A property with mouse droppings would have little appeal to any investor or prospective landlord. It is because they know that in turn any rodent control issue will be a problem further down the line with prospective buyers or tenants.
When you translate this concept to high end buyers, the mice control issue become either a no-sell or a possible lawsuit. I cannot imagine someone who shed £3 million on a penthouse purchase being overjoyed having been mislead into thinking they will find heaven among the clouds.
How to get rid of mice at the top of the building can only be achieved at short notice with carrying out the full mouse proofing of the property. Depending on the time scale and budget available you may use a pest control company that will carry out exclusion work, or a builder who will possibly have to pull out the kitchen to seal holes and gaps at floor and wall level.
Saying that a pest control mice problem can seriously compromise a sale is not an understatement. So it would be advisable to take every precautions to reduce whatever mice infestation there is and call a mice exterminator. By placing the best bait for mice at void space level, the pest controller will reduce the chance of house mice breaking through into the property.
Before listing the property, you should therefore look for mice droppings underneath the kitchen units and a the back of domestic appliance. If you see any mice poop, you would then need to remove them all and contact the building manager to address the issue. Most large residential development have contracted one of the best pest control companies in London. And they should have already put mice traps in place in the lower floors.
Although if the mouse pest control would have worked in first place, we would not have had mice on the top floor. So reviewing the pest control arrangement at building level and inspecting the flats next door and below yours may be the best thing you will have ever do. Suddenly, pest control become an asset, and you can promote how well the building is being managed and that it has pest control services to ensure it stays that way.
From the point of view of a property developer, mouse control is equally important. But the solution lies in the implementation of the building and insuring the highest standard of craftsmanship. In principal it may sound straight forward but it is not. Often a building relies on more than one company, and more than one trade having to work side by sides, or one after the other. In many occasions things will not always go according to schedule, and the plaster boards go up before the electrician had the chance of running all his cables.
But when it come to mouse pest control, the kitchen and bathrooms are the most critical. As the pipes and the cables have to go through the floor and through the walls, it only take one not being sealed around to open up an access route for rodents. Possibly, the most important person would become the kitchen fitter who before placing the first kitchen units in place should insure that all is sealed perfectly.
Morden high rise and traditional buildings have in common the fact that the pipework travel through a shaft from floor to floors. There are typically following the toilet waste pipe from the top to ground floor. Similar setups are found for the water, gas pipes and electricity cables. Essentially, once mice are within the fabric of the building, they can hence travel and spread like wild fire if they are given a chance.
For high rise buildings, the solution will often be to put in place some mouse bait at ground floor level that is the gateway for mice infestation, and in every riser cupboards throughout. For traditional buildings, the solution may be to place air brick mouse covers on the outside of the building to prevent mice ingress.
We all know that time is money, and many are focused of the profit margin of their endeavour. But you would be surprise that taking into account mice control is not necessarily costly and can often be reduced to a few minutes and some cheap sand and cement. In the other hand, the not doing it will often yield to implementing an extensive pest control program, and having to deal with incessant stream of complaints.
