Buying first home mid-gas crisis...

HeroftheWords

Good morning all!

I am after a little advice. Husband and I are expecting to complete on our first ever house purchase (after much scrimping and saving and heartache) in the next 4-6 weeks. Right now, we rent a house which uses heating oil, costing roughly £550 a year total. We therefore aren't with a gas supplier at the moment.

The house we're buying is currently supplied by British Gas. As it stands, the cheapest tariff we can get is £91 a month for gas, and this is going up by the week (it was £81 about 10 days ago...) We are starting to worry about the financial implications of taking on a gas-heated home right in the middle of this crisis - we are in a privileged position in that we can afford to pay £100+ a month for gas, but by golly it's a jump. And the house needs remedial work to fix a damp issue too, meaning the heating will be on a lot during the winter!

How best do I approach getting the cheapest possible tariff once we have completed? Is it possible to haggle down the quotes being given online? And is it really just a case of having to suck it up and pay the money? 

Finally, the tariffs we're looking at with British Gas lock us in to that price for 24 months. What is the likelihood the price of gas will go back down again, leaving us paying way over the odds?

Exceptionally grateful for any help and advice offered.

R. 

worrywart_3

You can’t haggle no, however it will be cheaper for you to go on the deemed tarrif which will protect you with the cap untill April especially as you say your going to be using a lot of gas initially. You need to be looking at the unit rates, the cap would be approx 4p per unit for gas 

Spacie22

When you move in you will automatically be placed on a "deemed contract" with whichever company was previously supplying the house. This will be at the capped standard variable rate which is currently far less than any fixed rate available on the market.  Take a meter reading, contact the supplier to let them know you've moved in and sit tight.

savers_united

The numbers being quoted will likely be based on what the previous occupants used, they may have been home all day, you may be working. They may like the house at 22 degrees at all times, you may be happy with 19-20, they may have heated all rooms, you may not need to, maybe they did not submu readings and it's based on estimates. 

Comparing to your previous property using oil is also diffcult, what fuel was used for cooking / showering in your previous property?
Is the new property bigger, older? 

Also not sure when the oil was purchased but its now up around 50%, so today's prices you could be paying close to £750 for oil, if it was purchased in 2020 then you can't really compare as oil prices fell through the floor. 

Your not really going to know until you get onto a tariff and start submitting readings, stick to the capped variable tariff for now, in the current climate not much else you can do so think about energy efficiency measures that previous occupants have not bothered to do. 

jimjames

HeroftheWords said:

Good morning all!
The house we're buying is currently supplied by British Gas. As it stands, the cheapest tariff we can get is £91 a month for gas, and this is going up by the week (it was £81 about 10 days ago...) 
R. 

The price isn't going up by the week at least not with the capped tariff. It increased on 1st October and won't increase again until April next year. 
Other fixed rate tariffs may be going up but you don't need to go for those, with the capped tariff you know how much the units will be until April and that will be cheaper than any fixed tariffs at the moment.

Spies

Phone them up when you move in and ask to stay on SVR

MaryNB

HeroftheWords said:

Finally, the tariffs we're looking at with British Gas lock us in to that price for 24 months. What is the likelihood the price of gas will go back down again, leaving us paying way over the odds?

Does the tariff have an exit fee? Some allow you to leave a fixed tariff without having to pay anything. Some may charge a fee (usually about £30 per fuel) to leave. If the gas price falls again to the extent where you'll save more then the exit fee then you can just pay the fee to leave early. 

HeroftheWords

savers_united said:

The numbers being quoted will likely be based on what the previous occupants used, they may have been home all day, you may be working. They may like the house at 22 degrees at all times, you may be happy with 19-20, they may have heated all rooms, you may not need to, maybe they did not submu readings and it's based on estimates. 

Comparing to your previous property using oil is also diffcult, what fuel was used for cooking / showering in your previous property?
Is the new property bigger, older? 

Also not sure when the oil was purchased but its now up around 50%, so today's prices you could be paying close to £750 for oil, if it was purchased in 2020 then you can't really compare as oil prices fell through the floor. 

Your not really going to know until you get onto a tariff and start submitting readings, stick to the capped variable tariff for now, in the current climate not much else you can do so think about energy efficiency measures that previous occupants have not bothered to do. 

Hi savers - current home uses oil for heating and hot water only, new home will be for heating and the gas cooker. I must say we haven't noticed anything like a 50% price rise for what we're paying. Bought 500 litres of oil yesterday and that was the same as what we paid for our last lot back in January. That's by the by though as we're moving out haha. 

New home is almost identical in terms of footprint to current home, same number of bedrooms too. It's practically a carbon copy (pun intended?) 

Thanks ever so much for your useful advice! ESG report (is that the right acronym??) did suggest some measures, and we'll be having insulation added when we do some of the remedial works mentioned, so that will help keep it a bit warmer, I'm sure. 

HeroftheWords

HeroftheWordds said:

Good morning all!
The house we're buying is currently supplied by British Gas. As it stands, the cheapest tariff we can get is £91 a month for gas, and this is going up by the week (it was £81 about 10 days ago...) 
R. 

The price isn't going up by the week at least not with the capped tariff. It increased on 1st October and won't increase again until April next year. 
Other fixed rate tariffs may be going up but you don't need to go for those, with the capped tariff you know how much the units will be until April and that will be cheaper than any fixed tariffs at the moment.

Interesting - all I know is that I have been through the exact same quotation process with BG twice. 10 days ago it was £81, last night it was £91. Maybe it's like airline tickets... the more you look at prices, the higher the prices get!

Sounds like I have definitely been looking at a fixed rate tariff, but from all you lovely lot I am very much getting the sense SVR is the better option. 

Thanks!

HeroftheWords

HeroftheWords said:

HeroftheWordds said:

Good morning all!
The house we're buying is currently supplied by British Gas. As it stands, the cheapest tariff we can get is £91 a month for gas, and this is going up by the week (it was £81 about 10 days ago...) 
R. 

The price isn't going up by the week at least not with the capped tariff. It increased on 1st October and won't increase again until April next year. 
Other fixed rate tariffs may be going up but you don't need to go for those, with the capped tariff you know how much the units will be until April and that will be cheaper than any fixed tariffs at the moment.

Interesting - all I know is that I have been through the exact same quotation process with BG twice. 10 days ago it was £81, last night it was £91. Maybe it's like airline tickets... the more you look at prices, the higher the prices get!

Sounds like I have definitely been looking at a fixed rate tariff, but from all you lovely lot I am very much getting the sense SVR is the better option. 

Thanks!

Dur, meant capped! 

Swipe

I wouldn't go overboard on your heating just because there's a bit of damp. Treat the causes of the damp and it will take care of itself.