Posted by Mindy on January 31, 2002 at 07:25:13:
I moved into my house a little over a year ago and shortly noticed a strange residue on the walls in the bathroom. It seems that when someone takes a very hot shower moisture collects on the walls. Eventually this moisture evaporates leaving a brownish residue in its place. I recently painted and I'm seeing it happening again, this time on my new paint. Although this residue seems to wash off with soapy water, I don't want to be washing my bathroom walls weekly.
My house is fairly old, built in the 20s sometime. I didn't use a special bathroom paint, just a Martha Stewart latex satin. Everyone I tell this to asks about the paint and my instinct is that it's not the paint but something in the water. I talked to my neighbors and they aren't having any problems. I've considered getting a whole house water filter, but they are expensive and I don't want to spend the extra money unless I know it's going to fix the problem. I don't have a fan in the bathroom so I've considered adding one but again, that's somewhat expensive so I'm hesitating to do that.
Any ideas you could share on fixing this problem would be greatly appreciated.