When it comes to social housing in Liverpool, our home city, we know a thing or two about the struggles families face. There has never been a time when there haven’t been people living in these homes who struggle with fuel costs. Lately, however, the situation has worsened.
Stagnant wages, high fuel costs, and limited retrofit options have led to a cost crisis. Average heating bills are rising, leading families to spend more of their monthly budget each year. Many in social housing across Liverpool will feel the pressure of these rising costs and have valid concerns about how they can continue to support their lives.
At Flutter Shutter, one of the ways we’re driving improvement in this sector is through our window system, incorporating energy efficient blinds in Liverpool social housing. Today, we will cover how these blinds can help to cut the costs haunting everyday people.
What is Social Housing?
Social housing stock likely brings up a range of mental images. The reality is that it can include a wide variety of homes. For instance, social housing stock can include flats, detached homes, apartments and more. The defining factor in whether housing stock is social or not is its ownership and rental rates.
Social housing stock is often priced at a lower rent than the market rate. Alternatively, it can be part-rented in shared ownership schemes or part-sold as a long-term contract.
Why are Fuel Costs a Problem
Fuel costs have always been a problem. That said, they have worsened significantly in recent years for various reasons. For those in social housing, incomes are often lower, and thus years of low wage growth paired with high inflation have effectively shrunk home budgets.
How do Energy-Efficient Social Housing Blinds Help?
Many energy efficient blinds in Liverpool homes have varying effects on monthly fuel bills. With such a range of energy-efficient blinds across Liverpool, from dozens of businesses, an all-encompassing statement can be misleading.
So we are specifically referring to the energy-efficient social housing blinds that are as effective as the ones included in our own system, Flutter Shutter.
You can read more about Flutter Shutter’s window system in our most recent winter update.
Reduce Thermal Bleed
These blinds can help to prevent energy from leaving the home. So the heat within a building becomes trapped there. Reducing thermal bleed reduces the heating required to keep the building warm.
In turn, this leads to lower fuel bills in social housing, which could otherwise be costly to keep warm. This also has the added benefit of being cheaper to install than most costly measures, such as triple glazing.
In our own testing, social housing with blinds proven to be energy-efficient has been shown to have lower year-on-year costs than social housing without blinds.
Better Heat Regulation
Housing with household blinds across Liverpool has been found to be more consistent in heat use, with many of these homes able to better regulate temperature. This is because these energy efficient blinds in Liverpool housing can be adjusted to meet the tenant’s needs.
During warmer periods, they can be opened to let heat in and closed during colder times to prevent heat from escaping. This thereby allows for better heating management. In turn, this means a reduction in shock spending, where a tenant may find themselves turning on the heat multiple times over the day.
Instead, the heat can be used briefly in the morning while the home stays warm all day.
We previously wrote about how this works in our blog on insulation and solar dampening.
Improvements on an EPC Rating
Our window system, including our bespoke social housing blinds, can improve an EPC rating. This, in turn, can help to facilitate better financing options and renovation work that would further improve the quality of life within the home.
All of this to say that a better EPC rating means increased energy efficiency and lower costs.
Plantation Shutters in Liverpool Social Housing
When it comes to social housing blinds, their effect can be significantly boosted when paired with a plantation shutter from Liverpool. The options for what plantation shutter to use are significant. So we are specifically talking about proven energy-efficient ones.
When combined with energy efficient blinds from Liverpool businesses, this results in even greater improvements in a home’s energy usage. Not to mention, this enhances the installation’s aesthetic beauty.
Flutter Shutter combines the best of these products in our own secondary glazing window system. Leveraging both to significantly bring down the amount of energy being lost through a building’s windows.
Want to Cut Your Costs with Our Social Housing Blinds System?
As an energy efficiency measure backed in part by the government, we can help you!
Flutter Shutter, our system that leverages social housing blinds and plantation shutters in Liverpool, can significantly reduce fuel costs month on month for any building.
You can get in touch today via our contact form, by phone on 0151 245 4691 or by email at contact@fluttershutter.org.
If you want to know more about our work, then you can visit our blog, our page on Flutter Shutter in heritage sites, our work with registered social landlords and see our informative brochure!
