Lars, I wonder if steaming cleaning will really do any good if it's that bad. How long until you plan to replace it? Could you have it pulled up and put a few large throw rugs around? What's under it? Plywood? If it's that bad, maybe you can pull the carpet out, paint the floor for now and put lots of rugs down in the meantime. ??? Just an idea. Yeah, I'd feel like vomiting, too. I'm so sorry you're having to deal with mess like this while you're trying to orchestrate a move.

Ugh... If the carpet is that gross it might not ever really come clean. I'd go to a carpet store that sells remnants and see if you can get something cheap to hold you over till you figure out what you really want. Unless it's a big room you can probably get away with a couple hundred bucks.

Lars, I tend to agree with Deb. Steam cleaning could make the smell worse. You could pull the carpet out and paint the plywood then put a layer of wax on top of the paint. It will do a good job at sealing in the smell. Later, when you have the time, replace or cover with your choice of flooring. I've seen some really cool looking plywood floors painted. You are so artistic you would come up with a great look.

Well, we are having it professionally cleaned. I had Kevin call Stanley Steamer, and they claim they they can get the smell out. It costs $117 for a two room minimum (We do have two rooms with carpet left, but mine is the only one that smells that bad) plus $50 for the deodorizer. When we viewed the house before, the owners had plugged in some room deodorizers, which Kevin had noticed and which made him suspicious. They did a decent job, but I wouldn't want to have to live with those on a permanent basis.

I now wish I had taken my co-worker Dana's advice and had planned to replace the carpet before the move. If I had known it was going to smell that bad, I would have pushed our move date forward one day so that we could have allowed for this to be done.

I've heard that baking soda helps remove odors - has anyone tried this with success?

Lars

Not to be too graphic about this....but does it smell like pee? or just a "doggey" odor.
If it's just a doggey odor, baking soda will help....if it's urine, get a spray on enzyme cleaner and really wet it down. I would think a $20 bottle ought to do you.....then let it dry.
Baking soda won't hurt.....put it on....grind it in....brush it.....let it sit them vacuum and repeat and throw away the vacuum bag!
Linda C

Baking soda won't start on it if the smell is bad. You're doing the right thing, having it done professionally. Or just set your bed up in the living room for two days and go ahead and have the carpet replaced before you get settled in.

I think the smell is partially from pee - I learned a bit from a dog forum, and the stains look like dog urine. I have a black light, which we will take to the house tonight, to make sure what the stains are. The owners warned us that there was a dog smell, and we requested that they remove it, and they refused. We did force them to fix the sewer, however, as that would have been a deal breaker, and it ended up costing them $6,000. Both agents agree to chip in $435 each to help pay for the sewer. The sewer now has a teflon liner and is supposed to be the best one on the block! Both agents made over $15,000 on this deal, and so I don't think having them pay $435 was out of line. We were very easy client for our agent, since only showed us one house, and I found her at the house!

Honestly, I don't know how the previous owners lived with the smell. Kevin thought it was bad, and he has a much less sensitive nose than I do. If the smell does not get removed, I will take sushipup's advice and move into the guess room temporarily. It is the other room with carpet, but it doesn't have the smell.

Thanks for your responses! Sorry to be posting so much, but by tomorrow, we will disconnect our internet. We'll be reconnected on Wednesday, and so there really won't be that much of an interruption.

Lars

See that's what I'm saying - $167 is a good chunk towards a cheap carpet. BUT, I understand about logistics, so I'll just leave it at "good luck!" I don't know if going through the house with a black light is a good idea or a bad idea... some things we just don't need to know. (But do fill us in - LOL!!!)

If the floor has been thoroughly saturated, you may find cleaning the carpet will not resolve the problem because urine may have penetrated the carpet, the backing and even the subfloor so that the odor continues to exude back up through all the layers.

In December my brother bought a house with the same problem; he ripped out the carpet then used an enzyme cleaner followed by KILZ, a sealing primer, before installing new carpet. BIN is another product of the same type and some prefer it. Any good paint store could recommend which would work better for your situation.

Hopefully this won't be necessary but I've been in two houses where shampooing didn't resolve the problem because the subfloor was saturated. In one case two Great Danes had worked to powerful effect.

I included a link to one account of this sort of problem. I'm not recommending that particular product, though it might be wonderful; I just thought some of the info might be helpful.

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: Eliminating Pet Urine Odors

I have no idea what kind of dogs they had, but they definitely destroyed one of their orange trees. We took the black light and found major stains in both rooms that have carpet remaining, and so I think that we will want to have the carpet removed from both rooms as soon as it is in our budget. We could probably afford it now, but I want to see what effect the carpet cleaning will have. In the guest room, we can just have the carpet ripped up and then sanded and waxed, but in my room, there is no hardwood subfloor.

Lars

I done renovation work in some homes where pets had soiled the carpet. Professional carpet cleaning should help. If the underboards are badly soaked they will have to be treated after the carpets are pulled up. Bleach and water applied with a paint roller works wonders! If cleaning the carpet fails have a look at carpet remnants. While it won't be the perfect kind and color it will be new and clean. If you are careful not to slice off a finger (my dad's advice to me once) it can be cut with a utility knife and simply laid in place. Again not the best installation but fairly inexpensive and much better then living with stinky carpet. Part of the joy of being a homeowner is fixing things. Check out the link to doityourself website! Free articles on everything from wiring to cleaning windows. I had never been taught electrical wiring and that site gave me enough information to be confident that I could do the job the right way. Just becareful as you could become one of the glassy-eyed masses wandering around Home Depot dreaming of the next six things you can do to the homestead.

Dolly dog whizzed on my carpet and I noticed it was much worse then any kitty accident. I had to buy my own carpet cleaning machine with special pet odor soap... which has been handy as I stupidly dribble coffee on my carpet fairly often. Just one of those cheapo machines but it is easy and does a fair job... better then I can do with a scrub brush and rags.

Alas... I have about 1000 sq.ft. of light blue carpet that is 12 years old. Getting to be time to rip it out and lay some new.

: )
lyra

Here is a link that might be useful: do it yourself

First, just wanted to say congrats to you and Kevin on moving into your new home. Sorry to hear about the carpet and all. I had the same thing happen to me with my new place but got lucky with having the carpets cleaned. The trim in the laundry room needs to be replaced though....not sure what they kept in there but it did do it's damage. Hope your move goes as planned with no surprises Lars!! I know y'all are going to love your new place even though there may be a challenge or two.

David

Too late - we've already had surprises :(. The cable guy came this morning and blew a circuit breaker. We were using a socket that the inspector told us was not grounded and needed to be fixed, but when we plugged the TV, surround sound, BluRay player, and cable in, last night. Now we have an appointment with an electrician at 4:00 p.m.

Dog odor went away temporarily after my carpet was cleaned and deodorized, but it came back with a vengeance. I'm going to have my carpet replaced with hardwood as soon as I can fit it into my budget. I'll check on prices - I think it won't be too expensive. We also need garden furniture and dining chairs. We set up my old dining table that will seat six people. That table would not fit in my dining room in Venice unless there was no other furniture and I put the table on the diagonal. I liked the diagonal, but eventually I put bookcases in the dining room, and so I had to use a small (36" diameter) round glass top, which is now in my bedroom closet.

Thanks Lyra for the Do It Yourself link - I'll look at it later, as we now have to go shopping so we can get back before the electrician.

Lars

Bummer, Lars. I was hoping the effects of the cleaning would last longer than that! What's under there now if it's not plywood? Is it anything you could paint for now?

You have a lot to do, I'm sure! It'll all be great and worth it!

Lars, having dealt with some cat spraying issues in my day, Nokout is the absolutely best product I've used. It's better than any of the enzymes the pet stores carry. There is also another deodorizer used by kennels but I think you can tamp down the smell with Nokout just as well. I just bought another gallon and a 32-ounce spray bottle. It really makes a difference. You can use it on clothes, too. Some of my high-tech workout clothes were getting a bit stenchy in the armpit region but Nokout took it right out.

Here is a link that might be useful: Nokout

Oh dear, I was afraid of that. We had the same problem in an upstairs bedroom when I moved into my house. Fortunately there was some very nice hardwood floor under the extremely ugly shag carpet, so I pulled up the carpet and rented a floor sander. Every time I hit the south corner of that room with the sander I could smell the dog urine coming up fro the wood. Eventually I got the stain out with some bleach and the sander and then refinished but it was a PIA and was a lot more work than I had expected.

Good luck, it definitely takes work and diligence to fix something like that. I hope the electrical issue is very small and very cheap to fix!

Annie

Lars, sorry to hear about the carpet; I hoped the professional cleaning would take care of it. I know replacing carpet can be a budget buster when you've purchased a new house. To me, it's obvious the carpet pad is the source of the smell....I'm guessing the previous owners weren't diligent in cleaning up accidents.

Carpet cleaning rarely gets to the pad. You need to purchase a pet odor neutralizer and spray the carpet enough to get through to the pad. You get it really wet and let it sit for a time (30 minutes or so). Blot the carpet to get the excess product up and let it dry naturally. I recommend buying the gallon jug and follow the directions. If the entire carpet is affected, you could use a carpet shampooer for the initial treatment.

My old dog (she was old!) used to have accidents and I always used Nature's Miracle to neutralize any odors. I also shampood my carpet every few months and did a rinse cycle that had some Nature's Miracle in it. We lived in the house 14 years and people told me they never smelled our pets (2 dogs, 2 cats and a bird). And I am by no means Fly Lady! *grin*

Good luck......let us know how it turns out.

Thanks, Diana - I am going to order some Nok-Out. I really appreciate the recommendation. OTOH, the smell seems to be diminishing slightly. Kevin just looked at the receipt for the cleaning, and it said to wait two days for the odor to go away, and so I think the carpet was still wet. I know it felt damp yesterday, and I have a feeling it is still not completely dry.

I took the day off today after working yesterday because I was way to exhausted to drag myself the 1.3 miles to the office! I got important things done yesterday, like reviewing some new dining chairs that I designed. One of the chairs was a collaborative effort, but the other one was completely mine, and I got to see it with the limed oak finish and textured leather upholstery. It's a rather unusual design, and I think it will sell well, if others in the company will mind their own business and stop trying to change it. It's already been approved by the owner, and the sales people in NY and L.A. love it as it is. It looks kind of like mid-Century Modern, but with a bit of influence from Rietveld. I wish I could buy a whole set for my dining room, but they will sell wholesale at about $1850 for side chairs and $2150 for the arm chair + the cost of the leather. I would need two of each, and there's no way I could afford that :(. If I could buy them at cost minus overhead, I might be able to afford it.

Lars

You could try Kids 'n' Pets odor remover from Target to treat the carpet while you're waiting for your Nok-Out order. The PetCo on Sepulveda should also have something for that purpose.

I just now got this message - yesterday we were moving out the last few items from the Venice house. I told the neighbors they could remove any remaining debris that they wanted, and so they took the plastic pots and hexagonal pavers that were around the pond. They said they would also take the volcanic rock that I had used for the waterfall. We were at Target yesterday, I think (the one in Culver City), and I would have bought the Kids 'n' Pets odor remover if I had known about it then. I did buy some Lysol air freshener, and that helps. It does seem to be slowly dissipating, however, although it is still lingering. I still have boxes in my room right now, and so it's hard to do anything. We're hanging paintings today to get them off the floors and out of the way, but we now have to find the drill so that we can install drywall toggles. Not all of the walls are drywall, but the ones in the sewing room are.

Lars