It's getting cold! Time to Improve your EPC rating

The government set the date of April 2018 to allow landlords time to plan, save up and make improvements to meet the new minimum energy rating of E or above for private rented properties. After that it will be illegal to let a property with an F or G rating. But it is estimated that even now 343,000 private rented properties have an EPC rating of an F or G, so there is some way to go in the next 17 months.

New research just released by the government shows that thousands of domestic properties in general are still scoring in the lower bands of energy efficiency so if you are looking to buy a property to let out, you need to consider what you might need to do in order to rent the property from 2018.

Of 1.5 million EPCs issued in the year ending September 2016 for domestic properties almost one third were in the lower ratings:

Based on Energy Efficiency

25% had a rating of E, F or G
63% had a rating of C or D
12% had a rating of A or B

Based on their CO2 emissions,

40% had a rating of E, F or G
46% C or D
14% A or B.

Urban has produced detailed advice in Be Green in 2016 which will help you to improve the EPC ratings in your rental properties.

Alternatively, we do offer customers an EPC service and can arrange for an assessor to come and provide an EPC certificate and your own bespoke report with recommendations on how to get to a higher rating level.

It's also worth noting that tenants are now able to approach landlords with requests to conduct energy efficiency improvements on their rental properties.