Dead Body Smell in Your Las Vegas Apartment
Your place can smell like home again once the source next door is out and the shared air is treated. Start by telling us where it comes in.
Don't know where the smell is from?
If a neighbor hasn't been seen and there's a strong, sweet, rotten smell with flies at a window, call 911 or the police non-emergency line and ask for a welfare check. Please don't go in. The numbers for each city are on the first 24 hours guide.
Odor keeps coming until the source unit is cleaned
Removing the person doesn't end it. The fluid and everything it soaked into are still next door, and the smell keeps coming through until someone cleans that unit.
This has happened in Las Vegas. In 2019, KTNV reported on a family near Jones Boulevard and Washington Avenue whose downstairs neighbor had been found dead. Days later the unit was still uncleaned, the smell was coming through their vents and cracks, and they were sleeping in a minivan. The manager told the station he didn't know whom to call or what it would cost.
Las Vegas Bio Clean can take your call from either side of the wall, as a tenant next door or as the building's manager. Death odor cleanup for apartments in Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas is two jobs. The source unit has to come first, and then the air in the units around it gets dealt with.
Apartment smells move through predictable gaps
Through the structure
Plumbing chases under sinks, gaps around outlets, the space above a dropped ceiling and the join between floor and wall. Above the source unit, smell rises with warm air. Below it, the first worry is fluid through the ceiling, so report any stain right away.
Through the air system
EPA's guidance on contaminated buildings notes that one HVAC system can serve several units and spread a problem between them. It's written for drug labs, and odor moves the same way. If your building has shared returns or a common hallway supply, tell us. Individual units still leak through the door and vents.
What to ask your property manager
These are short, fair questions, and the answers tell you how far along things are.
- Has the unit been released, and is someone able to authorize the cleanup?
- Who's handling it, and what day does the work start?
- Is the air system in that unit off? Does it share anything with mine?
- Will the hallway and the units on either side be checked when the source is gone?
- If the smell stays after that, can I call about my own unit?
Nevada's landlord and tenant law counts a clean, sanitary unit without built-up debris or filth among the things that make it habitable. If you're a manager reading this, you can call us directly and the property manager page covers what the job needs from you.
Your own unit may need its own scope
Once the source is out, the smell in the units around it usually fades, but soft things can hold on to it. The crew checks your carpet, curtains and furniture nearest the shared wall, your air filter and the vents.
Some of that may be the owner's to approve, and some may be yours. Say whether you rent or own when you call. Renters can call us too. If the job touches the building itself, the owner has to agree to it.
In the meantime, a closed door and a towel along the gap at the bottom can cut it down. Wash what you're wearing as usual. CDC says hepatitis B, hepatitis C and HIV have never been traced to a housekeeping surface. If fluid has come through a ceiling, stay out of that room and tell the manager at once.
The crew checks both sides of the wall
The visit follows the smell through the shared wall, the vents and the hallway, and shows what needs doing in your unit and what doesn't.
Call(725) 745-8630Have these on hand
- The building and both unit numbers
- The property manager's name, if you have it
- Where in your unit the smell is strongest