Extreme heat and your home: protecting your property when the mercury climbs

On 19 July 2022, the UK passed 40°C for the first time since records began, with 40.3°C recorded at Coningsby in Lincolnshire. Heatwaves that once felt like a rare event are becoming a regular feature of the British summer – and our homes, built to hold warmth in rather than keep it out, are starting to feel the strain.

In this article, we’ll look at why UK homes struggle in extreme heat, the damage a long, hot spell can do to a property, and the practical steps you can take to keep your home cool, sound and protected – including where your insurance will, and won’t, help.

Why UK homes are built to trap heat

Most houses in this country were designed to do the opposite of what a hot summer demands: keep heat indoors so we stay warm and comfortable through the winter. That works beautifully in January. It works against us in a heatwave.

Buildings made from materials like brick and concrete absorb the sun’s heat and hold onto it, which makes them more likely to overheat. That’s uncomfortable for the people inside – and hard on the building itself. Prolonged heat can open up cracks, wear down surfaces and fade paintwork faster, while roofs can warp and crack under constant sun. As we sometimes put it: there’s no factor 50 for your roof.

Watch for subsidence in a long, dry spell

Hot, dry weather also raises the risk of subsidence – the downward movement of the ground beneath your home’s foundations, often because clay soil dries out and shrinks. It tends to show up gradually, so it’s worth knowing the tell-tale signs: new cracks in walls (typically diagonal and wider at the top), doors and windows that start to stick, and rippling wallpaper around cracks.

If you spot any of these, don’t panic – but do get advice early. Caught quickly, subsidence is far easier and cheaper to deal with.

What your insurance will – and won’t – cover

This is the part that catches people out. Home insurance is designed to cover sudden, unexpected events – not gradual wear and tear. Keeping your property well maintained is down to you, and longer, more frequent hot spells will make that maintenance matter more, not less.

Here’s why it counts: if a storm damages a roof that was already cracked, a claim can be turned down on the grounds that poor weather simply made an existing problem worse. Subsidence, by contrast, is usually covered under buildings insurance – but claims can be involved, and the excess is often higher than on other claims. From experience, the owners who fare best are the ones who understood their cover before anything went wrong.

How to protect your home from extreme heat

A few straightforward habits go a long way:

• Stay on top of maintenance. Longer periods of extreme heat take their toll on building materials, so keep an eye on your roof, walls and paintwork and deal with small problems before they grow. A well-maintained home is also far easier to insure and to claim on.
• Create shade. Make the most of cooler morning air, then close curtains and blinds through the day to keep rooms as cool as possible – a simple trick used across hotter parts of the world.
• Ventilate carefully. Open windows to keep air moving; still, humid air can encourage mould. But be mindful of security – remember to close any open windows if you leave the house.

Extreme heat and garden fires

The smell of sizzling sausages is one of summer’s great pleasures. But as the weather warms and the barbecues and firelighters come out, the risk of garden fires climbs – especially when lawns and borders are tinder-dry.

Most standard home insurance policies include some limited cover for your garden and its contents in the event of a fire, provided reasonable care is taken to stop it spreading. Every policy is different, so check your policy wording for the detail. And if your garden holds something valuable like a hot tub, check the single-item limit – you may need to insure it separately.

A few sensible precautions:

• Never leave a fire unattended. It only takes seconds for a fire to get out of hand, so make sure someone is always keeping watch.
• Take care with firelighters. They’re powerful stuff and can flare up quickly if they aren’t handled carefully.
• Dispose of barbecues, cinders and matches responsibly. Many garden fires start with coals dumped while still hot. Make sure they’re fully cold before you bin them, and take care where you discard matches, cigarettes or vaping materials.
• Keep water or sand to hand. Better safe than sorry – if the flames start reaching for your borders rather than your burgers, it’ll help you put them out quickly.

How L Wood can help

We’ve been arranging cover for homes and businesses across the region for more than 60 years, and in that time we’ve seen how much difference the right policy makes when the weather turns. We can review your buildings and contents cover, check your limits and exclusions, explain how subsidence and storm claims work in practice, and make sure your protection matches the home you actually live in – not an off-the-shelf assumption of it.

Talk to us

For tailored advice on protecting your home, get in touch with our team. Call us on 01274 515747, email mail@lwood.co.uk, or drop by – we’re here Monday to Friday, 8:30am to 5pm.