Regardless of where you move and what kind of building you move into, whether it’s single family home you rent or buy, an apartment in a dingy walk-up or in a luxury high-rise, inevitably you will discover some problem with it. Some will be small and easily fixable, others may require more time, money, and effort, while others will just be… flat out disgusting.

We did an apartment inspection with the building super on Wednesday and called out a few things that needed fixing or touching up that they missed. But one area that I didn’t check (that I also did not think I even NEEDED to check) was the garbage disposal and drain in the kitchen sink. And well, clearly, they missed this, too.

When I went to clean the sink yesterday, I pulled out the plug and noticed… not only a very off, sewage, moldy smell, but also… MOLD PLANTS growing on the kitchen plug. There were three of them growing and sprouting leaves. It was the most hideous thing I’d ever uncovered in a new apartment. I was particularly appalled because we’ve been living in this building for four years now, and I’d never heard or seen anything so gross. Plus, this is supposed to be a luxury building in New York City. All I could think was, WTF?! I wiped them off and sanitized them. One of the porters came up and did some additional drain cleaning for us, but it still wasn’t enough to get rid of the smell. I’ve had to apply a baking soda and vinegar solution to let the drain soak to try to get the smell out. While it’s helped, there is still a faint moldy smell every time I take the kitchen plug out of the drain. Not happy.