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Open house bedbugs — Brooklynian

Open house bedbugs

8thandprez
8thandprez
edited November -1 in Park Slope
I went to an open house on Sunday for a 3-family building in North Slope. The duplex unit in the building was a warren of 5 bedrooms -- looked like a share of college-aged kids -- and several of the beds were elevated on plastic risers with white powder placed in the little depression where the bed leg rested. I immediately suspected bed bugs and started itching... but could it have been something else? Fleas?

Anyone know if that was a telltale sign of an infestation?

Any chance that bedbugs could have come along with us after the viewing?

sign me,
paranoid.

Comments

  • MOD
    MOD
    Sounds like it.

    Run!! Flee!!!!!
  • pitu
    pitu
    :shock:

    I don't think they jump on passersby, tho.
    You didn't sit down, did you? Even then, from what I've read they become active in the early morning.

    ps don't buy that place! Bedbugs sound like they need serious dedication to get rid of, and can spread from one room/apt to the next. There's was a bunch of stuff on ApartmentTherapy.com about it...
    ick

    Run!! Flee!!
  • rtraindweller
    rtraindweller
    yea even if you suspect it, its better safe than sorry. my ex had a terrible bedbug problem in her old apartment and even with multiple visits from exterminators they were still there and she ended up breaking her lease and moving. i helped her move out and destroy all her furniture. slashed up the couch coushins, wrote "DO NOT TAKE, BED BUGS!!!" all over everything in black sharpie. sure enough as im taking apart her bed i look down to the street and there's people looking at the couch and slashed coushins, AND THEY TAKE EM! thanks for spreading the bedbug epidemic throughout the city...
  • pitu
    pitu
    rtraindweller wrote: yea even if you suspect it, its better safe than sorry. my ex had a terrible bedbug problem in her old apartment and even with multiple visits from exterminators they were still there and she ended up breaking her lease and moving. i helped her move out and destroy all her furniture. slashed up the couch coushins, wrote "DO NOT TAKE, BED BUGS!!!" all over everything in black sharpie. sure enough as im taking apart her bed i look down to the street and there's people looking at the couch and slashed coushins, AND THEY TAKE EM! thanks for spreading the bedbug epidemic throughout the city...
    so . . . the bedbugs never came home with you, visitor to her apt?
    So far I've only heard about bedbugs being infested in a place, or moving in with a used mattress/upholstered furniture...

    and
    thanks for being a responsible citizen and marking up the bedbug furniture, even tho it didn't work
  • 8thandprez
    8thandprez
    Luckily, I refrained from rolling around in the beds. It was funny bc, of the 5 beds in the apartment, only 3 were up on risers. Perhaps the other 2 bed-tenants were the ones responsible for the outbreak?

    Seriously though, I would have serious reservations about buying a place with bedbugs... I too have heard that it's a total nightmare to get them out. Too bad, the building had good bones.
  • armchair_warrior
    armchair_warrior
    hey where is the house located. i'm looking for family :).
  • rtraindweller
    rtraindweller
    pitu wrote: [quote=rtraindweller]yea even if you suspect it, its better safe than sorry. my ex had a terrible bedbug problem in her old apartment and even with multiple visits from exterminators they were still there and she ended up breaking her lease and moving. i helped her move out and destroy all her furniture. slashed up the couch coushins, wrote "DO NOT TAKE, BED BUGS!!!" all over everything in black sharpie. sure enough as im taking apart her bed i look down to the street and there's people looking at the couch and slashed coushins, AND THEY TAKE EM! thanks for spreading the bedbug epidemic throughout the city...
    so . . . the bedbugs never came home with you, visitor to her apt?
    So far I've only heard about bedbugs being infested in a place, or moving in with a used mattress/upholstered furniture...

    and
    thanks for being a responsible citizen and marking up the bedbug furniture, even tho it didn't work

    nope, atleast there's been no signs of them in my apartment. luckily we broke up (hmm, ok rather we didnt) before her bedbug problem! she stopped having people over when she noticed she had a problem in her apartment cause she didn't want it to spread to anyone elses. Shame too cause it was a great apartment in a great neighborhood and the rent was still fair compared to other places around there. and had just bought the furniture a few months before.
  • veets
    veets
    Not for nothing... but what ethical broker (sometimes I do wonder if those 2 words go together) would take a listing and proceed with an open house when they know there is an infestation? Do they really think people are so clueless that a potential buyer might think it is some Park Slope Style to raise those bed legs and set them in little swimming pools of poison?
  • raw
    raw
    rtraindweller wrote: yea even if you suspect it, its better safe than sorry. my ex had a terrible bedbug problem in her old apartment and even with multiple visits from exterminators they were still there and she ended up breaking her lease and moving.
    I know a guy who had the same problem. The exterminators couldn't do a thing, so he broke the lease.
  • the chipster
    the chipster
    But maybe it wasn't bedbugs! I don't know of any white powder that keeps them away. However, boric acid is often used as a natural insecticide for ROACHES. They walk in it, lick their cute little paws, and dry up internally. All this jumping to conclusions--maybe it was ANTHRAX DUDE!!
  • veets
    veets
    OK Now we are just having fun with alternate explanations.

    I like Chipster's explanations. Think about doofy college kids that have the roach thing going in the kitchen.. and they have the boric acid in their kitchen drawers and are skeeved out thinking the roaches will climb in bed with them so they set their beds in little saucers billed with boric acid.
  • 8thandprez
    8thandprez
    A reasonable explanation. The sites I've seen recommend mineral oil in the little dishes for bedbugs. But they also recommend dusting with Diatomaceous earth, which is a white powder. The kids could have put that in the dishes, thinking it would repel the bedbugs.
  • dakotas way
    dakotas way
    I recently read that institutions were using the method of steam cleaning to rid themselves of bedbugs and they swore by it. They said every week for several weeks you have to steam the beds, floors and walls and put all clothes and fabric (such as drapes) in the dryer to kill the little buggers.
    The advice was that heat is the only real way to finish them off. I guess you'd have to check the gestation period and take it a week or two beyond to make sure you got all of them.
    If that is true and it seems to cost so much for exterminators, it would probably pay to buy a steam cleaner out right.
  • the chipster
    the chipster
    wow! Mineral oil? Thanks! I gotta go tell all my scrounger friends. Oh....um....maybe I'll just email them.
  • benzapp
    benzapp
    Just go to latin america and get some DDT. It's totally non-toxic for humans and will kill all the bedbugs.
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