Extreme Pet Odor - Cat Hoarded Home

[SeanTXTY]

I'm about to get married this year and I thought it was time to get into my first home. After some bleak searching, we found this foreclosed house at a steal.. An investment company had been holding onto it and seemed anxious to dump it. This should have been a red flag but we checked it out and didn't see anything too major. We kind of ignored the smell, figuring it would be something we could take care of.

What we couldn't figure out was why the floor (which was stripped to the concrete slab) and the exposed studs (the sheet rock was cut 4' up) were painted white. We were assuming there was some kind of flood, but we didn't understand the white paint.

We learned today it was a cat hoarder home, and that the white paint was KILZ. Additionally they had used OdorBan to try to get the smell out. From what I'm reading - they did just about everything you're supposed to in order to remove cat hoarder odor. However, the OdorBan might not have been the best cleaning product to use?

Here's what I'm thinking - I think we need to take up the KILZ and hit the concrete with a muratic acid and re KILZ it. But I don't know, it seems like from what I'm reading we shouldn't be smelling anything through the KILZ. I'm wondering if the smell will EVER be gone!

So I guess the question is, what do you do if you can still smell cat odor through sealed concrete?

[pushkins]

Do you know if they used latex or oil based Kilz ? Oil base has a much better sealing function for both stains and odor.
Gold bullseye Zinser (oil base) is my sealer of choice.

[SeanTXTY]

I don't actually know, but the bucket of KILZ is actually at the house. I'll have to check this out!

[mrcaptainbob]

Cat odor....

Go there when it's dark out. Use a black light. Black light shows up any protein stains. Shine it across the floor, along the walls. Consider there may have been a cabinet or table near a wall where 'fluffy' stood and let loose. It could well be more than just within a few feet of the floor. Unless that OdorBan was allowed to neutralize the 'odor' for a few days, applying a sealer may not have allowed enough time to work. If it's on the drywall, it could well be 'in' the drywall. Check behind baseboard moldings, as well as wall outlets near the floor. The black light will lead the way in finding the trouble spots.