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Sitting in a draft can be very uncomfortable and unpleasant. It can also, if you are the person responsible for paying the heating bill, cost you money. Fortunately there are some simple but effective measures which you can take to increase your comfort level whilst simultaneously saving money on your heating bill.

Drafts are the result of gaps, or holes, in your home’s insulation system – the fabric of the building more often than not. All that you need to do to address the problem is to locate the gaps and fill them. It really is as simple as that.

In particular, you want to look for gaps between the outside environment, which is naturally much cooler than inside your house, and your main heated areas. Second on the list would be any gaps between the heated and unheated areas within your house.

With that in mind, doors and windows are always a good place to start. Something as simple as an old sweater placed across the bottom of a door will often make a big difference to the comfort level of a room and the cost of heating it. Of course, you can get slightly more sophisticated solutions – such as brush strips for example – but even these are very inexpensive.

Flexible foam strips, usually with a self-adhesive backing, may also be used to seal gaps around the edges of both doors and windows. Once again, this is a very inexpensive, but very effective, solution to the problem of drafts.

Sanded floors are very popular these days. Sometimes gaps between floor boards can lead to drafts. These can be addressed by filling the gaps with a suitable sealant – ideally a flexible one which will allow for some movement of the floor boards. Alternatively, something as simple as a strategically placed rug can work wonders.

Sealant can also be a very effective method of treating any gaps between your house and the outside world. Pipes and cables are often the cause of these, but it is relatively easy to fix this problem.

In summary, draft-proofing your house is a simple, inexpensive and very effective method of making your house more comfortable. You will also see good results in terms of lower energy bills.

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