower, we do have a vent in there but yet the walls sweat; where you can kind of see it drip down and everything.

TOM: I have a solution for you, DeeDee.

DEEDEE: What?

TOM: Cold-water showers. (DeeDee chuckles)

LESLIE: No.

TOM: It will completely eliminate the problem. No, it’s condensation, obviously.

DEEDEE: Right.

TOM: And what kind of a ventilation system do you have in that bath right now?

DEEDEE: I don’t know. It’s just a vent that we have up in the ceiling.

TOM: OK, well, I suspect it’s not doing its job. It may be a real weak, wimpy vent and you need something that’s a lot stronger.

DEEDEE: So they do have bigger vents then?

LESLIE: (overlapping voices) Oh, yeah; they have all sizes.

TOM: (overlapping voices) Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And not only do they have bigger vents; you know, the best kind – have you ever checked into a motel room and you see that there’s a vent but there’s no switch for it? Typically, those are remote exhaust where you can actually have the exhaust fan, say, mounted up in the attic and it’s ducted right to each bathroom in the house and once that comes on, it pulls a real strong draw from that moist area from the bathroom and takes it right outside. I suspect you probably have a real wimpy bath exhaust fan here that’s not doing the job. What I would do is I would improve that bath exhaust fan either by replacing it with one that’s designed to pull more moisture out of that space or install a remote bath fan. And most importantly, in either case, make sure you put a timer switch on so that that bath vent fan can run for 10 or 15 minutes after you’re done with the shower.

LESLIE: (overlapping voices) After your shower. Because there’s still moisture in the room and then you’ve got the door open, so you’re dealing with the mix of air temperatures. The condensation appears more so at that point; so if you run that fan longer, you’re going to get that moisture out.

DEEDEE: Alright. Well, thank you.

TOM: You’re welcome, DeeDee. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.