Buying an energy efficient home

The first place to start when looking at a home’s energy efficiency is its Energy Performance Certificate, or EPC. When any home is sold, it legally needs to be made available. Our handy guide looks at the EPC page by page and highlights all the important bits.

It provides information on the home’s energy efficiency band (rated A-G, with A being the best), estimated energy costs, provides an overview of its existing features like insulation and heating system, as well as letting you know what level it could be brought up to with improvements.

For those investing in more of a ‘project’ home, this is crucial, as it will give you an idea of what improvement costs you might want to factor into your decision-making ahead of buying.

While the EPC lists building features, there are key areas to check up on when visiting a property. Firstly, insulation. You can see for yourself that what’s said to be there is indeed there, and also take a look at the age and wear and tear of loft insulation, if the property has an attic space.

Leaking roofs and gutters can allow water to enter walls – so if the property has insulated cavities, also check that gutters are clean and there’s no staining on exterior walls.

It’s also well worth checking the windows. High-quality double glazing would be the best option, but proper sealing to cut cold draughts is a good basic quality to look out for.

The type of thermostats that are installed is also important. Thermostatic radiator valves, a programmer and a room thermostat, when controlled properly, can save £75 a year in a typical three-bed, gas-heated home, as well as cutting your home’s carbon emissions by 320kg.  If the property doesn’t have them, that’s another potential cost to factor in – but you may want to go further and install smart heating controls that can be operated from your smartphone.

Beyond these basics, it’s worth considering homes that have renewable energy features. The most likely renewable technology you might encounter are solar PV panels. They reduce your electricity bills, cut your carbon emissions and, if you live in Great Britain, you can apply for the Smart Export Guarantee (SEG), which pays you for the electricity you generate.

The SEG replaced the previous Feed-in Tariff (FiT) scheme on 1 January 2020. There are a few things to check first, before you can apply for SEG payments. The solar panels and whoever installed them must be certified under the Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) or equivalent. You will also need a registered smart meter that records your exported electricity, even if you’re not signing up to a smart tariff.

Whichever life stage you’re at and whatever attracts your initial interest, comfort and long-term savings are things that make a serious difference during your time in a property.

For those making aesthetics high priority, the interior may look stunning, but if the rooms are full of draughts, it’s going to be difficult to fully appreciate that.

Perhaps there’s big spaces and plenty of storage for a growing family – but if those spaces are going to prove difficult to effectively heat without breaking the bank, that’s room that comes with a serious cost.

If you’re choosing a home for retirement, there are different considerations. You may want to downsize, you may want to move to the country or even be closer to the high street. But there may be money issues to consider: your income might have dropped in retirement, or you may want to use as much of what’s coming in as possible for hobbies. This makes it all the more important to make sure your home doesn’t guzzle your money, leaving you struggling with heating bills during the winter months.

If you need any more persuasion to take energy seriously when picking your home, there’s a possibility that mortgage providers could be open to lending people more to buy energy efficient properties.

Our LENDERS research, which was carried out with a number of partners including Nationwide, conclusively proved the link between better energy performance and higher disposable income – income that raises the opportunity for a slightly bigger loan. The findings are being taken seriously by the mortgage industry, so it’s definitely something to watch out for when the next time you’re house hunting.