I blamed my detergent for months, but i think my laundry corner is just too humid

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I think i’ve been blaming my towels when the real problem is my laundry corner.

for months i kept getting that stale towel smell and assumed i was doing laundry wrong. tried less detergent, more detergent, vinegar, hot wash, cleaning the washer gasket, leaving the door open, smaller loads, all of it.

some of it helped for like five minutes, then we’d get a few rainy days and the smell would slowly come back.

the laundry area is right by the bathroom and has basically no airflow. thick towels take forever to dry, and anything i hang indoors feels like it gets 80% dry and then just gives up.

borrowed a cheap humidity monitor and it was around 70% in that corner. so now i’m wondering if this is not a detergent problem at all, just a room-that-never-dries problem.

i was looking at DampRid, fans, maybe leaving the bathroom fan on longer, etc. someone mentioned a keepglad dehumidifier because it can sit near the laundry area and drain into a sink instead of needing the tank emptied all the time, which does sound practical.

before i buy another random thing, what would you check first? washer gasket? venting? towel habits? humidity? i’m tired of playing laundry detective.