Cold Upstairs Bedrooms — Window Replacement or Attic Insulation First?

Heat rises, so an upstairs that is colder than downstairs is a sign that heat is leaving the top of the house faster than the furnace sends it up. Two things do that. Old windows let cold air in around the sash and through worn weatherstrip, and their glass gets cold enough to pull heat out of the room and drop a cold draft down the wall. A thin or leaky attic lets warm air out through gaps around pipes, lights and the attic hatch, and lets the ceiling get cold. A bedroom over a garage or a cantilever has a cold floor on top of both.

The test is a cold night and your hand. Stand at the window: if you feel moving air at the sash, the meeting rail or the casing, the window is leaking. If the glass is frosted or sweating, the glass is too cold. Then put your hand near the ceiling and along the top of the exterior wall: if the ceiling is noticeably cold, or there is frost in the attic on a bright cold morning, the attic is leaking heat. Most older houses show both. When only one shows, fix that one. When both show, the attic is usually the cheaper first step and the windows are the step that makes the room feel warm to sit in.

When it is the windows, the replacement for cold upstairs bedrooms is specific: casements that lock tight against the wind on the north and west rooms, warm-edge spacers and a heat-retaining low-E package on every unit, a third pane on the bedroom that frosts, and a full-frame install with foam in the gap where the old frame is leaking around its edges. JMB Builders does both halves across the Twin Cities metro: window replacement in this section, attic air sealing and blown-in insulation in our insulation section. We tell you at the estimate which one your house needs first, and quote them as separate lines so you can do them in whatever order the budget allows.