If you have a basement, then you need to keep it dry and keep water from getting in there. When water gets in your basement, it gets moist and can cause mold to grow everywhere. You need to keep it cool in there with an air conditioner or lots of fans. Sometimes, that technique might not work as well because of how hot it can get outside or inside your home.
Basements are the best place in the house you can find mold because it is dark, and there can be a lot of moisture down there for it to grow, spread, and cause mold damage. If you have a dryer down there, you need to watch it because, as you know, the basement is under ground. You have to find some way to keep the heat from the dryer out, even if you have to have the hose go right out through the window.
You can tell when you might have it. There might be a musty smell, or there will be a bad odor that won't go away. When moisture gets in there, the growth of the mold can be found in clothes, in your carpets or rugs, on your wall, in your appliances, under the stairs, in the ceiling above you, and in many other things. If you have water or moisture that is left to settle and you don't get it cleaned up or you don't see it, the mold will definitely grow. It will be small at first and then it will get bigger. You will start to see it because it will be black or white depending on where it is at, and you will have to get a professional to rid the mold in the area. You will have to stay at a family member's house, at a friend's, or at a hotel until they can take care of the problem.
There can be toxins floating in the air in your house, and it will not be safe to be inside. They will test your home to see if it is in any other parts of your home just to be on the safe side. If the toxins have not spread, then you are lucky it did not come to that. If it has spread, however, they will shut up the house so no one can get into it until they get it taken care of.