There is growing evidence this
week of housing developers instigating pushes to make their homes more eco-friendly.
This has come as a response to new legislation proposed at the start of the
year meaning that homes awarded with an energy
efficiency rating of F or G will be illegal for landlords to let
to tenants from April 2018 at the
latest.
Surveys have shown that 11.4% of homes were classed as F & G in the private rented sector.
This is compared to 2% from the
local authority and as low as 1.6%
from housing associations. The evidence shows that 1 in 10 landlords should be looking to improve the energy efficiency
of their homes.
From surveys taken on the homes,
it can be seen that the problem areas lie in loft and cavity insulation and the state or lack of double glazing in properties. For
example, 57% of owner occupied homes
were reported to have cavity wall insulation built in, whereas only 38% of rented homes had the privilege.
Similarly, 12% of rented property
had no double glazing at all compared to 5.3%
in the owner occupied sphere.
It is clear there is a lot of
room for improvement on the energy efficiency of buy-to-let property before the
legislation comes into effect in 2018,
especially considering complimentary legislation will give rights to tenants to
be able to demand improvements in housing insulation by 2016. Under this proposed legislation, Landlords will be unable to
refuse tenants’ ‘reasonable’ requests for energy efficiency measures to be
improved. It is a much better idea to raise the energy rating of your property
now to avoid ugly situations with tenants in the future.
The Energy Saving Trust provide guidelines on the areas of homes which
can be targeted to raise the energy efficiency rating significantly while also
lowering the cost of gas and electricity bills for your tenants which will be
much appreciated.
- First of all, as mentioned, the loft and wall insulation is where over half of the heat will be lost from your property. Costing around £450 to £500 to upgrade, good insulation is expensive but will be made back in 5 years due to the decreased bills by your tenants, and through the opportunity to put up rent given the raised efficiency rating of your property.
- Secondly, the windows and doors of your property must be examined; for draughts, and most importantly for double glazing on the windows. The Energy Saving Trust operate under the mantra 'it's good to see double' and its benefits are clear to see, with savings of up to £165 a year compared to single glazed homes.
- Finally the third highest cause of a decrease in energy efficiency ratings will be an old or out of date boiler. The Energy Saving Trust keep a list of approved boiler models and if yours doesn't appear, it is advisable to invest in an upgrade considering that having a more energy efficient boiler installed can save £310 a year on running costs.
Positive progression in
low-energy home schemes have shown themselves to be fruitful in dealing with
the problems facing poorly rated homes. The ‘Model Homes 2020’ initiative, is a scheme run across Europe to test
run a series of eco-friendly housing developments with ‘guinea pig’ families
living and running homes rent free for 14
months. The homes are super insulated and run on solar energy due to a
series of PV panels on the roof. The
houses are then monitored by a plethora of diagnostic machines which run around
the clock delivering statistics to the programme runners.
The initiative has so far proved
extremely successful in Britain, showing a low bills price and a comfortable
temperature throughout the year. However in other nations, namely Denmark, cold
winter and prolonged snowfall has negated the use of solar panels proving that
the less integral solar hot water panels which only account for 1/3 of water heating is more cost
effective in areas where light is minimal. Other sources of eco-friendly energy
are being investigated. All in all, the scheme is proving useful towards
weaning Europe off of Russian gas and turning to energy efficient sources of
home running.
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David Steedman
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