ERMI SCORE

That’s pretty high for an ERMI. If you have to stay in that house then you should be prepared to have it inspected and remediated.

The highest ERMI I tested was 18. The lowest was 4. Same house. The highest score was after repeated water incidents - hot water heater in attic leaked onto the ceiling. Toilet seal broke. Then a leak under the kitchen sink.

If you plan to stay there and fix the problem, ask here or on a mold group for references of inspectors and remediators. There are also 2 mold dogs that I know of - one in FL and one in NJ, I think. I hired the one in FL. The dog was able to detect approximate location of mold growth inside walls, which can be hard for inspectors to do without cutting holes all in the wall.

Try calculating the HERTSMI score from your ERMI results: https://www.myhousemakesmesick.com/h2calc/

(HERTSMI is the measure of the five most toxic molds.)

I lived in a house with a very high ERMI score but a very low HERTSMI score. There are a lot of molds that are common outdoors and don't typically cause symptoms in humans (but could for someone hypersensitive or hypersensitized) and those were in high numbers in my house because I had a dirt-floor basement. They can be present in high numbers also from houseplants or opening windows or drying laundry on a clothesline. Knowing that your highest mold counts were from "harmless" molds isn't helpful if you're someone who reacts to all molds, but it was interesting information to me. My high ERMI score made my doctors believe my house was making me sick, but I got to 85% remission while still living there, so there was definitely more to the picture for me, even if the moldy environment contributed.

If you are in the Northeast, I have a fabulous mold inspector for you.

I think the HERTSMI-2 has recommendations based on ranges if I recall correctly. Something like < 2 is good. 2 to 4 is only a problem if you were previously mold compromised and have the genetic defect and then it goes up somewhat exponentially from there. The highest score I ever got was 9.7 but I didn't actually do a test in the water damaged house I lived in, I just moved out ASAP. The lowest score I ever got was 2.9. The joys of living on the East Coast I suppose. The ERMI is more dependent on what type of molds you find, but a high score on the HERTSMI-2 means its the bad molds since they weight it based on danger. Try to find the reference ranges, but in general I think a score above 10 should be remediated