I am having a problem in my house that no one can seem to explain or solve. Our house is 6 years old with brick front facing south. We live in Omaha, NE so we have hot humid summers. The problem we have is that in the summer we are having moisture appear on the vapor barrier on the exterior walls. The moisture is forming on the outside of the barrier (against the bat insulation). We tore out all the drywall last summer, replaced the insulation, installed a new vapor barrier and hung new drywall. This summer, we started to notice a damp smell again. I removed a portion of the drywall and the vapor barrier was covered with water droplets (looked liked condensation on a window). We have had numerous contractors over and no one seems to know why this is occurring. We don't have any leaks in the roof (that we can or any contractors can find). It simply looks like the outdoor humid air is meeting the cool vapor barrier causing condensation.

If we hadn't had everything professionally redone last summer, I would have thought there may be problems with the insulation. The construction is as follows from the exterior in - brick, air space, tyvek, particle board, bat insulation, vapor barrier, drywall. Every article I read explains that this is the proper and necessary way to construct the walls to avoid moisture from forming.

Is the vapor barrier necessary and is it causing the problem. What would happen if we reinstalled everything without the barrier?

Any thoughts you have or type of contractor you could refer us to would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.