Flipper · Irvine, CA · Member since 2013 · 349 posts · 45 votes
Hello BP Nation,
We have a property in Gilbert, AZ purchase about a year ago. We are looking to sell but there is an ingrained smoking odor from previous owner's 20 years of smoking. Our agent could smell it right away when checking out the property. She recommended getting a quote from professional cleaning company that will the air ducts, vents, etc. She also stated we will need to repaint with some kind of coating, and that still isn't a guarantee the smell will be gone. Any other suggestions on how to remove the smoking smell?
I'm in the same boat. My client has 20+ years of smoke in this home. He doesn't smell it anymore, but the smell it overwhelming. I had a long talk with him yesterday about it.
We are moving him out, but not sure if we are fixing it up to sell or selling as is. I would hate to fix it (new flooring, kilz the walls, repaint, etc) only to have it come back to haunt us...
There is another thread that is 3-4 pages that goes into a lot of other possible ideas, but in the end it comes down to lots of cleaning and the shellac primer. And I can say Kilz doesn't quite cover all of the smell, my first rehab was a 10 yr smoke house and there was just a touch of a smell when I was done.
Some things you can't get clean you just have to replace or live with whatever damage there might be. My kitchen cabinets are nice even beige color...they were originally white!
I don't have any special insight as to what to do, but I just rehabbed a townhouse that smelled as though the prior owner had been smoking four packs a day for twenty years without ever opening the doors or windows. It was bad. After replacing all of the carpets, removing three layers of wallpaper, and painting the whole house, it is 95% better, but still lingeringly musty. I'm under contract; the new buyers are also smokers. So, I didn't have to take any major steps to remedy the issue, but I am interested to hear others' tips.
My real estate agent said that there is some chemical that you can put on the walls and literally watch the nicotine run out of the walls (don't recall the name). He apparently had a client that had success with it.
Yes if it has central A/C definitely get the vents and ducts cleaned, as well as having the air handler serviced and coils cleaned. the tar gets on everything so it really is just wash down everything to the best you can prior to starting to repaint. It's amazing to see this stuff, when you clean the windows there will literally be tar on the glass. So just clean clean clean, like @Account Closed mentioned you can use TSP to wash everything. It's a really harsh chemical but will help strip everything off before you get to repainting.
Our experience has been that in cases where there has been prolonged smoking by the prior occupants, the only way to rid the most affected areas of the odour and harmful residues accumulated on exposed surfaces is to gut these parts of the property back to the studs.
In our worse case, previous owner had smoked in the house for ~30yrs. The room where she read had a brown spot on the ceiling over her reading chair which radiated to yellow the further you got from the epicentre. The sheetrock and finishes in this room, and two others, were so saturated with smoke residue that we gutted back to the studs (even removing cellulose insulation that was in the external wall cavities) and refinished. The rest of the property received a through scrubbing, "Binning" with Zinsser, and repainting along with replacement of all carpet.
If faced with this nature of contamination again, we would plan a full gut of the property (and make our offer accordingly), especially in light of some recent studies showing that painting / resurfacing only contains the toxins for a time and they eventually make there way back to the surface where they are absorbed by the new inhabitants ... especially small children.
There is often an oily residue in ductwork that cannot be removed. Cleaning of ductwork removes dust. Duct cleaning should be followed by running ozone thru system at all return air intakes. Remove filters and wire fan to run continuous. Close up house and let ozone machine run full blast for about twelve hours in each room with a return air duct. Smaller apts may only need machine run in one main area and will circulate adequately thru all ductwork.
I think every investor should own an ozone machine. They also work great for removing new paint smells and running them a few hours before an open house makes for a fresh, clean smell and feel for prospective buyers.
Be careful about hiring professional cleaning teams. Most aren't actually very good with smoke damage but will charge you a lot. You need more remediation than you need cleanin.
Remove and dispose of all window coverings, including blinds, and all carpeting. Remove and clean or replace all lighting covers and fixtures. Replace or prime and paint all vent covers. Prime ALL surfaces with Kilz shellac based primer and repaint. The kitchen cupboards will often have the worst damage, as there is often unfinished wood in the drawer sides and bottoms. Don't skimp on the painters.
Cleaning the ducts has limited results. It will get rid of old dust with tar buildup in the ducts, but tar build up will remain on the duct walls. If you do everything else, you may be able to neutralize the duct odors until they burn off.
Are you trying to sell retail? If so, in most cases you will have to remediate the issue to get it sold. Or accept that your buyer pool will be very small. Has the property been painted since the smoker moved out and the smell came back? Or did you not know about it when you bought the property? If the agent is mentioning it, IMO it's gotta be pretty bad.
I suggest crunching your numbers with and without repairs and talk to your agent about selling retail versus to an investor buyer. Then you can better asses your options.