How much oil should they leave us?

[fruitstick]

We are about to buy a house with oil fired heating. They have said there will be 'minimal' left in the tank.

How much can we reasonably insist they leave. I realise it's not a hire car and we can't expect a full tank but don't want to panic about having no hot water 2 days after we move in?

Does it work like a petrol tank? Is there a red section?

We have oil fired heating and water, and so I understand where you are coming from.

I imagine the current owners will try and run the supply down and not buy any more oil than they need to before the sale, which is reasonable. I think it would be v difficult to insist they left a certain amount - it isn't an exact science of how much oil you use a day and the gauge isn't that clear (at least on my tank) so it would be tricky to leave a certain amount.

Had you thought about finding out from them who their current supplier is, and asking them to deliver a smallish amount of oil a couple of days after completion is due. Or at least finding out from the supplier how long they take to deliver more oil once requested? Might make you feel better once you have this info and can plan ahead better

We too have oil heating and water.
Agree with onlyaphase - find out who the supplier is and have them come and fill you up the day after completion.

It is unrealistic to expect them to leave you any more than minimum - ie why should they pay to heat your house for a week?

If you would rather they left you a decent supply then arrange to pay them for what they leave inthe tank

Seems reasonable to me to only leave the minimum (although I'd find it near impossible to engineer that in practice).

I find that with ours once it goes below 1/4 full (1000 litre tank) we're into a danger zone - can be less in there than you think (our dial moves down jerkily and suddenly). We've run out once - PITA to restart the boiler if oil runs out completely.

Arrange for a refill on completion day. You can always phone and cancel before the delivery if completion gets put back.

when we moved in they had recently had a delivery - we split the cost.

We have a plug in gauge in the kitchen which flashes when it is getting low.