The Real Reason British Homes Are So Cold In Winter

Comments · 123

• JO

  @johnkeogh-m8f · 2 weeks ago

  We had central heating in a house built in 1933. We were lucky.

  15

• CO

  @corneliuswowbagger · 8 days ago

  At one point we went to Edinburgh for their then Folk Festival. For three years we stayed in a 100 plus year old B&B flat on High Street with a delightful retired couple. This was during spring break at the universities. It was by far the coldest home I have ever experienced and must have been worse in mid- winter! Great people, great experience, but one of the coldest experiences of my life.

  4

• SK

  @Skirliegirl-s7l · 2 weeks ago

  I grew up in a Northern British city, living in a terrace; I was 8 before we had the luxury of an inside toilet and I was in my late teens before we had central heating; all we had was a gas fire in the living room and dining room.  I recall there being solid ice on the window and breathing out fog! I still feel the cold worse than my friends and  colleagues. The only way to keep warm, was to wear a dozen layers and sometimes to get under a duvet.

  33

• VL

  @vladtepes481 · 12 days ago

  I grew up in a house built in 1936 in a Great Lakes State.  All winter it was 22 C inside everywhere.  Heat was provided by an oil furnace which was replaced with gas heating.  A whole house fan removed heat in the summer. The house now has AC.

  9

• FR

  @fredrika27 · 2 weeks ago (edited)

  The most asinine thing I saw while living in the UK was the doggedly adhering to traditional one pane glass, especially  in historical buildings. Once in Scotland, I stayed on the high street in Edinburgh. I paid £150 for frost on the windows and a heater that I had to put a pound in to warm up! It was so cold in the wondow sill that the curry I put there froze because of lack of refrigerator! Moved into the Holiday Inn the next day! Just no on all levels!

  15

• MA

  @mairedaly4926 · 2 weeks ago (edited)

  Britian is rather like Ireland so I&apos;ll give you the Irish reasons why<br><br>1. Poverty... Although Britain was richer than Ireland, it&apos;s poor were very poor. &nbsp;The housing for the poor was cheaply built<br>2. &nbsp;Heating Design; &nbsp;We had open fires rather than stoves, that&apos;s been changing thank goodness<br>3. Humidity. &nbsp;The Damp is a whole different kind of cold<br>4. Out of date housing stock, homes built in the 70&apos;s were built for cheap oil, for example. &nbsp;Folk are updating them, but if you&apos;re a renter.... you&apos;re often occupying out of date, expensive rental homes<br>5. Cost....Our homes are so very expensive and there&apos;s a shortage. &nbsp;Many are &apos;thrown up&apos; shoddily by developers to make huge profits, so the owners spend a lifetime catching up on repairs<br><br>Conclusion: &nbsp;After heat, the truth is, a de-humidifier is vital in Irish &amp; British homes

  66

• JU

  @JuliaPauline-bm9lo · 2 weeks ago

  Canadian here, where the temperature drops to well below 0 (Centigrade or Fahrenheit, your choice) and stays there. For weeks. Freeze-thaw-freeze cycle and the top-rolling garage door is frozen shut to the ground. So much snow you&apos;re shoveling twice a day and it&apos;s now piled higher than your head.<br><br>If &nbsp;you&apos;re a homeowner you just accept that windows, doors, duct-heat furnaces and air conditioning have to be replaced/upgraded every 10 to 20 &nbsp;years.<br><br>Using the Aga cooker oven to heat the kitchen? And that&apos;s why there&apos;s no &apos;OFF&apos; button? WHAT?!

  11

• IN

  @ingegerdandersson6963 · 10 days ago

  We put on more insulation on our old houses after the oil crisis in the 70s.

  2

• SH

  @shanedouglas6971 · 12 days ago

  I’ve never been so cold as being inside my aunts house in Kent,huddled by the fire place, and I hate to say this, Im Canadian!

  15

• HA

  @halfdane1693 · 2 weeks ago (edited)

  Sweden (and Norway, Finland and Denmark) &nbsp;has a lot of houses that are 100-200 years old that we live and work in. We just fixed them with more insulation, triple glazed windows and central heating.<br><br>But at pointed out, you need venilation as well.

  21

• RO

  @robertcuminale1212 · 2 weeks ago

  I lived in Dade County, Florida as a boy. Our house was of concrete block and no insulation. The floor was uninsulated terrazzo. We had one gas heater in the front room. In those years when we had a cold winter, we would all sleep on the floor of that room, December through February. That room also had a window type air conditioner/heater installed in the wall that my father had installed. The house was built in the early 1950s. There were jalousie windows and the cold air filtered in through each pain of glass. Even the front door was mostly a jalousie window. Really terrible construction. Cold to us was when the temperature dropped into the 30s and 40s.

  21

• CH

  @chrisbarnes2823 · 2 weeks ago

  One problem in today’s UK is hot water heat, before we had coal fires and lots of ventilation, now the house is sealed with high humidity. <br>Now I have hot air heating via ducts and I can control the humidity, plus I have six inches of wall insulation in wood framed walls. <br>People also keep all the doors and windows closed thus no airflow within the house causing damp and mold on the inside walls.

  19