Strong smell coming from floor

Several times a day we have a very strong smell coming from the floor of our brownstone (sometimes also out of the vent). The smell reminds me of a dead animal, but we now have it since 4 month, so this is unlikely. We checked if we have any water leakages but did not find anything. We are thinking if it can come from our neighbor as her bathroom is on the side where the smell comes from. Our neighbor told us she does not smell anything. We are now really desperate because our landlord does not really do something and we are sleeping outside of our bedroom since weeks. Does anybody have ideas what it can be?

Guest User | 6 years and 5 months ago

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cate | 6 years and 5 months ago

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It is certainly possible to open up a wood floor and seal with concrete the party wall and or joists next to it….but based on my experience with all of the above and smells I’d doubt it would solve your problem.

Guest User | 6 years and 5 months ago

string(1) "3"
string(6) "199969"

Thank you! I also have the feeling it comes from the neighbour (I know she has cats, birds etc). In this case she lives next to us, so the floors/ crawlings spaces are probably connected through some cracks. I do not know what else it can be as there is no plumbing etc from us (only the vents and it does not come mainly from the vents but from the floor). Has anyone experience with opening old wood floors and closing cracks to the neighbour house?

resident2 | 6 years and 5 months ago

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I bought a house many years ago where there was one apartment that I could not see; the tenant was always out of town, the owner did not have a key… It was a middle apartment, even if it needed a complete upgrade what could there be in there that would cause structural/mechanical problems that I could not see from above & below?
The tenant moved out shortly after I closed on it; voluntarily at the end of their lease.
They had one room where they had kept a dog, no one in the building was aware that they had a dog. The dog had never been let out and there was 12-18″ of hardened dried dog shit covering the whole 7 x 10 foot room.
After digging out all the dried up composted caked dog manure, we took out all the floor boards, base boards, plaster… we bleached and “deodorized” all the joists, we wrapped & sealed the joists and all structural components, replaced the wood floors etc.
Whenever there was a change in temperature, especially when the heat came on, th ere was a waft of ” what the hell is that smell?”
No matter what we did, that smell would keep regurgitating….
Beware of tenants burning incense, when looking at houses.