Dad spends thousands decorating house with 60,000 Christmas lights

A dad spent around £2000 on kitting out his house with 60,000 Christmas tree lights – to celebrate having a proper blowout this year.

Iain Fleming, 36, decorates his home with thousands of lights every year – spending around an extra £200 on electricity in the festive period for santas, sleighs, Christmas trees, snowmen, baubles and candy canes.

Dad-of-three Iain, from Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, has around 60,000 bulbs on the go, plugged into 137 sockets.

He has been doing it for around 13 years and nearly 1000 people attended a switch-on last week.

The family, including Ellie, 13, Hollie, 11, and Lucy, six, moved into a bigger house this year meaning Iain splashed out on some new decorations.

The dad spent around £2000 on kitting out his new house. SWNS via SWNS

Iain, who works as a catering manager, said: “We’ve added a lot bigger things this year, like a huge six-metre tall Christmas tree.

“That alone has around 5000 lights.

“It’s taller than the house.

“It’s the first year in my new house, so I made my all neighbours aware of what was going on and they’ve all been very supportive.”

“At the switch-on night there were around 800 to 900 people there.

“The whole street was full.

“It was the most I’ve ever had at a switch-on ever.

“It was really good to see people back to normality.”

He spreads out the huge costs of the display over the year – even paying more for his monthly electricity bills so he’s not hit extra hard in December.

Iain added: “I started buying back in January.

“I think I’ve spent a couple thousand.

“I bought stuff while the lights were still on last year, in the lead up to Christmas and at the January sales.

“When I see something pop up on Facebook, eBay or Amazon I buy it.

“If I’m spending around £40 or £50 on a light at one time, it’s alright but if it was all in one go it would be too much.

“Every year when I take them out of storage around ten per cent are faulty so I’ve always got enough to replace and go bigger.

“Because it’s LED the bills go up around £200 but I pay extra all year to cover the increase in December so it doesn’t hurt me then.

“The house becomes for family and friends the go-to house for Christmas celebrations for the whole month.”

This year, Iain is donating to the Les Hoey DreamMaker Foundation which gives children with life-threatening illnesses experiences like meeting their celebrity heroes and days out.

At this year’s opening night, Iain raised £806 and has raised around £1100 in total so far.