Energy secretary Ed Miliband has committed to consult on raising the minimum energy efficiency standards for private and social rented homes by 2030.
The consultation will happen “by the end of the year”, according to The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.
Currently, private rented homes can be rented out if they meet Energy Performance Certificate E, while social rented homes have no minimum energy efficiency standard at all.
The government will now consult on proposals for private and social rented homes to achieve Energy Performance Certificate C or equivalent by 2030.
Commenting on the proposals, Chris Norris, policy director for the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) said: “The NRLA wants to see all rented properties become as energy efficient as possible. However, the government’s approach must involve a clear and comprehensive plan which recognises that the sector has some of the oldest, and hardest to improve, properties in the UK’s housing stock.
“The sector needs a clear trajectory setting out what will be expected of it and by when. This plan must also ensure sufficient numbers of tradespeople are in place to undertake the work that will be required.
Norris added: “Alongside this, as the Committee on Fuel Poverty has warned, is the need for a financial package to support investment in energy efficiency measures. At present, the private rented sector is the only housing tenure without a bespoke package to support work to upgrade homes.”
According to official data, in 2022, almost 45% of private rented properties in England had an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of at least a C, more than double the rate compared to 2012. However, a third of private rented sector homes were built before 1919, a higher proportion than any other tenure. These are among some of the hardest to improve properties of the entire housing stock.
Research suggests the UK is set to see a shortfall in the number of tradespeople grow to 250,000 by 2030 while the Committee on Fuel Poverty has argued that landlords could best be supported to improve the energy efficiency of rented housing “through tax offsets for improvements, loans or potentially grants for landlords with a low profit margin in areas of low rental value”.
Proper thick Ed Miliband is.
Cold and draughty?
Come and tell that my tenants who’s got new boiler, new windows, warm home, but UNFORTUNATELY, still an EPC D cause of the way the flawed system works.
And tell them we know u paying £200pm below market rent and perfectly happy, but if we get u to EPC D (which we know that means you’ll have to pay market rent £2400 per year more}, we’ll look good to the voters for doing what we say.
And we’ll keep quiet about how we constantly retrospectively changing the rules after you’ve moved in and this causes more landlords to sell, but we’ll blame homeless on a local level.
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Or sell up the old stock and pay more CGT to keep the benefit brigade in the comfort they are used to.
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Half the rental properties being Victorian are going to cost a fortune, better off waiting for the u turn, labour out of power or slowly watered down.
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Yes well said. They creating 2024 rules that don’t work on 1910 houses with cheap rents
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Why are privately owned dwellings never mentioned by Govt when demanding higher EPCs?
Owner occupied dwellings marginally outscore privated rented for EPC ratings in only 2/4 property types. 1 is equal and the other rented is marginally higher.
Owner occupied homes make up 62% of all UK dwellings. Am I missing something??
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Housing trusts and council houses were exempt from EPC proposed rule change under the last prospective legislation, because they know with old housing stock it’s too costly to achieve. So it’s not really about the tenants comfort and costs or saving the world.
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I would assume that it is because a rental with a low score can be sold, therefore reducing the PRS and either increasing home ownership by increasing supply and driving the market down, or allowing councils/housing trusts to purchase cheaply to increase their rental stock.
And that as it is someone’s personal home, there is a limit to what they can force us to do. If they try to force OO to increase the rating or it cannot be lived in, either they will have to come up with massive grants (with either no interest or no repayment) to fund it, or they will have millions of people suddenly demanding council/local authority homes as theirs are ‘uninhabitable’ legally. They would then have to be sold far below what they are mortgaged for, as no-one would buy them for their ‘true’ value if they need to spend tens of thousands on box-ticking improvements, meaning an entire generation goes into negative equity and the financial systems collapse. Then followed by the rest of the civilised world and we all end up realising that those houses weren’t actually that bad compared to living in a cave or a tent..
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Yes that’s the alternative. EPC C or homeless
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From a financial point of view, not far off. With the cost of everything having gone up, if I turned round to you and told you that you had to spend £20k on making improvements to your own house, that would have little to no financial benefit to you, or I was going to consistently fine you until you did so, what would your choice be? How many people have £20k sitting around? Or can afford to take out a loan for it, with the repayments on interest rates at the moment and most families living month to month?
Many Landlords have the option to sell their asset if they cannot make the improvements, and Owner-Occupier does not, unless they will make more than enough to pay the mortgage and find somewhere else to live.
My point is, nothing happens in a bubble when it comes to housing, politics and finance. If they started forcing OO’s to get their house to a C, the picture I painted above could very well happen. It’s unlikely, admittedly, as I’d hope even the most stubborn and blinkered politicians would realise the monumental chicken-up they had made and back-pedal, but it would still devastate some areas…
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Well said Billy
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Arranged an epc yesterday on a victorian end terrace house, came in at D. Using the estimated costs on EPC (where do those figures come from. £1400 to replace windows in a 3 bed?). To get to a C would cost £14,000, to achieve just £600 a year saving for the tenants. Figures are wrong, algorithms are wrong and, not yet met tenants who take any notice.
This is communism!
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I recently spent £14k to replace doors and windows on a three bedroom semi detached. As it was in a conservation area, we had to keep the look of the original sash windows, but we could still use uPVC. I think it was 2 doors and 11 windows, and we had a new modern boiler fitted, removing the hot water tank at around £6k. The house next door (same construction) is an E and has single glazed windows, and the difference in EPC rating after spending £20k? It’s now a D. It is absolutely ridiculous. I also have a client who had brand new electric heaters fitted, but because they were not the specific high heat retention ones the government want fitted, and were individually, room programmable heaters, it didn’t make any difference towards the EPC rating…
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What an absolute tool of a man and completely out of touch with building techniques. Impossible to achieve on dwellings built 75 -125 years ago, without adding 150mm to every outside wall (making the house smaller), ripping floors up to add insulation underneath. Ripping ceilings down to add extra insulation. Even 1970’s homes would struggle. Band D would be very difficult in some homes but a more sensible target. I built my own house in 2005 with over and above insulation added to the 2005 regs. Kingspan backed inner skin block work, thermal backed dry lined inside. Insulated ground and first floor. Still only a Band C.
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A “C” rating is too high for older properties to achieve, unless you’re prepared to spend £1000’s. Realistically the benchmark should be a D rating.
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I am going to keep this one short……apologies as its been typed in haste, due to the distain of the author, so will be strewn with spelling and grammatical error……….
I ve been saying it for nearly 10 years now. This is not, and never has been, about the energy efficiency or becoming carbon neutral. This is yet another weapon to remove the smaller private landlord. The cleansing continues. No need to list all the various ways successive governments have hammered the small guy/girl whilst favouring the big investment organisations. Not to mention what is ahead with the renters reform and pandering to the mischaracterisation of the accelerated possession proceedings AKA the no fault eviction. (sec21 4b and latterly 6a)
This was a plan hatched years ago. Clear out the small landlord and replace with the large investment funds. Read in EYE today the latest story of Nest (with L&G) investing further Billions in the PRS. They (rule makers) have realised recently there is a small fly in the ointment in as much as interest rates rose higher than expected and many landlords exited in a short period due to the real bite of sec24 relief removal coinciding with a stable sales market. Available stock levels have plummeted, whilst multi billion pound investment takes time to clunk through to creating available houses. So, what’s the answer to this we hear asked in the corridors of power? How do we stick to the plan but reduce the exodus of the small landlords (in the short term) whilst the investment firms step in? The answer that the latest con men/women have come up with ? Hit landlords YET AGAIN when they come to sell with higher capital gains tax. Many landlords are in the 60/70’s and owned their portfolio for 20/30 years so politicians know there are large gains in the portfolio so its win / win for the government. Landlords sell, the government robs more of the return on investment or dont sell and stock levels stay stable whilst big business comes in.
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Absolute BS. Lets put this into perspective using their own data. 55% of homes do not currently achieve a Band C. According to the last England census that equates to just over 2.5 million private rented homes (excludes social housing which is exempt from Band C and above).
How many of these properties are pre 1940? I have surveyed properties since the concept of EPC’s started back in 2007 and 70% are pre 1940. On average you would need to consider minimum of £15,000 to bring the property up to a Band C. But that is for the parts, this does not include having to take the kitchen, bathroom furnishings out, removing skirting, mouldings around doors and windows, ceiling coving etc which is often required for many improvements, decorating costs, trimming carpets, laminate and wooden floors replacements (parquet nightmare). New electric hob and fires (gas is being phased out).
Your bill is now over £25,000 (very reserved estimate).
Now you have to assume your tenant isn’t going to cause any damage, pays the rent and you don’t have any maintenance issues for the next 10 years!!!!
How long will it take you to recover the costs …….. If ever you get a bad tenant, please don’t tell me insurance will cover you, LOL.
This is political madness, based on ideology. Band C sounds good, see the advantage for the occupier but suicide financially for a landlord with a pre 1940 property currently and Band E (most) or Band D if they recently had a new gas fired boiler (being phased out) which cost £2k compared to air source heat pump £8k plus all the extras.
Drive along any local authority housing estate and see all the solar panels etc, which the tax payer paid for in social housing. Any support for the private landlord …. you must be joking, the authorities see you rolling in cash!
We have a current housing crises with landlords leaving the market over the last couple of years for many, many reasons. Top on the list in some parts of the country is government interference with regulation regardless if it had an impact on the landlord. They sold up and left. A very big void in need for housing.
If you had to spend for example £10,000 today on your rented property, would you get a yield by 2030?
We have some pretty horrendous rental prices which many tenants cannot afford, well guess what, its going to get even more expensive for them and the wise landlord is going to get out of the market over the next 12 months once they hear this nonsense by Labour.
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