NASHVILLE Blog

Top 10 Signs of Low Insulation

Top 10 Signs You Need More Insulation

Home insulation is an important cog in your home’s system. Whether it’s a toasty August day in Green Hills or during another ice over in Franklin, your insulation’s job is to resist the transfer of unwanted temperatures into your home. Without adequate attic insulation, crawl space insulation and exterior wall insulation, a home’s efficiency and comfort will undoubtedly suffer.

      1. Bare spots in your attic.

This one is obvious. Total lack of insulation is causing a giant gap in your home system. We often see this in homes following other contractors who have been in your home. Last week it was a home in Murfreesboro that needed a roof replacement. The roofers had moved an entire 300 square foot section of insulation over the master suite. Ouch.

      2. Attic joists are visible.

When poking your head up into your attic, look around. If you can see the joists that make up your attic floor, you are seriously lacking insulation. In our area, 2” x 6” beams are often used in construction here. If you see the skeletal beams of your attic that means you have 5 1/2 inches or less of insulation. This is roughly an R-19 amount of fiberglass or cellulose, which puts you roughly 10 inches from the updated code in Nashville for attics (R-49).

       3. High temperature changes between floors and rooms.

We often hear, “My upstairs will not cool no matter how low I set the temperature.” Again, this week a Mt. Juliet customer called us after having called multiple HVAC companies out to help her cool her children’s upstairs bedrooms. After hundreds of dollars spent on unneeded maintenance trips and additional freon, one of the technicians told her she should have someone look at her insulation. Sure enough, her insulation had not been addressed in over 30 years and was severely lacking. The hot air coming not being resisted sufficiently in summertime or held inside during the winter can cause serious levels of discomfort in your home.

      4. High energy bills.

If you feel that you are paying way too much each month, your insulation should be one of your first places to look. If your home is allowing your comfortable air to escape, the furnace or air conditioner must work overtime to combat this. Pay attention to how often your unit is running. If you notice that it is running constantly, you are unfortunately paying more than you should.

      5. Cold spots on floors

Here in greater Nashville and central Tennessee our homes are often built on crawl spaces. Low or a lack of crawl space insulation will lead to cold kitchen and bathroom floors in the winter. Some contractors and environmental service companies recommend removing crawl space insulation. They suggest this when mold or other microbial growth occurs in the crawl space. There are better ways to address these issues that won’t cause other discomfort and inefficiencies.

      6. Ice dams on roof

Poorly insulated attics let heat from the home escape quickly in the winter. When it snows this can create ice dams as the snow melts towards ridge and flows down the roof but freezes once it hits the eaves as the texture temperatures change dramatically. This is known to cause damage to your shingles and create leaks and a whole host of other problems.

      7. Recurring issues with freezing pipes

Exterior walls have a required insulation of R-13. Installing batt insulation around pipes means a lot of cutting and fitting. It is very common that contractors will rush through installation and the insulation will not fit snuggly or they will not have split the batt to fit it on backside of pipes at all. You’ll never know until it’s too late.

        8. Bugs and other pests

No one enjoys seeing a roach scurry across the floor or spotting a spider in your bedroom. These insects often come through disconnected pipes or vents in your crawl space or attic. Also, they come through light fixtures or other gaps in insulation in your attic. Blown-in insulation fills up creases and gaps in construction to block entry. Cellulose is also treated with borates which strongly deters rodents and other pests from settling in it. We had a customer in Antioch recently that was having all sorts of spider issues in her townhome’s top floor. One quick look and we discovered there were no covers in the attic for her lights. Can light covers are a quick easy solution. Covering the light, we can then insulate around and over the light without fire safety fears and simultaneously blocking the free passage of eight-legged friends.

        9. Touch Test

The simplest way to tell if the insulation is lacking in your home is with your hand. Touch your exterior wall. Cold? It shouldn’t be. Touch the ceiling in your upstairs hallway. Hot? Low insulation is unable to fight off the hot attic air from entering your living space. In multiple older homes in East Nashville, we didn’t even need to touch the ceiling. The heat could be felt by hand even few feet away.

       10. Roof thawing and icicles

Try this out this coming winter. When we receive our first snow this winter in Nashville look around your neighborhood. Compare the rooflines. Has the snow melted from your roof before your neighbor’s? This is heat escaping your living space escaping. This also causes icicles to form. If the air is cold enough to freeze the melted snow it should be cold enough freeze the snow itself. Unless of course your furnace’s hard work is not being contained in your home and warms the roof from the inside.

All these signs and symptoms of low insulation are uncomfortable and some much more costly than others. Book a free attic and insulation analysis here and let us either put your mind at ease or get out in front of some of the costly consequences that can come from lacking or low attic and crawl space insulation.