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Energy Performance Certificates
(EPC) Winchester, Hampshire

Domestic Energy Assessor Hampshire.

Energy Performance Tips & Advice
To Help Save You MONEY

At Property Assess we love to help. The following guidelines can help you enormously by saving money in the long term and helping our planet by reducing your carbon footprint.

A list of resellers for some of the items listed below are available on our resources page. If you are serious about saving money on your energy bill's, you may be able to apply for a grant for up to £2500 to help towards your improvements.

Domestic Energy Assessors have been thoroughly trained to look at your home and report our findings of the impact your home is making on our planet.

By making use of our knowledge and using some common sense, the following guidelines have been provided complimentary to our services:




Chapter 1: How You Can Save Money Straight Away
Chapter 2: It's The Small Things That Make A Difference
Chapter 3: Getting Your Home Ready For An EPC
Chapter 4: Final Thoughts

Chapter 1

How You Can Save
Money Straight Away

This short guide is designed to help you to save money on your household energy bills. In addition to these savings, you are also making a big difference in helping our planet and the emissions we are sending out there.

So, how can you save money? Well, the following bullet points are the first major steps you can take to make significant improvements to your property, some of which are very cost effective, others are not so cost effective, unless you intend to stay in your house for a number of years:-

1. If your home has a cavity wall, consider having this filled with insulation. If your home was built after 1982, chances are that it will be already filled under the building regulations that came into force in 1982/1983. A reputable cavity wall insulation company will do a survey on your house to check if it is suitable for insulation. You can also enquire with your local council to see if a grant is available to help with the costs. The heat loss through your walls is significant and insulation will save you money on heating your home.

2. Take a look in your attic and measure the depth of the insulation. If this is under 250mm, consider adding more insulation to 350mm to help stop heat loss through your roof. This is a very cheap and easy method of insulation.

3. If your heating system has a hot water cylinder, consider increasing the insulation to 150mm by adding a tight fitting jacket. Again, this is a cost effective and easy method to stop heat loss from your cylinder.

4. If you have single glazing, partial double glazing or very old double glazing, it would be worth replacing your windows for the latest e-coated uPVC windows. The heat loss through windows is significant and full replacement would be a great long term benefit to your fuel bills. For listed buildings, you would need to seek an alternative solution such as secondary double glazing or go to the expense of specially manufactured window frames.

5. Your heating boiler can make a significant impact on your fuel bills and carbon footprint. If you have an old boiler, consider replacing it for a band A condensing combination boiler which will be the most energy efficient solution. Although, not so cheap to do, when replacing boilers, look for the most energy efficient system you can afford.

6. Install thermostatic radiator valves to allow for heating to be adjusted in each room. For unused rooms, turn this valve to off or number 1.

7. A room thermostat is a great addition to your house if not already installed. By installing one of these, you can easily adjust the whole house temperature by one simple control.

For items 6 & 7, these are now mandatory in properties if you have any new plumbing work carried out in your house, or build a new property.

8. If you have an open fire in any of your rooms, the heat loss up a chimney is significant. If you rarely use your fire/s, consider fitting a chimney balloon which is a temporary solution and stop heat loss. These can be easily removed when you use the fire. If you never use your open fire, then it would pay to put in a more permanent measure at the base of the chimney, such as a made to measure board. You can buy chimney baloons here.

9. If you are currently using electric, oil or LPG for your heating system and you have mains gas coming into the house or it is available in your street, it would pay to convert your heating system over to gas as a cost effective measure and reduce your carbon footprint.

10. Finally, and really depending on your finances, house position and investment on your returns, you could consider installing solar panelling for your hot water supply and/or photo voltaic panels for your electricity supply. As these are quite expensive to install, you would need to be satisfied about your investment and how long you will be staying in your house. However, they can make a huge difference to your carbon footprint and you can be satisfied in the knowledge that you are generating your own electricity.

Chapter 2

It's The Small Things
That Make A Difference

You have probably heard of the old saying "look after your pennies and the pounds will look after themselves”.

Well, nothing could be truer when it comes to the small things in your home to help save some extra money on your energy bills and still make a huge difference on the impact to our global warming.

I know at first glance the following list may look ridiculous, but by getting into a habit of actually doing these suggestions, over the year, you could probably save enough money for a nice weekend away! Think about it!

1.      Switch off all of your audio / visual equipment at the socket when not in use. This includes your stereo, TV, digi box, DVD player, computer & printer, games consuls etc, etc.. Do not leave on standby as this uses electricity.

2.      Switch off any lights in rooms not being used at the time.

3.      Fit low energy light bulbs throughout the house, including your side lights. These not only save energy, but they will last up to 12 times longer than conventional bulbs. You can buy high brightness low energy bulbs here.

4.      If you have a thermostat on your hot water cylinder, turn this down to 60 degrees.

5.      Wash your clothes on a 30 degree cycle instead of 40 or 60 degrees.

6.      Avoid unnecessary use of your washing machine, tumble dryer or dishwasher.

7.      Avoid leaving your fridge / freezer door open when not in use. I.e., when loading in shopping or whilst cooking.

8.      Switch off your mobile phone charger after use. Do not leave on standby as this uses electricity.

9.      Turn down or turn off any thermostatic radiator valves in rooms you do not use.

10.  If you have a decorative lounge gas or electric fire, consider not using it when not needed or keeping it down very low if needed.

11.  If you have a room stat in your hallway, turn this down a few degrees to a more comfortable level.

12.   And finally, adjust the on & off time on your heating / water programmer to save a few minutes during the day.

Chapter 3

Getting Your Home
Ready For An EPC

Because your home cannot fail an Energy Performance Certificate, there is no right way or wrong way to present your home for the EPC. But you can improve the results of the assessment before we arrive.

Why? Well by increasing this final result, you are not only saving money on energy bills, but demonstrating to your potential buyer / tenant that you are serious about saving energy and the more work you put in now, the better the results, the more likely you are to secure your buyer / tenant.

How? If you are considering placing your home on the market to sell or to rent out, you should consider following the suggestions in the previous 2 chapters which will help increase the final results of your energy certificate.

Any upgrade you can do now will pay dividends to your results. Just by replacing your light bulbs with low energy bulbs will increase your energy performance data, upgrading the jacket on your hot water cylinder will increase the results. Laying deeper insulation in the roof will help also.

Remember, that the more you can do to promote your home in a good light, the less opportunity a buyer / tenant has to negotiate the price!

Chapter 4
Final Thoughts

Well, a massive thanks from all of us here for reading this very short booklet on how to save money whilst helping our environment.

We sincerely hope that you will seriously consider all or at least, some of our recommendations for improving the energy efficiency of your home. There may be more you can do to help than on our list, but it is a great way to start and to get into some good habits.

Many of the suggestions are incredibly simple to do like switching off things and changing light bulbs, so we want you to start with these right away.

The more costly recommendations will need some serious thinking about, but please do speak to your local council and seek advice about any home improvement grants you could be eligible for.

If you have enjoyed reading this booklet and you know someone who would benefit from reading it, then please do pass it onto them.