Hi all-

Have a small, old holiday home looking to do some upgrades to, with goal of eventually doing holiday lets. No gas supply – only electric and water. Currently we use a variety of electric heaters and coal fireplaces to warm the place in winter, but looking for something that is cheaper and (for renters) safer.

Like Jon Snow, I know nothing. What’s the best option in terms of price (initial outlay and over-time efficiency) vs other factors? For sake of simplicity I’m looking for something we can install in each room, as opposed a central system. The main options seem to be brick or gel (which I guess is oil), and some have fan-assist and some don’t.

Any ideas, or even pointers to sites that explain this stuff in an ELI5 format would be greatly appreciated.

We have a place that is heated with electric. I wouldn’t touch storage heaters with a barge pole – not that cheap to run and not very controllable.
Electric heaters generally means 1kw in = 1kw heat out and none of them are going to be very cheap to run.

We have simple panel heaters with a thermostat (although I now control them all using a Raspberry Pi which I can also access remotely).

If you’ve got a fireplace rip it out and put a stove in – I know it’s the STW thing to do but it really will make a huge difference and will make it attractive to people looking to rent. Chances are it will do all the main heating.

Put panel heaters in each room and leave it at that.

If you’re feeling adventurous you could look at installing an air to air source heat pump which is what I’m thinking of doing but we’ve also got solar PV and I’d be running it on spare power. A heat pump ‘could’ give you 3kw heat for every 1kw of electricity. It really depends on how much winter use the place is going to get.

So in summary, panel heaters and a stove if you can.

[this is presuming you’ve already done as much insulation as you can]