Our house was built in 1960. We moved into it April of '98 and I have been having trouble with a musty smelling basement and the tiles are not coming clean with regular cleaning anymore, so I decided to take it out. There is black, slightly sticky, stuff still on the floor and I need to know how to clean that up. The floor was also damp enough last summer, that we couldn't keep a carpet on the floor. So I have decided to paint it, hoping that that will seal up the floor enough to stop some of that problem. I am also trying to get a ceiling fan in there to help with the air distribution. I wanted to know if that is some of the right things to do in order to help me get my floor in some kind of shape for the summer.
Answer:
You'll have to start by ventilating the basement and then drying it out. The black sticky stuff will give you problems no matter what you do but if the rest of the basement is dry, you should be able to put down a carpet over it. Paint will not adhere for long.
