What were they thinking?!?

Sometimes when visiting a home, I have that moment of surprise when damage is a direct result of how the home was built (and possibly designed).? This was such a home.

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These nice folks are getting ready to possibly list their home for sale.? And they have this mysterious staining and mildew/mold on the garage drywall ceiling.

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Being in home repairs, I have received special traning that I can tell that this is not normal.? Don't try this at home.

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Ok, so anyone would know this is not normal.? You got me.? Mold in the house, not normal, except on that sandwhich in the back of the fridge you forgot from last month.? You might want to get that out of there.

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But I digress...

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So being the naturally curious guy I am, I wanted to find out WHY there is damage on a drywall ceiling that is under what looks to be a really nice roof.? My first thought was a nail pop or a window leak.?

So we went upstairs and looked out the window on the roof.? No window over the area.? Very strange.

It's a low slope roof, so I ventured out to see if there was a hole in the shingles.? No hole at all.? Hmmm...

So then I go back down, and walk around to the left side of the house.? And that's where the surprise was waiting!

I was literally shocked that there would be a vent, directly onto a drywall ceiling.? And really, I was surprised there would be a vent here at all!

If there wasn't ceiling there, then the water would be coming directly into the garage.? Onto everything and anything the homeowner had stored there.? Really?? What were they thinking when they built this?

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So my advise to this homeowner is that we delete this vent, cover the hole with sheathing, put in the vapor barrier, and install some vinyl siding over it.?

There will be no ventilation to this space over the garage, but at least there won't be any water damage from the ventilation either!

Hopefully that's the end of the surprises for this house.? But you just never know when you'll find yourself wondering, "What were they thinking?!"

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***10/26/12 UPDATE:? For those of you that wondered about eliminating the ventilation into this area, we still plan to delete this vent.? It is not in the proper location to keep water from going into the vent.? But we'll likely install a vent on the front roof to offset this removal, probably something like a mushroom vent that you would see on the rear of a house roof.

***10/26/12 1:59EDT UPDATE:? We don't really like the thought of a mushroom vent here (on the front garage roof, yuck!), so we're seeing about getting a hood over this vent, or a vent with better louver design.? The architect says this is probably the wrong application for this particular vent.? And as some others in the comments below remarked, we're going to investigate if there are any additional sources of the water intrusion once we remove the drywall.? There may be more than one source with the gutter downspout here as well.

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Source: http://activerain.com/blogsview/3491419/what-were-they-thinking-

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