As extreme heatwaves become more frequent, young Londoners are finding themselves sweltering in overheated house shares.
Cash-strapped and unable to afford air conditioning or move to a better-ventilated property, many young renters are forced to find creative ways to stay cool while navigating the added pressures of living with housemates.
Nurse Ella Bowen, 27, shares a house in Archway with two friends who both have a bedroom in the cooler basement downstairs.
Her small box room traps intense heat, and she’s noticed her thermostat has been reading 30 degrees every day.
Ella has been opening her bedroom doors and the kitchen window to let air circulate, but her housemates complain bugs are flying in and have been shutting the windows, creating a stifling atmosphere.
She said: “My room is really small and is in direct sunlight, so the sunlight will shine through the whole day.
“If I want to cool the room down, I have to open my door and the kitchen window to let the air flow through, but that just means that my door’s always open during the week and it’s uncomfortable when I’m at home.
“Having the kitchen window and my door open means that we get so many insects, especially at night, we get mosquitoes, and the girls are so scared of bugs – so they obviously want it closed as much as possible.”
IT consultant Sacha Alexandra, 27, lives in a flat in Finchley with three others she met through renting website Spare Room.
They live on the second floor of a converted Victorian House which provides a warm refuge in winter.
During the heatwaves Sacha says it becomes like “a toaster”, holding warm air in the cramped corridor and shared kitchen.
When the Met Office issued an extreme heat warning at the end of June, Sacha says she covered all her windows with foil.
She also moved her fan around different parts of the house to try and push heat out and took cold showers every few hours.
Despite this, she still felt “overheated, completely sweaty” and unable to get on with daily tasks.
Her heat-induced stress was made worse by disagreements with her housemate, whose safety concerns meant windows had to be shut at night.
“I was waking up at six every morning to open the windows while it was still cool and dragging my £20 fan around the flat to push the hot air out,” she says.
“Then I’d come into the kitchen at lunch and the guys would be sitting there with the terrace door wide open – it just turned the place into an oven.”
Sacha also said the differences in heat tolerance between those living in the house makes it difficult to reach a consensus on what measures to take to cool down – one of her housemates grew up in Spain and finds the English heat easier to manage.
The 27-year-old also bemoans that the relentless heat, interrupted sleep and constant disagreements have left her drained.
She said: “The heat is not good for mental health.
“The amount of energy your body spends just to cool itself down is enormous, you’re tired all the time, and it’s so hard to maintain the same level of energy and sanity – it has a really bad influence.”
Research from the University of East London found that those in lower socio-economic groups or in more vulnerable housing situations were more likely to suffer the mental and physical effects of hot weather.
They found that renters are usually unable to implement “cooling-related adaptations” like shutters, blinds, and reflective paints because of tenancy agreements or planning restrictions, “even when they possess the knowledge and resources to do so”.
The study also warned about the under-researched impact of heat on mental health, suggesting that heat disrupts sleep, contributing to exhaustion, impaired concentration, accident risk, and declining mental health.
Michelle Duque, 30, shares a studio apartment with her husband in Swiss Cottage in North London and has spent days of the heatwave desperately trying to find AC.
She told the South West Londoner: “Coming from a smaller city in Canada, it feels like we’re equipped for a lot of things there, and the UK – London specifically – just isn’t.
“There’s this whole argument about how it’s not environmentally friendly to put up electricity costs with air conditioning, but it’s not like this is the most environmentally friendly place to start with.
“Some people even have to go through their council to ask if they can install AC, and at the same time people are desperate – people are literally dying.”
The shared experiences of these renters suggests that the heat doesn’t just warp the air – it warps relationships. Arguments about windows and doors being opened, safety concerns, and using electricity makes tiredness and the struggles of co-living even worse.
Renters who are trapped in tiny cupboard-like rooms in houseshares with semi-strangers have little hope of adapting to the hot weather.
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan announced a ‘Heat Ready London’ plan in June, which will include measures such as retrofitting overheating homes, expanding cooling spaces and increasing public drinking water points to help adapt to extreme heat.
Although steps are being taken to protect Londoners, there is little discussion on how to help private renters. There are no suggestions that schemes to provide portable air conditioning, fans or grants for tenants. Most of the Heat Ready London proposals focus on longer term structural changes, rather than immediate help.
In the future, it’s likely that these unbearable summers will continue to burden struggling renters in their homes – unless these steps include more immediate heat relief.
Featured image: Sacha’s living room which has huge windows, trapping heat inside (left)/ Sacha’s ice-maker machine which she says has been a god-send during the heatwaves (right). Credit: Sacha Alexandra
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