Soot

Having just had the pleasure of a cowboy builder (CB) in my house I now need help! To cut a very long story short I now have soot everywhere. The CB was making a loft hatch (which is another cock up - but that`s another story) and there was a bag of dust/soot in the loft space which I was unaware of. (Scared of heights, high celings etc so I had not looked into the loft space). Under his own iniative CB decided to bring the bag out of the loft. Alas the bag broke and now the soot is everywhere. No he did not shut the bedroom doors on the landing so it is on all bed linen, cushions, coats, curtains, clothes etc. These will have to be dry cleaned. I have hoovered what I can up but the CB has walked it all through the house. Luckily I am renovating the house so have not painted/wallpapered the stripped walls yet. However one bedroom had a painted wooden floor (off white - now black) and he has walked the soot all around the bedroom.

Does anyone know of any ideas how to shift the dirty sooty ingrained footprints from wooded florrs? It is a 5m x 5m space and I do not want the added expense/dust of sanding the floor. Also, is it ok the sugar soap the walls to get the soot off? These walls are going to be papered with lining paper and then painted.

And no he is not willing to cough up the money for repairing the damage nor clean up the mess. As they say in these parts `he has done one and got off`. So much for the `highly recommended`.

Sorry for the long post but any ideas on the soot would be much appreciated!

If this is real carbon soot, then I think your best bet would be to look in your phone directory under "Fire & Flood Restoration Services". When there's a fire in a house, the smoke from the fire can leave soot all over everything, and the insurance company will pay to clean up that smoke damage as well. Unless you get a better suggestion from someone else in here, I'd phone the companies that clean up fire damage and see what chemicals and tools they use to clean up soot.

Thanks for the reply. I have got the professionals in to clear it up which is a relief to say the least.