Funding needed to warm dangerously cold Sydney homes: Expert

It might be freezing inside, but social media has been on fire with complaints about the winter chill - and with Sydney homes colder than Finland, Sweden and even icebound Greenland, who can blame them?

Jess Maronese feeling the cold at her share house in Ultimo. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Sydney homes are colder in winter than Finland, Sweden and even icebound Greenland and are as much as seven ­degrees below the World Health Organisation’s healthy indoor standard.

It might be freezing inside but social media has been on fire as visitors from countries in the Arctic Circle complain about how cold it is inside Australian homes.

It has led to calls for laws to be changed to make landlords responsible for making old homes “habitable” – and even for taxpayers to help fund retrofitting existing homes to make them warmer.

To make matters worse, the Australian Energy Regulator has lifted the caps on how much retailers can charge for electricity as of July 1.

Two of Australia’s largest electricity retailers, Alinta and EnergyAustralia, raised their prices by 11 per cent and 8 per cent, respectively, making it more expensive for hundreds of thousands to turn their heaters on this winter.

Professor of Urban Systems and Health at UTS Nimish Biloria said homes studied in Finland recorded indoor temperatures between 20C and 24C, while Greenland had an average of 21.8C and, in Sweden, a separate study revealed 80 per cent of indoor temperatures were above 21C.

England, the country with the coldest homes in Europe, clocked in at 18.5C.

Jess Maronese says the cold is “unbearable some days”. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

“So if we actually start comparing ourselves, we are even cooler than the coolest of places in the world, then it becomes a big problem,” Mr Biloria said.

It’s a problem caused by houses being built for summer, not winter. Developers using the cheapest insulation possible and the high cost of retrofitting older homes.

Archit Madaan at home in Stanmore where he says it is so cold he can sometimes see his breath in the mornings. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Ironically, better insulation, double-glazed windows and insulated walls also help to keep down the heat in summer. But Sydney became used to the idea of just flicking on the airconditioning to fix the temperature – until power prices went ballistic.

Mr Biloria said grants for insulation from governments and councils could help fix the issue.

The danger of that is comparisons to the “Pink Batts” debacle of Labor prime minister Kevin Rudd in 2009-2010, when an idea to put better insulation in roofs ended in a massive rort of taxpayer money – and the death of four workers.

Another option could be redirecting other subsidies.

“For instance, now you have solar panels everywhere, and a solar panel subsidy,” Mr Biloria said.

“But the fundamental thing is, if your house is double- glazed, it will automatically make your house actually much more insulated. But there’s no subsidy towards that end.

“Different portions of Sydney have different problems, which actually implies that one-size-fits-all solutions are definitely out of the picture.”

Another chilling factor is “weather based bias”, Mr Biloria claimed, with locals psychologically resistant to cold-proofing their homes “because it’s hardly anything, only three short months of cold weather”.

Sydneysiders have taken to social media to vent over how cold it is. Picture: TikTok

Social media users are rugging up this winter. Picture: TikTok

But tell that to visitors, who are taking to social media.

Nick Fricky layered up in trackies, uggs, three top layers and two scarfs to simply sit in his living room, avoiding the AC because of running costs.

“It’s pretty normal to see people in puffer jackets on morning coastal walks, but I found myself wearing mine in the living room,” he said.

Lea Hobaiter also rugged up in a blanket, before declaring the inside of her house was “colder than in the fridge” and running it down to “some genius [deciding] insulation was for cowards”.

Ultimo’s Jessica Maronese said temperatures in her sharehouse are “unbearable some days” and force her to walk around the house wrapped in giant blankets.

“We don’t have internal heating, so I don’t expect to be able to walk into a warm home, like a toasty home, but I expect it to be at least a liveable temperature, and a temperature that when I walk inside, it feels like it’s warmer than outside,” she said.

Archit Madaan, who lives on the middle level of a three-storey home in Stanmore, said “it gets so cold in my house that I can sometimes see my breath in the mornings”.

The 25-year-old added it would take at least one heater in each room to adequately warm the house in winter.

But even if he could afford to do that, it would “probably not work” because the heat would escape from the ­windows.

Both Mr Madaan and Ms Maronese are renters, and there is no enforceable standard for indoor temperatures that landlords are liable for under the Tenancy Act, according to UNSW senior research fellow Chris Martin.

“Homeowners are required to ensure the home is habitable [under the Act], so if the premises are not habitable as a result of them being too cold, then it could still be a breach of (the tenancy contract).”

Mr Martin said regulation should not fall on tenants, who are apprehensive of bringing up maintenance ­issues out of fear of rent ­increases.

Instead, he said the government should look “more seriously” at appointing independent inspectors.

He suggested a role similar to a “property inspector to check premises are fit for habitation, before a property comes on the market”.

“Because by that stage, all too often, it’s leaving regulation up to tenants who are not in the strongest position to be effective regulators.”

Originally published as Funding needed to warm dangerously cold Sydney homes: Expert