Green Deal MSE Guide Discussion

Green Deal A Total Waste Of Money !

Having paid for an assessment in April, spent months on the phone to installers and providers, sent that many emails I've lost count, to finally getting an installer to quote for external wall insulation and a provider to quote, bearing in mind that ECO funding is supposed to make it more affordable and the EPC states that a green tick are likely to be fully financed through the green deal I was shocked to receive a green deal calculation with ECO contribution off £3060.17, green deal finance £2434.23 with a customer (me) contribution of £9,160.60 !!! to have the work done.
As I am a homeowner on working tax/child tax credits (earnings below £15,800 pa) with my wife being severely disabled on DlA where on earth do they expect me to find that kind of money.
The green deal was sold as a way to make energy efficient improvments to your home with little or no up front cost can somebody tell me if 9k cash contribution is what they call little ?

West Wales Idiot - solid wall insulation will, eventually, attract more funding from energy suppliers. Their interpretation of the scheme, how it should run, how and what they are prepared to fund, appears to change on a weekly basis. It appears likely that solid wall insulation will attract significant funding as we approach the deadline for completion of measures under ECO. You may need to wait a year or so though!!!!

Spider125 - I would have thought that for the same reason as mentioned above, your chances of receiving a decent ECO funding contribution for double glazing will improve over time. As it is right now, I haven't heard of any glazing measures being installed under ECO/Green Deal.

In general I would probably favour dealing with a smaller, local installer.

I would also ask the installer if their is a choice of boilers (unlikely) and what boiler they install under the scheme. Installers will each have their boiler of choice, and you should take this into consideration when selecting an installer.

Hi all,
I paid for a green deal assessment. I was full of enthusiasm hoping to get the walls and flat roof on my extension insulated (it was already there when we bought the house and is freezing in winter). I thought I might need to borrow about £5000 and wanted to use the scheme to spread the cost of this. The annual savings estimated by my surveyor for all measures he suggested (which did not include what I wanted) was a grand total of £59. As borrowing cannot exceed the savings from the scheme I would be able to borrow £590 over 10 years to do the measures they suggested which would cost around £4,800! If I needed to borrow £590 I would stick it on my credit card and not be stuck with a loan against my house! I should have saved my £100 assessment fee for my utility bills and stuck a heater in the extension. Homeowners be warned before you pay for your assessment how low your possible loan amount may be for each improvement. The assessment is "non-invasive" so I still don't even know if my extension would require cavity insulation or solid wall (so it wasn't even useful to me in an informative sense).
Improvements suggested on my plan:
Increase loft insulation, cost £100-£350, max repayment yr 1 £12
Cavity wall insulation (**if cavity wall!!), cost £500-£1,500, max repayment year 1 £7
Heating controls, cost £350-£450, max repayment year 1 £10
High performance external doors, cost £3,950-£5,300 max repayment year 1 £59
If other people have similar recommendations/financial help available then it explains why there is such a low uptake of the green deal finance - it is simply not worth getting involved with for the small amount of help available.
I think my assessor ignored the flat roof insulation I had asked about as there was no way savings on utility bills would begin to pay for it - the scheme isn't structured towards helping people be warm and comfortable in their homes in this way if the numbers don't add up.
Hope my experiences are helpful to some people as if I had properly considered I could only be lent a small fraction of my monthly utility payment I would have realised the numbers involved would not stack up for what I wanted and saved my money.:(