A real Missouri inspection: blocked soffits and a short-circuited attic turned into a 93° sauna. See what went wrong with the ventilation and how to fix it.

Spotted a yellowish-gold film on your attic rafters and worried it's mold? It's probably attic ambering—natural resin (lignin) seeping out of the wood under St. Louis's intense summer heat. Here's how to tell ambering from mold, what causes it, whether it's dangerous, and how attic ventilation factors in.