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So my wife called my attention the fact that the kids bathroom has some grunge on the ceiling and tends to have lots of water drops when in use.

First issue - at some point the vent motor was replaced with one that is too small for the housing, they had some foil tape on there to try to seal it...

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Today, I got up into the attic and it turns out that the fan isn't vented anywhere...it's just buried under the insulation.

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And the fan in our bathroom is the same enter image description here

Surprisingly, I didn't see any mold/mildew in the insulation...perhaps because we live in Salt Lake City, Utah...things don't stay wet around here.

Long term, I'll see about finding somebody to put in some actual venting through the roof. Although, the one bath will be tough, as the fan is close to the wall.

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I'd prefer to go out the wall, but there's no exterior wall above the bathroom ceiling...just the soffit.

As an alternative to the roof, I could go out the gable end, but that's 20ft or so..

So my question, what should I do today? Should I just put every back? Or is there anything I can do today that would help and not hurt?

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Many jurisdictions frown upon venting out of the soffit, particularly if the soffit is vented (perforated). The rationale being that the warm/moist air from the exhaust vent will be drawn back into the attic.

I think the preferred location for the vent is through the roof or out the side of a gable.

Here's the way I vented a new powder room.

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  • Hello, and welcome to Home Improvement. Thanks for the answer; keep 'em coming. And, you should probably take our tour so you'll know how best to contribute here.
    – Daniel Griscom
    Dec 21, 2019 at 2:23
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I have put 3 or 4" duct pipes through the insulation with plastic flapper check valves. When the fan is on it pushes the flapper open , when the fan is off the flapper closes and stops air exchange with outside. Probably also need one on the kitchen exhaust fan but I only have duct and no flapper valve there.

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  • Was considering something like that....or perhaps running something up to the ridge vent...just worried what it might do to the roof until I can get something proper..
    – Charles
    Nov 10, 2019 at 21:05
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    I always run my vents out the soffit. Keeps the roof clean (no holes to leak), fairly easy to get to and keeps the moist air out of the attic.
    – Micah Montoya
    Nov 11, 2019 at 17:25

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