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Insulation Tips To Keep Your Home Toasty This Winter

Are you already feeling winter’s chill? Even with your heating up to full blast? Not only is that going to cost you a fortune, but it is also proof that your property’s insulation isn’t quite doing its job.

When your home is properly insulated, it will retain its heat for much longer and won’t let any drafts in at all. As a result, you won’t need to have your heating on for as long or as high as you would normally have it. In fact, you might be able to go a few days without turning it on at all!

Old houses and new ones that haven’t been properly maintained often have quite poor insulation methods. If your home is letting in drafts and is very difficult to warm up, even with the heating on full, then you should consider what options you have to improve its insulation. Hopefully, some of the following ideas might help you stay a lot more toasty this winter!

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Add Rugs On Exposed Flooring

Sure, all those exposed wooden floorboards may look fantastic and help your home look very chic, but there’s one big problem with them – they will let a lot of heat out through the gaps in the floorboards. Even if you don’t see any cracks, there will still be some there that will be causing your home to lose a lot of warmth. Don’t fancy carpeting your rooms? No problem, you can always lay down some rugs instead. Placing a large rug in the middle of each room will make a big difference to the overall insulation of your home.

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Get Some Thermal Curtains

Regular curtains don’t do that well at cutting down drafts, even though they might cover the whole of the window. So, you should invest in some winter curtains. These are made from much thicker fabrics, and they often hang all the way down to the floor. When the window frame is fully covered by these thick and heavy curtains, you will find that you cut down on drafts and a lot less heat is lost through your windows.

And Open Those Curtains To Let The Sun In

Even though you might be tempted to leave your curtains shut for the majority of the time to try and trap all the warmth inside your rooms, it actually makes sense to open them during the day. Especially those on the south and west sides of your home. That is because these sides will be exposed to a lot of sunlight, and all that sun will shine into your home through the curtains, bringing plenty of warmth. Just remember to close the curtains once the sun goes down so that you can trap all of that heat into your rooms!

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Fix Roof Issues

If you know of any roof problems, you might want to call the folks at roofpro-llc.com to come and sort them out for you. This is especially important if you have any loose or missing tiles. These gaps in your roof will damage the insulation that it normally provides, and will result in a lot of lost heat. Not only that, though, but bad weather could be more likely to get into your home through any damage to your roof, which will reduce the overall temperature of your home.

Cover Windows In Bubble Wrap

Don’t have double glazing? If not, you will feel the chill a lot more in your home! Even if you have old double glazing, you might find that your home doesn’t feel quite as warm as it should. So, investing in some modern form of double glazing can really do wonders for your home’s insulation. But don’t worry if you can’t afford it just yet – you can simply use bubble wrap instead. Sound crazy? It really isn’t – you might even be surprised at how well this works! All you need to do is get a big sheet of bubble wrap from ukpackaging.com. It needs to be able to completely cover your window. Then, spray some water over the window and then press the wrap against all the glass. Don’t worry if you don’t want any visitors to see – you can simply peel it off and replace it once they have gone home!

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Insulate Electrical Sockets

Did you know that air can even pass in and out of the gaps in between your electrical sockets and the wall? Yep, it’s true! And even though hardly any air is going to pass through these gaps individually, when you think about how many sockets you have around the house, you will actually be losing quite a bit of warmth. And these gaps could contribute to a few drafts around your home too. If you take a look online, you’ll be able to buy some foam cutouts that will be able to cover up these gaps with.

Don’t Drain Away Bath Water Straight Away

As soon as you get out of the bath, you probably pull out the plug and let the water drain away, right? Well, when you do that, you will actually be heating up your bathroom pipes. All of that water could actually be used to heat your bathroom. You just need to leave the water in your bathtub until it has completely cooled down. By then, all of the warmth of the water will have heated up your bathroom. Once it’s cooled, drain it away and you don’t have to worry about wasting the heat in the pipes.

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Line Your Fireplace

Do you have an open fire? If so, it’s a good idea to line the back of it with some aluminum foil or a special fireback. You can often find all the equipment you need to line a fireplace within DIY stores. Doing this will reflect a lot of heat back into the room.

 

Once you start to use all of these tips, you will find that your home stays a lot warmer for longer. So you will definitely be very toasty over this winter!

Disclosure: This is a contributed post.

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2 Comments

  1. Cutting Costs This Christmas - Candid Mama
    November 20, 2017 at 9:31 am

    […] mentioned rugs and curtains with blinds earlier, and there’s a good reason why. Stopping the heat leaving the house through unnoticed gaps is going to make a huge difference to how much you spend. The last thing you […]

  2. 8 Common Winter Problems That Could Leave You Out In The Cold - Candid Mama
    November 20, 2017 at 9:39 am

    […] which means that your gas bills are sure to rise higher and higher. Luckily, there are lots of things that you can do to keep your home insulated. The first that you should consider is doubled glazed windows, as these are the best way to do […]

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