One of the things that is inspected for when you're looking to buy a house is dry rot; dry rot is a fungus that consumes the cellulose in the wood and thereby destroys the strength and structure of the wood on a cellular level.
Dry rot infestation is a bit of a misnomer; the fungi that cause dry rot actually require a relatively high amount of moisture to live and reproduce. The name dry rot originally referred to the fact that it was a condition of milled trees, rather than live ones. Ideally, dry rot prefers moisture levels of 28 to 30% but can sustain itself at levels damper than that as well. Constant saturation of wood or constant dryness wards against dry rot, however, constantly wet wood is at risk for other forms of rot.
Dry rot can travel through a building through materials other than timber and can spread quickly through your home which is one reason why dry rot is such a serious problem. If dry rot goes undetected—or worse, detected but ignored—then it is assured that the problem with get worse and may have catastrophic conclusions.
How do you know if there is a problem with dry rot in a home that you'd like to buy? Well, there are a variety of ways to tell. Wood that is infected with the dry rot fungus often shrinks or discolors; it also tends to crack against the grain into cube-like pieces as the fungus consumes the cellulose that gives the wood its cellular skeleton. Dry rot can also show as a skin over the wood or a cottony fibrous coating. The wood can also have a soft fungal growth that may look like a thick colored mold. A musty, moldy odor often accompanies dry rot. Your best bet when looking to buy a home—even if you do not suspect that it has dry rot—is to have the premises inspected for dry rot by an inspector.
There are some fillers that you can use to fill spots that have had the dry rot cleaned out of them which work to strengthen the wood and kill the fungus. There are also some good chemical liquids that can be applied to wood that prevent it from getting an infestation of spores, however any wood that gets wet repeatedly will be more likely to get dry rot even if these applications are used. The main problem is keeping the wood from getting damp in the first place.
Because of the seriousness of the structural damage that dry rot causes and the extensiveness of that damage it is best for a homeowner to call in a professional to determine the scope of the problem and to give an accurate idea of the work and money that will be required to rid the home of the fungal infestation. Do not agree to buy a property that has dry rot until you have an accurate idea of how extensive the dry rot is and who will be responsible for paying for the subsequent costs to fix it.
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