Loading scheme
Loading scheme
The most generous package a household can get in England, and the most unevenly distributed. Funding is allocated to councils rather than to households, so eligibility depends on where the boundary falls as much as on your circumstances.
Headline award
Up to £30,000
Council-run retrofits for low-income households — but only in participating areas.
Illustrative figures.
Maximum per property
£30,000
Insulation and low-carbon heating combined
Participating councils
268
Of 296 in England, alone or in a consortium
Income threshold
£36,000
Household income, before housing costs
Median wait
22 weeks
From expression of interest to first works
Illustrative. Participating councils comes from DESNZ's published statistics. The other figures are placeholders.
What it pays
Councils set their own caps within the national limits, so the numbers below are the ceiling rather than the offer. Insulation and heating are funded from separate pots, and a property can draw on both.
| Measure | Award | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Insulation packageWalls, loft, floor and glazing repairs as one fabric-first package. | up to £15,000 | Walls, loft, floor and glazing repairs as one fabric-first package. |
| Low-carbon heatingAir source heat pump and controls, including the cylinder and radiator changes. | up to £15,000 | Air source heat pump and controls, including the cylinder and radiator changes. |
| Solar panelsOnly where the fabric work is already done or funded in the same package. | up to £5,000 | Only where the fabric work is already done or funded in the same package. |
| Retrofit assessmentThe PAS 2035 assessment and coordination are paid from the grant, not by you. | Included | The PAS 2035 assessment and coordination are paid from the grant, not by you. |
Three-year allocation running to March 2028
Applications have to be in before 31 March 2028. Schemes with a published end date rarely extend at the last minute, and installer diaries fill up first.
Last checked against these sources on 10 September 2026.
Illustrative. Placeholder figures to show what this page will hold. Real ranges arrive with the quote and performance data behind them.
Who qualifies
Written as the published rules work rather than as the marketing describes them. If one line on the left fails, nothing else matters.
How to apply
Each step carries roughly how long it takes, because the total is what decides whether the work happens this winter or next.
This is the first and most decisive test. Councils bid for allocations, sometimes in consortia, and neighbouring authorities often made different decisions.
Most councils run a short online form covering tenure, income and EPC band. Some run waiting lists and reopen in tranches, so a closed form is not always a no.
Income evidence, then a retrofit assessment of the property. The assessment decides the package, and you should be given a copy of it.
You get a written schedule of measures. Read what is excluded — making good, redecoration and scaffolding for unrelated repairs often are.
Fabric first, heating second, with a new EPC lodged at the end. Councils hold retention on the contractor until sign-off, which is your leverage if something is wrong.
Demand
Seasonal, and sharply so. The end of the funding year in March pulls delivery forward, and April is always the trough.
16 months to Jul 2026.
Peak: Mar 1,504
March, the end of the funding year
DESNZ official statistics. Councils report late, so the latest months will be revised up.
By homes upgraded per 100,000 households.
Uptake follows housing stock and installer coverage more closely than it follows need, which is one of the things this site exists to show.
Homes upgraded from DESNZ's Warm Homes: Local Grant statistics; households per region from DESNZ's estimates.
What gets fitted
Measures installed so far, and the average installed cost councils reported for each. These are grant-funded jobs, often on the hardest homes, so they run above what a private quote for the same measure would.
Every home can get more than one.
Per measure, as councils reported it.
Measures with fewer than five reported costs are left out: DESNZ suppresses them.
DESNZ, Warm Homes: Local Grant official statistics, to Jul 2026.
Combining
No scheme will fund the same measure twice. Getting the order right — insulation under one scheme, heating under another — is where the money is.
The same heat pump cannot be funded twice. Councils claim the local grant instead of BUS where both would apply.
A property can use both over time, but not for the same measure in the same package.
What changed
Amounts, qualifying benefits and end dates all move. Anything you read about this scheme that predates the most recent entry here should be treated as out of date.
1 April 2025
Replaced the Home Upgrade Grant and the Local Authority Delivery scheme with a single three-year allocation.
1 October 2025
A further 41 authorities took allocations, closing some of the gaps left by the first round of bids.
1 June 2026
The household income cap rose from £31,000 to £36,000, bringing a substantial number of working households into scope.
Questions
Search your council's website for the scheme by name, or call its energy or housing team. Some authorities deliver through a regional consortium, so the scheme may be branded differently locally.
ECO4 and the Great British Insulation Scheme are national and do not depend on your council, though ECO4's income test is tighter. Both are worth checking before you give up on funding.
The household's, before housing costs, and councils ask for evidence. Benefits-based eligibility is an alternative route that skips the income calculation entirely.
In most areas yes, with a landlord contribution — typically a third of the cost. The tenant has to meet the income or area test.
Councils procure contractors in batches and the retrofit assessment has to come first. Applying early in a funding year is materially faster than applying in February.
Keep reading
Supplier-funded whole-house retrofits for low-income households in the worst homes.
Whole-house, fully fundedHow it worksSingle insulation measures for lower council tax bands, with no benefits test.
One measure, mostly fundedHow it worksA fixed grant off a heat pump, claimed by your installer and taken off the quote.
£7,500How it worksStart with your postcode. We work from what is already recorded about the property, not from a form you have to fill in.