Loft Insulation Guides: Schemes, Costs and DIY

The guides below answer the questions that sit around the main scheme pages. Three deal with money and timing: how supplier-funded offers from British Gas, E.ON, Octopus and others really work under ECO4; how VAT applies to loft insulation, which is zero-rated when installed until 31 March 2027; and what the Warm Homes Plan says happens once ECO4 ends on 31 December 2026.

We write a guide when a question keeps coming up that the main pages cannot answer in a paragraph: "does my supplier's letter mean I will get it free?", "should I wait for the next scheme?", "do I pay VAT if I buy the rolls myself?". Each guide names the document it relies on, so you can read the original rather than take our word for it. When a scheme changes, the guide that depends on it is re-read and re-dated, rather than left to drift like so many pages that still talk about schemes long closed. Dates in each guide tell you when we last checked; if one looks stale, the contact form reaches us.

The rest are practical. They cover how deep loft insulation should be and how to measure it, whether to insulate the loft floor or the rafters, how to keep storage without squashing the insulation, why a well-insulated loft needs ventilation, and why the Energy Saving Trust treats spray foam under an old roof as one of the riskiest options. If you only read one, make it the page on who qualifies, because it tells you whether you need to pay at all.