I have received a letter from my local council to say that inspectors will be coming round to see if we need cavity wall and loft insulation. If we do these will be done free of charge (it's a council house) but we would have to clear the loft out. Does 3 foot of junk in the loft count as insulation?
There's 8" of fibre glass insulation in the loft and I have boarded the whole of the floor, so I can't see why we would need anymore. Things that are concerning me are: I don't have the time, energy or inclination to clear out the loft; I don't have a ladder long enough to get in the loft safely ( youngest son pulls himself up if I need anything from the loft); I can't afford the 3 skips that would be filled if I cleared it; I don't have anywhee else to store the stuff whilst the work was carried out; I couldn't put the floor back down as that would compress the insulation reducing its effectiveness; and finally, if the planets getting HOTTER then during the summer (not this one of course!!) I want the heat to escape and insulating the loft any further would just make the house so much hotter than it already is ( I know I could buy one of those portable air-con units that will produce not only cold air but loadsa carbon emissions as well).
I'm so confused
Do you have a choice Jill?
If you do and you don't want it then say so, I know we have a load of junk in the loft. But it is very well insulated, so we will never need to do it. The house is too old to have cavity wall though, no cavity walls LOL
Wendy
It's probably part of Government or Local Council policy and following the green guidelines etc. In that respect it's their property and you may have to have it done.
Our Landlord in the past 3 years has put D/Glazing, Storage Heaters and Loft Insulation.
It's unfurnished, so I guess he may not have had to do it?
I agree with you though. My last house (my own) had floorboards in the loft, all our goods plus a 13 feet square train set.
I'd have been peeved to have move all that lot!!
It should be said that Loft Insulation also helps to keep the house cool during the summer. It's simply stops heat or cold getting out, not stopping heat and cold getting in.
I'd ask the question.
Richard
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Right, Jill, bear with me as I'm trying to remember..........
My parents had the same thing in spring. Like Wendy, our house is too old with solid walls, so can't have wall insulation, but we had the loft done.
Our loft barely exists. It's very hard for a slim person to crawl in and the workmen used roughly 2 and a half bales/rolls of insulation and took barely 15 minutes. It sounds like your loft is much bigger than ours, but it seems a lot of work on your part, for maybe half an hour of theirs.
I think it's more a govenment thing than a council thing, as my parent's house is private. I can't remember if the rule is 8" or 12". For some reason 12" rings a bell, but I honestly can't remember.
I think it's done on the theory that it will cost the government less money long term to put insulation in, than having older people in hospital with hypothermia and pneumonia, putting strain on the NHS. I'm not being rude and suggesting that you're old, but it's apparently more economical that way. I suppose that it's just a one off payment for insulation instead of a 2 week (or however long) rehabilitation for hypothermia.
But that's another thread.................
Bit long - but this seems the 'paper' to go by, Insulation is at bottom.
I think the min for Insulation is 8" but most are now doing 12" (took it off Local Government websites)
[color=darkblue][b]The Decent Homes Standard
As a minimum all council homes will have to meet the following standards by 2010 to comply with Government requirements. This standard must be met as the absolute minimum under all four of the options.
Fitness
Each home must achieve all of the following:
• be structurally stable
• be free from disrepair
• be free from damp levels that could affect the health of the tenant
• have lighting, heating and ventilation
• have a piped supply of wholesome water
• have facilities for preparation and cooking of food
• have a suitably located toilet
• have a bath or shower with hot and cold water
• have suitable drainage.
Reasonable State of Repair
All “key componentsâ€
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Well the house I grew up in didn't have central heating (though we did have a back boiler for hot water), and there was nothing un-decent about it.
In winter we dried our washing on a clothes horse round the fire.
And the first house I rented had a bath in the kitchen, just one cold tap to the sink. You filled up the Baby Burco, which stood on the spin drier. When it was hot you wheeled it across the kichen and baled the water into the bath with a saucepan.
The bath drained into a hole (no pipe between plug hole and hole in floor, as we discovered when we had water all over the floor), then was piped under an out-house, and ran across the yard to a drain.
Other 'facilities' were 'out the back', with a catch on the outside of the door that could swing round and trap you inside in the middle of the night. In winter you needed a night-light to stop the cistern freezing.
That was 40 years ago and we did think it was a little bit old fashioned.
The first house I brought had an outside loo! I've lived in about 12 houses over the years and never had central heating. The two houses I've had which had it, I didn't turn it on.
I must admit to being a fan of insulation though.
And we're here to tell the tale
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I had to smile at the criteria of the Decent Homes Standard, in particular " Piped supply of wholesome water". When we bought this house the piped water was a hose that came from the well, in through the living room window then into a hole in the wall, along the floor of the dining room then into another hole in another wall to the kichen and attached to a sink unit. ( by the way, thats how you recognised the function of the room)Lol. The water itself was brown .... full of manganese. Needless to say we sorted that situation out pretty quickly.
Oh believe me there were a lot more quirks to this lovely old farmhouse but i,m afraid it wouldnt have conformed to any of the stated standards. If your interested i could tell you more ........
Derra
Before I get stuck in, I must point out that this wee farmhouse is lovely, it has so much potential , and a lovely atmosphere to it. Though when i relay the problems we have found. you might wonder why in hells name we bought it.
Now i,ve explained the kitchen ...... just a sink. All the walls were painted with lurid gloss paint which meant there was a condensation problem, the 2' walls are rendered stone and they couldnt breathe. The ceilings consisted of the floorboards to the bedrooms. The central heating, i use this term loosely cos it was on a one way system which meant the radiators were hot upstairs and cold downstairs, the actual radiators were fetchingly place halfway up the walls and painted red. The boiler is outside and the burner installed was for diesel not the kerosene that was actually being used to fuel it. Therefore it was dangerous, inefficient and had burnt the outside render.
Upstairs again the walls were gloss painted and the radiators were also a feature, placed as you would pictures on a wall, albeit very low walls. Now the previous but one owners had not been able to get their double bed out of the angled doors so of course they knocked down the dividing wall to the next bedroom so they could lower it through the "fire escape window". Im presuming here that the bed was built in-situ! The damage had never been put right.
The bathroom ..... there was,nt one, not even even a toilet. No outside one either, in fact it remains a mystery after all this time time as to what the arrangements were. Now we have asked the neighbors but they just give knowing smiles, apart from this hidden fact they are very, very good neighbors.
Theres lots more if your interested, we dont call this place Money Pit Farm for nothing you know. There is a happy ending if you bear with me to the end. Please don,t get the impression all the improvements have been made yet and that we could put pictures of it in House and Country, lol. Derra
Well apparently I can't opt out of having the loft done, according to the council and they wouldn't provide me with 3 skips, a ladder and a hunky fireman type to clear the loft! So I told them that it will be done to MY timetable not theirs and I will let them know when I've cleared it!
So far I have done 2 trips to the tip (recyling as much as possible of course) and put out 9 bin bags, and I have only cleared the shed and the cupboard under the stairs!!
I am such a hoarder. I don't mean to be but I always think I might find a use for something. Also having 2 children who have moved away only to come back again bringing with them all their crap as well just adds to the clutter.
Of course as soon as the council have put in the insulation I will be taking it right back out and using some of it in the chicken shed. They are putting so much down that I will be unable to lay the floor back down And as for energy saving lightbulbs - I can't see a thing in the loft with them. Oh dear, all that landfill space, all those carbon emissions from the 100 watt light bulb and the petrol to go to the tip, the plastic in the bin bags, the waste of NHS resources for physio sessions on my back and the cost to the company for days off sick - it'll be worth it when my chooks are toasty warm all winter :wink:
Free insulation????
Gee I WISH they gave us that here in Aus!
The house I am renting now (privately) is so cold in winter and actually manages to be TOO warm in summer (even though it is by the sea and I am in the coldest part of Australia).
It so badly needs insultion - I have no idea how the owners could have lived here without putting it in (which apparently they did)
That's the difference between renting privately or having a commission house. (Not sure what the difference is between "council" house in the UK and a "commission" house in Australia is)
My brothers rental house, an old dump, is next door to a five bedroom, 3 bathroom, 2 living area - 27sq brand new (commission) house, the previous tenants burnt the original down during a drunken fight, luckily thier six children were still running up and down the street at midnight when the fire broke out, so were out of harms way!!!!!!!
, and a lovely atmosphere to it. Though when i relay the problems we have found. you might wonder why in hells name we bought it.
