The first week in a new flat is when sustainability habits form or fail to form. Almost every renter has walked into their new place, kept the settings the previous tenant left, and thereby locked in a heating bill that is 20 percent higher than it needs to be for as long as the tenancy lasts. This guide is a 30-minute walkthrough that changes that. Do it once, at the end of week one, and the flat is set up for the entire tenancy.
The walkthrough is deliberately fast. It is not a deep home energy audit; those exist and cost £150 to £400. It is the free version that catches 80 percent of what a professional would find.
Before you start: five minutes of paperwork
- Photograph both the gas and electricity meter and note the readings. You need these for your first bill and to catch any handover disputes.
- Find the tenancy agreement clauses about “what tenants may not change” (drilling, painting, fixtures). Note which of the below need permission and which are freely allowed.
- Find the fuse box and the water shut-off. Photograph both. You need to know where they are before the emergency, not during it.
The walkthrough, room by room
Kitchen (7 minutes)
- Fridge temperature setting. Aim for 3 to 5°C in the main compartment; anything lower wastes energy and any warmer risks food safety. Freezer at -18°C.
- Check the fridge door seal. Close it on a piece of paper; the paper should have gentle resistance when pulled. If it slides free, the seal is failing and the fridge is running harder than needed.
- Extractor hood works? Turn it on. If nothing happens or it hums but does not extract, tell the landlord; this is a maintenance job that affects your indoor air quality directly.
- Kettle capacity. If the previous tenant left a 2-litre kettle and you only ever boil one mug of water, add a small kettle to the shopping list. Boiling only what you need saves roughly £30 a year at 2026 rates.
Bathroom (5 minutes)
- Shower head. Standard head runs 12 to 15 litres per minute. A low-flow head runs 6 to 8 and costs £15 to £30. Payback in a shared-water flat is under 3 months. Save the original head, screw the low-flow on.
- Toilet cistern volume. Modern dual-flush toilets are fine; older single-flush toilets over 9 litres waste water. A displacement bag (or a bottle full of water) inside the cistern cuts this without any plumbing.
- Extractor fan. Turn it on; listen for the shutter closing outside. A stuck-open shutter is a permanent chimney to outside and needs the landlord.
- Bathroom radiator: does it have a TRV? If yes, set to 2 (16°C); the bathroom warms fast from a shower anyway.
Living room and hallway (8 minutes)
- Boiler: locate, photograph as-found settings. Reset flow temperature to 60°C (see the sister guide on boiler settings). If a combi, drop hot water to 55°C.
- Main thermostat: set to 19 to 20°C. If it has a schedule, program on 30 minutes before wake and return; off overnight and mid-day.
- Living room TRV: 3 (~20°C). Bedroom TRVs (any not-in-use): 2 or 1.
- Any old incandescent bulbs? Note the count and buy LED replacements from the first shop. Keep the incandescents in a bag for the end-of-tenancy return.
- Check any always-on standby devices (TV, games console, router, sound bar). A standby-load meter (£10 to £20) is worth borrowing or buying if the count is over 4.
Bedroom (3 minutes)
- TRV setting: 3 if you sleep with the radiator on, 2 if you prefer cool sleeping (recommended).
- Curtains: are they thermal or thin? Thin curtains lose visible heat overnight in winter. Charity-shop thermal curtains are £15 to £30 and drop the bedroom heat loss by roughly 20 percent overnight.
The whole-flat sweep (5 minutes)
- Front door: run a hand around the frame. Any air movement means the door needs seals; see the draught-proofing guide.
- Letterbox: same test. Almost always leaks. A £10 brush cover fixes it.
- Any window that does not fully close? Note; use window film in winter.
- Unused fireplace? A chimney balloon (£20-30) is the single biggest cheap heat-saving move in older UK conversions.
What to buy in the first week
Priority order, roughly £40 to £100 total spend that pays back in one heating season:
- Low-flow shower head, £15 to £30.
- LED bulbs for any incandescent-fitted lamps, £10 to £30.
- Front-door bottom brush, £10.
- Letterbox draught brush, £10.
- Chimney balloon (if applicable), £25.
- Optional: standby-load meter, £15.
Related: Simple Energy Fixes First Month covers the second wave of changes once these are in place.
What to email the landlord about
Any items that need permission or professional work:
- Extractor fan not working properly (usually shutter failure).
- Radiator that will not heat or bleeds air (air lock in the system).
- Any damp patch or mould.
- Boiler service if the last service sticker is over 12 months old.
- Loose window seals or perished window gaskets.
Keep the email polite and specific. Landlords typically respond faster to maintenance requests framed as concerns, not accusations.
Quick reference: the audit itself
| Room | What to check |
|---|---|
| Kitchen | Fridge temp, extractor hood, kettle size, door seal |
| Bathroom | Shower flow rate, cistern volume, extractor fan, TRV |
| Living / hallway | Boiler flow temp, thermostat schedule, TRVs, standby loads, bulb types |
| Bedroom | TRV, curtain thickness |
| Whole flat | Door seals, letterbox, unused fireplace, meter readings |
The point
The first-week audit is not about being an eco-warrior. It is about the fact that flats come with settings the previous tenant chose and habits attached to those settings. Reset the settings once, before the habits form, and the flat quietly runs at 15 to 25 percent lower running cost for the entire tenancy. Thirty minutes now saves several hundred pounds a year for as long as you live there.
The audit as a habit anchor
The reason this walkthrough works better in week one than in month six is small: no established routines yet. A boiler dial set to 75°C in October is a boiler dial that gets defended in December as “the one that works.” A boiler dial you have never seen at 75°C, that you have already set to 60°C during your unpacking, is not a controversy in December. The audit is not a physics operation; it is a decision made before the defaults harden.
Sources and further reading
Frequently asked questions
After you have furniture in, but before you settle into routines. Around day 5 to 10 is ideal, when you know the flat's rhythms but the habits are not yet locked in. Locked-in habits are much harder to change than fresh ones.
A notepad and a phone camera. The camera is for photographing meter readings, boiler dials as-you-found-them, and any damage worth flagging to the landlord. The notepad captures what to change and what to ask the landlord about.
Any gas leak smell, exposed electrical wiring, obvious damp behind bathroom tiling, or a mould patch larger than a hand is a landlord notification job, not a DIY. Photograph, note, and email the landlord within the week.
The reversible fixes (boiler flow, TRVs, thermostat schedule, plug changes) pay back in weeks, not years. Even a six-month tenancy benefits from a 30-minute setup. The permanent changes (draught kit, window film) genuinely need a year to break even; skip those.
