Why do old people...smell musty?

Fungus.

... and also burps, but mostly fungus.
 
See a need... Fill a need.
There you go, Invent something cheap and practical that will make old people smell like roses. You can make millions just from people who have to visit old people... And there will always be old people, so you'll always have a market.
 
After googling around, I think the culprint is palmitoleic acid. Yum.:sick:

In the April 2001 issue of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, Shinichiro Haze et al published an article suggesting that omega-7 unsaturated fatty acids, such as palmitoleic acid and vaccenic acid found on the skin surface were oxidatively decomposed to 2-nonenal, which may be the cause of the phenomenon commonly known as old person smell.[4]

A scientist in Japan, Shoji Nakamura is devising products for a cosmetic line to meet the market.[5] He says, "Over time, this fatty acid is broken down by bacteria inhabiting the skin or by lipid peroxides (which are present in larger quantities in older people), producing a substance called nonenal that 'has an unpleasant... smell... closely approximating... that of old books'."
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and
There is an alternate view. In 1999, the Japanese trade magazine “Beauty Technology” reported that a researcher at Shiseido Laboratories has traced the body odor to a fatty acid known as palmitoleic acid. He has also learned that the body of a person up to about the age of 30 does not secrete a noticeable amount of this substance, but that once a person-- whether male or female--hits 40, the volume rises sharply. The volume of palmitoleic acid released by the human body is 10 times as great among people in their seventies as in their forties.
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Someone would make a fortune selling Palmitoelic acid neutralizers. Then again, what should old people smell of?
Roses? (I think if they all smelled of Roses, Roses would be extinct pretty quickly)
 
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I think it's because of all the medicine they take and maybe they don't change their clothes as often as they should.
 
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