WANT TO RENT OUT YOUR VILLAGE HOME - BUT EPC RATING TOO LOW!!
Well our answer to this question may help !
Question
"My mother who lives in Wingham has recently gone into a nursing home, and with a heavy heart we have decided to rent out her cottage to help pay for the nursing home fees.
After approaching a local Letting agent, they informed me that every rental property (unless it is listed) needs to have an Energy Rating with an Energy Performance Certificate [EPC] of ‘E’ or above.
Unfortunately mums house is not on gas (they have oil fired central heating) and open fireplaces in most of the rooms, the 18th Century brick detached cottage initial EPC rating was ‘G’.
We have spent over £15,000 on new roof insulation, double glazing and new energy efficient boiler, and still, we only have a rating of ‘F’. The agent says we cannot rent the property out. What suggestions do you have that would help us gain ‘E’ rating on our EPC?
Our Reply
Of course if you were to install a decent quality, external wall insulation, it would essentially wrap your parent’s home in a thermal duvet and should improve the EPC rating by at least one letter. That would ruin the look of the lovely cottage and make it look like plain 1960’s box and be very expensive. The payback from reduced heating bills would benefit the tenant but not your mother.
However, we have some good news for you, the Government stated that Landlords only need to spend a maximum of £3,500 to improve their rental property to ‘E rating’ when installing all the recommended measures in your original EPC. Once that has been spent, the landlord is able to register an exemption, and thus you will be able to rent the property out, even though it doesn’t meet the ‘E rating’.
Any energy efficiency improvements to your property since 1 October 2017 can be included the cost of those improvements within the £3,500 cost cap.
As with all regulations, there is a due process to follow to enable you to register the exemptions.
Therefore, if would like more information about this, please pick up the phone or send us an email.
That offer is available to anyone reading this post as well .. happy to help
01227 767200 - lettings@regal-estates.co.uk
