The study aims to identify residence groups that are highly vulnerable to fuel poverty in the urban area of a South Korean city. Thereby, the paper emphasizes that fuel poverty problems occur in different ways according to the social and spatial contexts and thus need a more contextualized policy approach beyond the simplistic criteria of household income and heating cost. To fully capture the meaning of cold homes, an empirical dataset of thermal efficiency of individual dwellings and actual heating in a residential area in Seoul, South Korea is examined along with the tenure type and the ownership attributes. The analyses reveal that the amount of actual heating energy consumption did not show any clear relation with the thermal efficiency of housing or the tenure type. Additionally, considerably inefficient dwellings like old, detached houses are occupied by elderly owners who often lack both the financial capability and intention to properly maintain their properties. The result indicates that people who are living in cold homes are not always confined to poor residents living in rented homes. The study proposes some new types of potential fuel poverty based on the analyses of thermal efficiency and heating patterns by dwellings.