WWTD - New heating system. Heat pump or stay with oil?

[Sailawaygirl]

Our oil boiler needs replacing and is on its last legs. We are trying to choose between getting a new oil burner - (90% efficient compared to old one which is 70% at best) and a heat pump. (we will get some new radiators with both).

House is a small 3 bed 1930's semi ex council house in the country side. EPC - D.

I am doing the oil cost vs cost of eclectic calculations but we will probably be moving in 3 - 5 years so what i want to know is....

If you were going to buy a house what would appeal most to you heat pump or oil?

Oh god, heat pump.

I absolutely resent having to fork out £300 to £600 at a time for oil in winter (in a 1300 litre tank, it was double that in old house, which was a 2500 litre tank - I spent £1200 on one winter fill).

When Russia invaded Ukraine, the prices spiked from 45p when we moved in (July) to 60p (normal for winter) to £1.30 by March, and they stayed around the £1.10-1.25 mark for a very long time.

I absolutely hate that it is not regulated. Every time I order oil now, I think ‘am I going to find a house to buy and have to leave £500 of oil for the next tenant?’

I hate that the oil clubs can under deliver then argue they have not because ‘you can’t get an accurate reading.’

We actually moved out of a (crusty old, Uninsulated, single glazed) rental because the oil cost went from around £350 to £1250 A MONTH in March 22.

(we did not buy any, we turned it off and froze, then spent the next 3 months looking to move)

You need good insulation and a lot of radiators with heat pumps. And they can cause noise - if not noise you can hear, a low pitch one you can feel. And you need lots of rads. Have a good read on old MN threads.

Despite the above I would go heat pump every time, oil is a volatile ballache and not being on it is my no. 1 criteria for our next move.

You might want to cross post this to Rural, btw.

Wouldn’t you need to do some extra work - insulation and new pipes etc with heat pumps. I’d let someone else do that as a big renovation job myself or do it for a new house but not one you are leaving.

I'd probably go with a heat pump - there are good grants around bringing the cost down to comparable with an oil replacement.

I'd also insulate the wazoo out of the loft at the same time.

I voted heat pump (would have been different if you could have gas), but agree with @Stainglasses that I wouldn't want to be spending too much if I were planning to move in a few years' time.

Having said that, oil would put me off as a buyer unless the price reflected the cost of replacing it, so it's worth getting some quotes done for the heat pump and insulation.

Our boiler wont last till next winter so needs to be done soon, so we can't wait.
Install costs are about the same 5k vs 6k/7k

I'd look into heat pumps.
My PIL used to live rurally and they had a wood pellet fired system. I suspect had the technology been better at the point they had to replace their oil system they would have got a heat pump.

Our properties sound similar. We've just had a quote from Octopus, they work out quite cheap (£2900k) for a 'standard' all-in quote, new radiators if needed, water tank and all.
Our combi oil boiler is 20 years old as is the oil tank. So both need replacing soonish, the boiler needs it NOW, lol.
We chose heat pump because with the increased Govt BUS grant it makes installation a competitive price.
Heat pumps work in a different way to gas or oil, so that has to be learnt but I think it's worth the effort. Next the EV car!

Mostly though we'll be happy to get rid of the oil tank from the garden, the risk of oil being nicked or a spill happening is no fun either.

Heat pump & solar. Even if the solar is just to heat the hot water.

Heat pump

We replaced our Oil two years ago and it’s so much better. Oil is dirty, hassle ordering, cost goes up and down. ours was ancient so no brained to change and didn’t want Oil

If I bought a house in future with oil still, I would want to be offering £20k less for the cost and hassle to change to heat pump and solar

Heat pump and ideally solar too
Replaced ours a year ago from gas which we then disconnected so we no longer pay the gas standing charge. Bills down by about 40% in total (though about half of that will be thanks to the solar).

However there are so many cowboy heatpump installers out there that don't know what they're doing and there are loads of people on here who will you "don't go near a heatpump you'll never be warm again" etc. . The truth is it's not an off the shelf thing, you need proper heat loss calculations done by an expert and may need to replace radiators if yours are not large enough. You may need some pipework alterations too. Definitely look into it and it would be my first choice but your house is not necessarily well suited to it. You also need somewhere to put the (probably air source) heat pump in the garden.

Heat pump. We have oil too. It's a pain.

I think oil purely because you say you are looking to move in the next 3-5 years, as I'm not sure you'd recoup your investment on improving insulation/radiators etc. with a heat pump when you came to sell.

We replaced our oil boiler with another oil boiler last year and it reduced our annual oil spend by over a third. We are now saving to make the necessary house improvements (£££ in our case) so that the next boiler will be a heat pump and hopefully some solar panels too.

I must be the only person that like oil - but it’s in a smallish, modernish house. 1000 litres does a full year of heating the house to 18degrees and hot water! I think it’s pretty cost effective in a well insulated house.

@Spacecrispsnack - last time we filled back in spring 2022 it cost us over €2500 for oil and that wasn’t filling tanks. We had 4000l oil tanks, and On a normal year we used over 3500l oil. ( it’s minus temp often all winter where we live). We last filled filled to 4000l when the price was lower, but it’s so expensive now. Plus have to pay x2 a year compulsory inspection and chimney clean where we live (€60 ish a go). Our oil only did heating. Water was on electric unit costing €€ also

In comparison we now move to district heating. It’s basically communal heat pump. All our heating, and hot water is now on it. We pay €200 a month and that covers everything. Our electric bill has also dropped now water off it. Our house is around 220m2 (6bed) and we heat to 21 all winter

I must say I'm confused by people saying just get oil if you are thinking of moving. This is our first house and lots of FTB do a full renovation or modernisation and then move quite soon?

We arent looking at solar because it is a bigger and longer investment but cost and work wise heat pump is only a bit more so if it would make the house more buy able it would be an extra bonus

You'd probably need to do a lot of extra work, yes. New radiators. Possibly underfloor heating. Insulation. It's why we have been put off--the disruption.

I said it because new conservatory/kitchen/bathroom/flooring/decorating renovations all look lovely when finished and so add value to your house. Improving insulation and pipework etc is either hidden or doesn't really add wow factor, so you won't necessarily get so much back from your investment in terms of boosting the sale price. Buyers will like that you have a heat pump, but likely won't pay a premium price for it that reflects all the other work.

Oil!!! We've had the heatpump installed under the rural Gov scheme.... My bills are through the roof. Despite having solar too.

Our oil worked out roughly £100 a month across the whole year. Electric bill has doubled! It hates temps lower than - 7 as we discovered and had to wait for it to thaw out..... That was fun.... Not!

Saving grace is that we have a wood burner.

@CombatBarbie isnt that just the wrong heat pump was put in? Not a problem with actual heat pumps?
They run fine here (alps) and we get -20 some years. Our neighbours have had a heat pump 10-15 years already and their house is always boiling (about 25 degrees).
Our good friends living in Northern Sweden and use heat pumps no issue, but you have to have one designed for minus temperature. Most people in uk seem to install ones that don’t work well below 5 degrees and it’s that temp most the winter

Sorry @CombatBarbie it looks like you got given the wrong sort of heatpump. Ours is fine in up to minus 20 and friends in Norway have heatpumps that are very happy in conditions colder than that (which they frequently are).

It says its fine up to - 12.....😂 It's not!

I also wondered we've been installed with one that's too small. It's a 5 bed detached former Manse with 70cm thick stone walls (we have taken back to stone and put insulation boards) and down stairs cannot get to temperature. But it's more "open" than upstairs.

Hmmm may need to do some investigating.