Upgrades to 1970s home

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carmel65

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Hi
I read the contributions on these forums with great interest.

So I am hoping you can help me decide what to do next. Here’s the background.

We have a cold 4 bed 1970s house.
We had the attic insulated recently.
We have two bedrooms internally insulated and we can feel a real difference in these rooms.

We had a blower test last year and an infrared survey (verbal not a professional report). As a result, we had our window seals and hinges replaced, and sealed up our chimney. We also installed a gas combi boiler, but radiators are 5-15 years old. We have seen benefits this winter.

We are retired and we have decided we do not want to move home. So now we are ready to undertake more significant renovations to the house.

Here’s some more details of the house.
  • 4 bed two storey detached one side, other side original garage attaches to double height side of next door.
  • Two storey extension added to back of house late 1970s.
  • Garage flat roof converted late 1970s and now part of an open plan kitchen/diner.
  • Windows are double glazed PVC 15-25 years old.
  • House sits long and narrow on the site, back east facing, front west.
  • Both long sides are red brick. Front back mix of red brick/white walls.
  • Suspended timber floors.
  • House heats up but looses heat very quickly.
  • More recently experienced some condensation, mould problems in open plan kitchen area.
We want to end up with a warm and cosy home.
We want to have good air quality.
We want to upgrade the structure of our home so that we can enjoy it for the remainder of our retirement.

We are looking for someone to guide us through what upgrades would work on our home, project manage the work and ensure that these are done to a quality standard.

For example we looked at new windows but backed off when we realised we could not assess ourselves whether there were installed properly or not.

I have spent considerable time researching this, but I’m not sure what ‘professional’ I need or how best to start. I find the different types of surveyors/engineers confusing. I can only liken it to my recent hospital experiences where you have to understand which specialist can fix your problem.
 
Big ones to tackle are attic (which you have), walls and suspended floor.
The walls can be either a cavity fill, external wrap or dry lined. Of these cavity fill is likely cheapest and least mess on the inside. There is an SEAI grant of 1700 available.
The floors are a little more tricky. Suspended floor can be pulled up and insulated, difficult and long job DIY. Get a contractor probably best. Size depending, but likely at least 5000. No standalone grant as far as I know.
After that windows and doors, and at that stage you've managed to keep the heat you use in.
 
OP, (not answering your query, I know) your suspended timber floor is likely a major cause of your rapid heat loss. I'm very surprised this was not highlighted to you during your blower door test last year.
There are different approaches available to you depending on how disruption you are willing to put up with and how much you want to spend but even doing the basic, which doesn't necessarily need to cost a lot, should result in a decent improvement.

The professional you are likely looking for is someone either trained or very familiar with the primary passive house standard principles and who can apply these principles practically to your house, budget etc.
 
When you got the BER done for the attic grant there should be a second report called the Advisory report that will make suggestions as to what else you can do.
You'll see a set of indicators as to which of these will benefit you most and the relative costs - it might depend on the assessor and what you already have done.
 
Thanks for the feedback.

The floors are definitely on our list and were highlighted during the blower test. But we chose to go after what appeared to be the quick wins.
Is it feasible to approach the floors on a phased basis, for example about 50% of the downstairs floors are in the open plan area and the rest are spread between the sitting room, dining room and hall? Someone suggested looking into the possibility of replacing the open plan floor with a concrete one does this sound like an option we should explore further? Are there companies/people who specialise in insulation of floors in our type of home, if so where would I find them? Or what qualifications would I be looking for?

Where would I source a professional who is familiar with passive house standards, what professional body or organisation might they belong to? I am sure we can find an architect and maybe even be lucky enough to find a decent builder, but what professional would be able to ensure that all of the different retrofits will ‘fit’ together and ensure the work is completed to the right standard?

I can see the industry is currently geared up around BER standards, but from what I have read, in our type of home, there may be quite a difference between a comfortable home and a ber rated one. I can see the attraction of these one stop shops, when the alternatives are so difficult to source.
 
70's semi myself

There are the one stop shops for energy upgrades and the SEAI website can advise. Our experience of SSE Eirtricity was very negative I have to say, they were borderline useless but it did give us some ideas but we had no faith in their ability to delver. Currently doing solar panels and wrap insulation and the cost is around €10k cheaper then going with the one stop shop by going individually to contractors and managing the projects ourselves (which is not that difficult)

talk to your neighbours as well or people you' know in similar houses but it does sound like an insulation issue if the house is loosing heat and no point upgrading the heating without fixing that.
 
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carmel65 said:
Where would I source a professional who is familiar with passive house standards, what professional body or organisation might they belong to? I am sure we can find an architect and maybe even be lucky enough to find a decent builder, but what professional would be able to ensure that all of the different retrofits will ‘fit’ together and ensure the work is completed to the right standard?
Click to expand...
A 'certified passive house' designer, consultant or tradesperson is the qualification you are ideally looking for. These people will have gone through the rigorous training on passive house principles etc. The PHAI (Passive House Association of Ireland) will have further information.
The 'Enerphit' standard is the passive house standard for existing houses so you could also look for experience achieving this standard.
 
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