There are plenty of things besides the occasional creaking floorboard or a rattling window to keep the owner of an old home up at night.

Materials such as antiquated “knob-and-tube” electrical wiring, insulation of shredded newspaper or a residence constructed of dry, flammable timber all can cause a homeowner to toss and turn with worry.

“An older home will burn up faster than the new ones, it seems like,” said Revers Shears, an east Lawrence resident who lives a few blocks from the home at 1205 N.J. that burned Sept. 17, killing five people. “The lumber in these houses are so dry. It’s like it’s kindling.”

Lawrence-Douglas County Fire & Medical leaders have said they could not determine the cause of the fire at 1205 N.J. They also couldn’t say whether the age of the structure – built in approximately 1900, according to records from the Douglas County appraiser – was a contributing factor.

But people in the housing business said owners of older homes have to be particularly aware of some inherent fire risks that come with owning a piece of early 20th century America.

“It is an obvious issue,” said Mark Lehmann, an owner of the Old Home Store, which does remodeling work on older homes. “As the owner of an older home, you have to be even more careful about making sure that a fire doesn’t start in the first place, because it can do a lot of damage in a hurry.”

Some issues homeowners can’t change, such as the fact lumber becomes drier as it ages. Also, many multistory homes built prior to 1950 were built using a framing method that didn’t provide much insulation or fire barriers between floors. That means a fire in the basement can quickly become a fire on the top floor.

“You have very rapid fire spread in an older home,” said Mark Bradford, chief of Lawrence-Douglas County Fire & Medical.

Other issues, though, can be improved. Electrical wiring is one of the biggest. Tim Pinnick, inspections supervisor for the city’s Neighborhood Resources Department, said there are many homes that still have electrical systems that were installed in the early 1900s. Those systems aren’t generally equipped to handle the high electrical demands of a modern family.

“You don’t want to have seven or eight items plugged into one of those electrical outlet strips,” Pinnick said. “That is a tragedy waiting to happen.”

The old electrical systems – called knob and tube systems – aren’t designed to have insulation placed over the top of them because the wires contain only a thin sheath of coating that often deteriorates with age. But Pinnick said he suspects that is happening in many homes, especially in attics, where people have been adding insulation to cut down on electrical bills.

But the fixes usually aren’t cheap. Installing a modern electric system can cost thousands of dollars. Even a partial fix to install a new electrical panel and upgrade the electric service coming into a home normally will cost $1,500 to $2,000, Lehmann said.

Other fire safety improvements also can be expensive. Installing larger windows in bedrooms to allow for an easier escape route can cost about $500, or more than $1,000 if it is for a basement room.

Money issues often can be a concern because many of the older neighborhoods in Lawrence also are where some of the city’s lowest wage-earners live. For example, 68 percent of all households in east Lawrence – the site of the New Jersey street fire – are considered to have low-to-moderate incomes, according to federal statistics.

“Moneywise it is tough because you spend so much money just trying to get a place to live,” said Eugene Hunter, who has lived in east Lawrence for 39 years. “But I tell people you can’t half-step it on safety. You have to spend the money. But some people can, and some people just can’t.”