How Dehumidifying a Garage Can Save You Money Long-Term

Is a dehumidifier good for a garage? Absolutely.

Garages are prone to humidity because standard construction practice for residential properties is to leave them uninsulated. It’s not considered part of a house's living space (that designation goes to the living room, dining area, kitchen, bathrooms, bedrooms, and other interior rooms).

Even attached garages are considered just that—attachments to the main building. This is also why garages are typically excluded from the “living space” square footage of residential real estate listings.

An uninsulated garage becomes a problem when homeowners use it for anything besides parking their cars. Once it becomes part storage space, workshop, or guesthouse, the requirements for the space must change.  

Depending on how often you are in it or what you do with it, the garage will now need living space provisions like air conditioning, heating, and insulation, installations that make garages less vulnerable to moisture from humidity or water intrusion.

Doing the whole shebang will certainly cost you money. But, if you want a high-impact solution at a reasonable cost, dehumidifying a garage is the way to go.

Can you dehumidify a garage, even one that’s not yet insulated and has a lot of air leaks? Yes, to a degree.

A well-made, high-quality dehumidifier from a trusted brand like Argendon can make a marked improvement in a hot and humid garage. What’s more, it can help you save more on utility bills and other related expenses.

Money-Saving Advantages of Dehumidifying a Garage

Let’s take a look at how humidity and moisture control in a garage can save you money.

Reduces Condensation

Garages are prone to condensation because they’re not insulated. Warm air also floods the space every time you lift the doors and drive in and out of the garage.

Since condensation occurs when warm air touches cold surfaces, dew can form on the walls and floors when they are still cold from the previous evening. Condensate that lands on wood and permeable materials like foam or paper will also get absorbed; and as we know, saturated organic materials quickly deteriorate and rot.

Reducing condensation prevents mold, rot, and other forms of water damage. This spares you the cost of repairing or replacing damaged parts of your garage.

Protects Your Cars, Tools, and Equipment

High humidity is bad news for cars. Over time, the saturated air can cause the exposed metal parts of the undercarriage and exterior framing to corrode.

Rusty suspension springs and shock absorbers won’t function smoothly, making car rides bumpy, embarrassingly squeaky, and uncomfortable. Worse, rusty ball joints and springs could break and cause major problems.

Corrosion can also compromise the performance of power tools and equipment stored inside a garage. Cordless drills and lawn mowers aren’t cheap, so it saves you money if you can keep them in good condition for as long as possible.

Dehumidifying a garage lowers the chances of corrosion and material degradation in cars, tools, and equipment. Keeping them from rusting can save you hundreds, even thousands, in repairs and replacements.

Keeps Mold Away

Mold needs moisture, organic materials, and humidity (at least 70% of relative humidity, according to the University of Central Florida) to thrive.

Deprive the fungi of one of these, and you can effectively prevent them from growing at all. That’s what a dehumidifier can do in your garage. It will also spare you the expense of buying mold killing products, or worse, paying for mold remediation professionals to treat hidden mold that’s grown out of control.

Prevents Allergies and Other Health Issues

Mold does not just cause material and structural damage; it can also cause health problems. It can trigger allergic reactions in children, senior adults, people who are sensitive to allergens, and people with weak immune systems. These symptoms include coughing, sneezing, eye irritation, rashes, headaches, difficulty breathing, and asthma attacks.

Using a dehumidifier addresses the root of allergy problems. It will save you a lot of medical bills and help ensure the comfort and health of your household.

Lowers Cooling Costs

Can a dehumidifier cool a garage?  

No, but it can change the way your body feels on hot days. Keeping relative humidity low enables the sweat on our skin to evaporate quickly, which helps your body stay cool. 

Unless the temperature hits the high 80s, in which case the heat will be impossible to ignore, the temperature in your garage will be bearable even if you don’t have an AC. So, with a garage dehumidifier, you won’t have to turn on the AC every time you're working in the space. You may not have to install one at all. 

 

Raises Property Value

A commercial-grade dehumidifier that costs $500-800 and can dehumidify over 2,000 sq. ft. is sufficient as a whole garage dehumidifier.

Considering all the benefits and cost-saving opportunities above, it should be a worthwhile investment for your home. There’s also a long-term cost benefit to keeping your garage in excellent shape. If you decide to sell your home in the future, a well-maintained garage can add to the property’s value (between $12,800 to $33,200, says Angie’s List).

The Hidden Costs of a Humid Garage

When there’s savings potential in preventing moisture-related damage in a garage, it means any existing damage could be costing you money already.

Let’s consider the expenses awaiting a homeowner of a garage that has long stayed damp with moisture and elevated humidity

Professional Mold Remediation

A neglected garage with significant mold damage that spans more than 10 sq.ft. (which is roughly three-by-three feet), requires professional remediation services.

The EPA advises against DIY removals for severe mold problems because the health risks are higher and there’s a chance that mold will return if it’s not treated properly. Professional remediation costs $10-25 per square feet and testing alone costs $250 to $350. You could be looking at these costs if your humid garage hides a mold problem.

Structural Damage

When relative humidity in a garage has not been addressed for a long time, there’s a chance that rot has already started on the walls, if they’re constructed from wood.

If it’s a steel garage, there might be some rusted parts that will need careful inspection. The concrete floors of garages are also vulnerable to moisture and may have sustained cosmetic damage that needs to be fixed.

Higher Maintenance

Speaking of cosmetic damage, elevated humidity accelerates material degradation.

It causes paint to crack and peel earlier than expected. The same goes for wood panels or trim that warp or develop water and mold stains. These are minor issues that can be fixed without spending a lot, but the costs will accumulate over time.

Although a garage can still be functional despite having cosmetic damage, repairs are still inevitable, especially if you plan on selling the property.

Vehicle Damage and Maintenance

Does it baffle you that your tires deflate faster than they used to? Or that your car smells musty no matter how often you vacuum, clean, and deodorize the interior?

These can be due to unmanaged relative humidity in your garage. Besides corrosion, high humidity can trigger tire pressure fluctuations, make your car smell dank, mess up electrical circuits and sensors, wear out seals and weatherstripping, cause condensation in the AC, and weaken batteries in your car.

The expenses you’re forced to make because of problems will fly under the radar at the beginning (Any responsible car owner would buy a tire pressure gauge and portable compressor, right? And isn’t it acceptable to buy a new car freshener every week?), but like with garage maintenance expenses, the costs eventually add up.

Damage on Stored Household Items

Seasonal clothes, decorations, sports gear, and other things that don't fit inside the house often end up in plastic bins in the garage. They will most certainly smell musty and get rusty and damaged if kept in humid conditions all year, every year.

Dehumidifying a garage will reveal these hidden problems and their related costs because once you start using a dehumidifier, many of these problems will go away. Then you’ll realize just how much you’ve been spending, and would have continued spending, if you continued to ignore how humid your garage is.

Optimizing a Dehumidifier for Garage

Now let’s talk about how you can make the most out of your dehumidifier so it can keep your garage moisture-free and keep saving you money.

Dehumidifier Settings

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recommends keeping relative humidity between 30% and 50%, to prevent microbial and fungal growth.

When using a new dehumidifier or dehumidifying the garage for the first time, start at a high setting, like 60% RH, before slowly working your way to a lower percentage. This allows the dehumidifier to warm up while you’re learning its functions, features, and drainage set-up. Afterwards, you can lower the settings to 50% for an hour or so, and further down to 45-30%, if you wish.

Location

The ideal place to install or park a portable dehumidifier is near the dampest spot in your garage. You should also make sure there’s good air circulation in the area. Dehumidifiers draw in humid air and release lighter, fresher air. It can’t extract moisture as well as it should if there are too many obstacles to airflow around it, or if other objects block its vents.

Duration / Time Settings

How long should your dehumidifier run? Dehumidifying a garage doesn’t take a lot of time under normal circumstances. If you’ve already been using it for many days and are now regulating relative humidity, turning it on for a few hours a day is enough.

On summers, however, when relative humidity can go higher than 70%, you may have to run the dehumidifier for 10-24 hours, depending on how quickly the readings go down. Summer humidity is more difficult to keep up with because moist air is guaranteed to enter your garage every time you open the door.

It’s easier to maintain 30-50% RH on random rainy days because outdoor humidity fluctuates with precipitation. Once the rain stops, rainwater goes down the drain and remaining moisture evaporates. Indoor RH will then regulate in a few hours with a dehumidifier. The exception is during the monsoon season, which is much like summer where humidity is elevated nearly every day. It’s not uncommon to keep a commercial dehumidifier running for days during these seasons.

 

Other Ways to Dehumidify a Garage

A dehumidifier is the most reliable and best way to dehumidify a garage. But you can make it work even better with the following additions:

• Sealable vents – We understand the confusion surrounding ventilation and dehumidification. Air sealing is necessary to ensure humid air cannot enter, but also, ventilation flushes out stale, humid air from a building. The key is knowing when to use a vent. If bad air is trapped, for any reason, inside a garage, a vent will transport it out of the garage. The air movement can also help dry any damp surface. Once the air quality has improved, you can seal the vent and then run the dehumidifier to ensure the relative humidity stays low.
• Insulation – Insulating a garage helps regulate its temperature, which is vital for keeping relative humidity stable. Keep in mind that the air’s capacity to hold water increases the warmer it gets. Insulation keeps heat out of your garage in the summer, and this ensures that relative humidity will stay low.
• Vapor barriers – Installing vapor barrier sheets can prevent water intrusion through the walls or concrete floor. They don’t directly address humidity, but they prevent unwanted water from getting through, which is the point of dehumidifying a garage.
• Gutters and downspouts – Roof runoffs with nowhere to go can enter garages through leaks in the roof or through the gap under the door. Ensuring the integrity of the downspout and gutters around the garage prevents this from happening.

Solving moisture problems and lowering relative humidity in the garage will be a breeze if you have these in addition to a portable dehumidifier.

How to Choose the Best Dehumidifier for Garage

Apart from the usual purchasing factors like price, brand reputation, and customer reviews, there are four important things to consider when choosing a dehumidifier:
-Size of your garage
-Type of dehumidifier
-Capacity (in liters or pints per day) of the dehumidifier
-Specifications and features of the dehumidifier

Dehumidifiers are built for different environments. Residential dehumidifiers are typically compact. Small dehumidifiers with built-in tanks have 1-3L capacities, while bigger models with continuous drainage can collect around 30-85 pints per day (PPD).

Commercial or industrial dehumidifiers have more drawing power. They are more ideal for traditional garages wherein dehumidifying with a regular home unit can be challenging.

A commercial dehumidifier can function as a whole garage dehumidifier. They have a wide coverage (some going up to 2,000+ square feet) and high moisture collection capacity (measured in tank size and pints per day or PPD). They can run many consecutive hours, even all day. When you have a dehumidifier for garage that matches its size and the relative humidity (RH) you’re usually dealing with (it can be at 74% RH if you’re in Florida, 61% in California, or somewhere in between depending on your location), moisture-related problems will evaporate in no time.

You don’t have to go elsewhere to find a good dehumidifier for your garage. Argendon offers several options suitable for garages, including commercial dehumidifiers capable of 24/7 operation.

Browse our Shop and contact our customer support if you have questions.