Signs your house needs rewiring

Wiring does not announce that it is finished. It carries on working until the day it doesn’t. These are the signs that are worth taking seriously.

What to look for

• The wiring is still the original rubber or fabric-covered cable. Houses from the 1950s to the 1970s often still have it.
• The fuse board is old. Rewirable fuses, or a small board with only a handful of switches.
• Two or three sockets a room. If extension leads and adaptors run along the skirting, the house has outgrown its wiring.
• Warm, scorched or crackling sockets and switches.
• Lights that flicker, or a board that keeps tripping.
• Something has pointed at it. A survey, a renovation plan, or an insurer.

If a socket is hot, scorched or smells of burning

Stop using it and switch the circuit off at the fuse board. Don’t wait for a survey slot: have a registered electrician look at it straight away. Ian does not offer emergency call-outs, so this is not the page to rely on in an emergency. If there is a fire, call 999.

What a survey tells you

A survey is what turns “it might be” into a plain answer. Ian looks at the cable, the fuse board and the circuits, and tells you whether the house needs a full rewire, a partial one, or just a new fuse board. You get an itemised quote and there is no obligation to go ahead.

Not every older house needs the same job

Age is only a clue to look closer. Some older houses have already had work done. Others have a mix of old and new wiring in different rooms. That is why the answer has to come from the house itself.