Solid wall property

stuart45

The old cavity walls with a brick inner skin, and open cavities were not much more thermally efficient than a 9 inch solid wall.

lookstraightahead

I have a Victorian cottage with solid walls and I love it. The walls have been up for 270 odd years

Martico

lookstraightahead said:

I have a Victorian cottage with solid walls and I love it. The walls have been up for 270 odd years

Sounds suspiciously Georgian, with apologies for pedantry.
No matter - my 1920s house is also still standing, no cavity, no damp, no structural worries at all

FreeBear

Martico said: - my 1920s house is also still standing, no cavity, no damp, no structural worries at all

Late 1920s semi here. Built on the cusp of changing building practices in that it is cavity wall on the lower half, and solid brick on the upper. Slowly making thermal improvements such as replacing the windows and insulating the external walls. Well fitting DG windows has made a huge difference in the ability to keep the place warm, mainly due to the elimination of all the cold draughts. Insulating the solid brick walls is making a slight difference, but it will take a very long time to recover the cost through savings on heating bills. Reducing the risk of damp and the inevitable black mould makes up for it (doing the work myself keeps the cost down).

Dustyevsky

Your worries are not perhaps from the property itself, but from governments pursuing the unattainable 'net zero by whenever' policies. 

If you read the runes, 'environmental safeguarding' probably will continue to be used as an excuse to push certain agendas determined in places beyond Westminster. Measures like banning gas boilers and promoting fully electric vehicles haven't gone too well, so far, though. Also, bulldozing thousands of perfectly liveable homes at a time of shortage doesn't seem likely. Maybe expect to be penalised in some way, like those who drive the old diesel cars the government at one time saw as flavour of the month!

BungalowBel

I have owned my own home since 1976.  Three different properties.

Not one of them has had cavity walls as they have all been too old.  In fact the one where I live now, built in 1930, seems quite new compared to the the other two!

I wouldn't worry about it if you like the house.  There are millions of properties in the UK built like that.

Albermarle

I also live in a 1920's semi with solid walls. However we have had  a rear and side extension, plus a loft conversion.
If you then also take into account the party wall with the neighbour and the double glazed windows, then there is only a limited amount of old solid wall left exposed to the elements. It is only noticeable in one corner of one bedroom, which is quite a cold spot.
Previously had a smaller Victorian semi with original sash windows. Even that was not that difficult to keep warm as the rooms were not that big, and there were doors that stopped all the heat going up the stairs.

lookstraightahead

Martico said:

lookstraightahead said:

I have a Victorian cottage with solid walls and I love it. The walls have been up for 270 odd years

Sounds suspiciously Georgian, with apologies for pedantry.
No matter - my 1920s house is also still standing, no cavity, no damp, no structural worries at all

You're absolutely right I got my maths wrong. It is Victorian built in 1865. How I got to that figure is a mystery 😝