Is anyone else’s house freezing?

[OneCyanHiker]

partly a question and partly a whinge (sorry). Our house is really struggling to get to temperature and hold on to it in this cold spell. Mornings are awful! We spend like £5 a day just on gas

Victorian house here. To be honest in this weather one has to have the heating on for at least 8 hours a day. Otherwise it gets too cold and takes lingering to reach a decent temperature. I tried just having mine on for a couple of hours twice a day and it never got above 12 degrees. .

I really feel for those who are choosing between food/clothes for their children and heating.

However if one has disposable income for niceties, I'd prefer to do without takeaways/newer phone etc and be warm ( or at least not miserably uncomfortable)

I've had a carpet fitter in all day and he has had an electric heater running ALL day as the carpets were cold/frozen in shape.

My heating was already on and it's currently 20 degrees in my house and I've turned my cheap gas heating off.

There really is absolutely no substitute for a well insulated house with decent doors and windows so that the house retains any warmth/ stays cool. Sadly alot of the housing stock in the UK is older and unfit for purpose, many with solid walls or listed, without a huge amount of work/expense.

Yes, freezing. I blame the weather.

^

😂

My home is a 2 bedroom terrace built in 1880, with outer walls built from half metre square stone blocks. When I moved in in 2003 there was no insulation at all in the attic, not even a layer of old newspapers. Having lived in Sweden for the previous 25 years I was mindblown by the realisation that in the 123 years since the house was built nobody had thought that it might be a good idea to roll out some wool, straw or paper to stop all the heat floating up and out through the roof.

I'm disabled so have the heating set to 21 degrees between 7am and 9.30 pm. At night the central heating is set to come on if the temperature drops below 16 degrees, but most nights it doesn't get lower than 18. It was below zero last night and the temperature got down to 17 before the heating came on automatically in the morning.

I just checked and the gas bill was £3.02, £3.05 and £3.01 over the last three days. I tried turning the heating down to 18 degrees after the Russian war against Ukraine sent gas prices soaring, but it made the house damp, gave me asthma and made me susceptible to one cold after another, which made all my other health conditions deteriorate. So now I overpay during the warmer months to be able to afford to keep the heating on through the winter. There are other things I'd rather spend the money on, but I'm investing in dodging bronchitis instead.

Yes it’s freezing. 2 bed here & some rooms are 18c with the heating on all day. Under loads of blankets.

our brand new energy efficient extension was 6c this morning. Rest of the house was 16c 😭 it reached 17-18c quickly though.

A new build should be well insulated and draught free.

Buy some joss sticks and crawl around searching for draughts.

If the house is damp (for example, from wet washing draped around, or inadequate bathroom extractor) it will feel colder.

Close all the internal doors, and in the morning check room temperatures to see which is worst.

If the radiators are fully hot (top, bottom and middle) but are not throwing out enough heat, they are too small.

This is often found in new builds where the contractors have calculated the heat loss grudgingly and saved money by fitting the smallest radiators that will just do. On cold nights, or heating from cold, too small.

Our house is super old, single glazed but it's not as bad as you might think because the walls are so thick it really holds the heat in.
We also have wooden shutters which are much better than curtains. Where we do have curtains we keep them closed and the doors between rooms shut.

Mine was build in the early 1700s, sash windows, listed. I only put the heating on briefly for maintenance, not to keep warm. I have had a heated blanket for the last two years and wish I'd bought one before.

£140 a month is quite little to spend on gas….

Is your heating on very little during the day? I am guessing that is the reason for your house being cold?

I’m visiting Mum in Richmond- Old cottage conservation area, under a duvet with a heated blanket- very cold in London today. 17.55 pm

Could I ask. Do people not over pay during the summer so there is enough credit to get through the winter?

I did! But had to request a refund due to redundancy and needing the cash for other things. I did leave a chunk of credit on my account to help with Winter heating but had most of it refunded.

I can afford some heating per day with careful planning though ☺️

We only heat a room 18 x 12 ft plus an hour of central heating twice a day. Cost is increasing with lower temperatures but gas is just under £6 a day right now but previously it has been around £4 a day.

I'm in a new build bungalow. Heating is set at 19 at night and 20 or 21 during the day. We are toasty warm.

I live in a 1890 stone miners cottage and it’s baltic . My kitchen is basically a lean too and has zero heating source at all so every time you open the door the temperature drops by 10c. I can have the heating on 22c solid 24/7 and my room temperatures barely go above 18c

@HellsBalls my house is a 1920/30 house and it's toasty warm during winter.

we put it down to the position the house is in. We get sunlight (when there is any) at the front of the house in the morning, at the side of the house early afternoon and the back of the house in the early evening. As you walk through the house you can really feel the difference in temperatures, room to room.

Our thermostat is set to 19 degrees, but DH and I work from home/im at home on mat leave, so we are very liberal with boosting the heating (2/3 times per day) to 22 when 19 feels like it’s not enough.

We fully renovated our house 5 years ago with brand new doors and windows. All the heating system was replaced at the same time and we made sure to maximise radiator output in all the rooms, plus we were eligible for the green homes grant and had cavity wall insulation and loft insulation installed under that scheme, so the house heats up and holds heat really well.

Costs us about £8 a day in gas to keep it this comfortable though.

House is 30 years old

Heating on for 12 hours a day
Doesnt get above about 17’

Radiators have been flushed out and new boiler

Im currently in bed under the duvet

7 layers of clothing including thermals here !!
have logs fire burning, costs a huge fortune
but still frozen
cheapest and warmest is a heated electric throw , be lost without mine
I have insulation but it’s cold ,
haven’t had a boiler for years broken
but somehow , keep moving and layers it’s doable

We have a new build 2800 ft.² with underfloor heating on from 4am until 9pm to keep the temperature around 20° costing us around £20 a day at the moment. Our house is full of electric so we don't have to worry about gas bill thankfully.

Electric throw is a godsend here! I put on a little plug in radiator next to me in the kitchen so it’s bearable when cooking, and on just enough next to me in the living room so that the cold air doesn’t trigger an asthma attack. Otherwise I stay under the heated throw, and have several hot water bottles at night. Luckily Dd doesn’t feel the cold, as there’s no way I could afford to have the heating on all the time in winter. I just put the central heating on for half an hour when it’s bath / shower time, and that and the dehumidifier mostly keep the mould at bay.

Yep- draughty Victorian house that we just bought. No loft insulation (roof needs fixing before I do that) and "vintage" single panel radiators. We have double glazed it now but I'm still wearing a beanie and puffa jacket. Woodburners go in next month though and all radiators replaced and moved so not under windows/ behind curtains so hoping next winter will be a different story.

I live in a very old, very cold house- single glazed.
It's costing us about £5 per day in gas. It will be more over the next few days as it's -3 here at the moment, so the heating is staying on constantly until Saturday by the looks of the forecast.
DW has just been to get a spare king size duvet from the airing cupboard, as she's cold- but she's cold in summer to be honest.
I might move and sit under it later, but at the moment I'm fine. I do have cold toes, but I can't stand slippers.