Property unoccupied over winter

jcuurthht

I inherited my late mother's property in January and it's been unoccupied since then.

It's a 1930s semi.

It was to be sold, however the sale fell through last month, and considering the housing climate it's possible it won't sell for another 6 months, meaning it could be unoccupied over winter.

The house insurance gave me 2 options for an unoccupied property:

• drain the heating system
• keep the property above 15C between November & April.

I hired a plumber to drain the system and the heating has been off since January.

Is there any risk to the property being cold over the winter period?

I currently have the neighbor checking the property once a week. Should I also ask them to ventilate it to prevent moisture build up.

greensalad

If you are keeping it cold, I would ventilate it constantly. Does it have windows you can leave on a secure latch to make sure each room is ventilated? Once a week likely won't be enough.

diystarter7

set it on a timer various times of the day at around 20c. We have those individual settings on all rads bar one and if you have one of those you save a lot of money as can leave it on a longer time and hearting will onl come on in rooms/areas that is below the set requirement.

You can sell a property at anytime at market prices and no gurantee pricess will be better in 6 months

shiraz99

diystarter7 said:

set it on a timer various times of the day at around 20c. We have those individual settings on all rads bar one and if you have one of those you save a lot of money as can leave it on a longer time and hearting will onl come on in rooms/areas that is below the set requirement.

You can sell a property at anytime at market prices and no gurantee pricess will be better in 6 months

That's hardly money saving asking them to have the heating come on up to 20⁰C at various times of the day.

chris_n

Is the stop tap off? Is the tank / boiler / pipework all drained?

macman

You'll probably get some damp and localised mould developing, but draining down removes the main risk.
It's currently a seller's market, as long as the property is realistically priced, so not sure why you think it would take 6m to sell? The longer you leave it unoccupied, the less attractive it will be to a buyer though, especially with the heating off.

Eldi_Dos

You can get dehumidifiers that have the option to drain constant and not rely on anyone emptying. Could set with timer or to come on at certain humidity level.

diystarter7

shiraz99 said:

diystarter7 said:

set it on a timer various times of the day at around 20c. We have those individual settings on all rads bar one and if you have one of those you save a lot of money as can leave it on a longer time and hearting will onl come on in rooms/areas that is below the set requirement.

You can sell a property at anytime at market prices and no gurantee pricess will be better in 6 months

That's hardly money saving asking them to have the heating come on up to 20⁰C at various times of the day.

It depends on how you look at this. EG, keep the house with a bit of heat using the TRV's on your rads I think they are called keeps away the damp and the damp smells and rot and more inviting when going to sell it. 
Therefore, to the untrained eye that may not own their own property this looks expensive but looking ahead you are saving from damp/condensation damage/etc so a savings.

If the OP has just the one central thermostat, then that would be expensive but what i said was use on a timer with tRV on a room-by-room basis.

BooJewels

We went with the opposite option of leaving the heating on, controlled by the thermostat insurers requested 13C, we went with 14 or 15C for comfort.  We were attending to clear it, so wanted it pleasant for not only us staying there, but to protect the fabric of the building and to feel fresher and more recently lived in to potential buyers.  We didn't want it to feel like a long-unoccupied house, which it was.  It cost of course, but we felt it was worth it.  We didn't need to worry about ventilation as the upstairs windows were in bad shape.

If I remember, you live in Germany, so not able visit regularly - is the house actually empty now?

shiraz99

I'm in a similar position with my late Dad's house, although it's not fully unoccupied as I stop by at least once per month for a few days. When I'm not there I've been putting the combi boiler onto holiday mode with a minimum temp of 12C, so far it's not got anywhere near that low.

TBH, I'm not sure whether it's better to do this or just turn the thermostat down in combination with the normal timer. For example, in holiday mode, should the temp ever get down below 12C inside, the boiler could be cycling on throughout the day to maintain that temp whereas if I just use a low temp instead of the holiday mode, say 14C, it would only come on during the times specified in the timer, to bring the temp back up to 14C, eg, just a few hours of the day. Not sure which would be less expensive.

jcuurthht

greensalad said:

If you are keeping it cold, I would ventilate it constantly. Does it have windows you can leave on a secure latch to make sure each room is ventilated? Once a week likely won't be enough.

Yes, I'm pretty sure it has these windows.

chris_n said:

Is the stop tap off? Is the tank / boiler / pipework all drained?

Yes, stop tap is off and all pipework has been drained.

BooJewels said:

We went with the opposite option of leaving the heating on, controlled by the thermostat insurers requested 13C, we went with 14 or 15C for comfort.  We were attending to clear it, so wanted it pleasant for not only us staying there, but to protect the fabric of the building and to feel fresher and more recently lived in to potential buyers.  We didn't want it to feel like a long-unoccupied house, which it was.  It cost of course, but we felt it was worth it.  We didn't need to worry about ventilation as the upstairs windows were in bad shape.

If I remember, you live in Germany, so not able visit regularly - is the house actually empty now?

Yeah the house has been cleared. 1 sale fell through last month just before exchange.

My concern with leaving the heating on is if something goes wrong with the boiler, I'm not local so getting someone round to fix is difficult. (I live in Germany)