EPC – A good idea, but?

I had an EPC done quite recently.

The house has GCH and all radiators have TRVs. There was also an electrical fire in the lounge to act as a focal point and provide a source of heat should the boiler fail.

The electric fire would have made the EPC Rating a D but, by hiding it from the assessor, the EPC was a C Rating.

Seriously.

Rules are for fools and for the guidance of wise men.

Reply to the comment left by Cider Drinker at 26/09/2024 - 09:56
This has also been my experience of EPC assessments. The other problem with them is that if you want to get a grant to upgrade an EPC rating then the assessor may require cavity wall insulation and that may be damaging to the property.

Worst thing is. They playing with people perfectly happy in their homes and making them homeless every time and MP mentions the word EPC.

My recent notes on this:

Yes it’s a shame that in 2024, the biggest threat to tenants homes is Govt and Councils and the constant retrospective changes they keep imposing.

We’ll make em EPC A if u like, massive mould and condensation that sometimes hard to undo.

Well these houses weren’t substandard till Govt said EPC D no longer acceptable. Tenants very happy with em and the cheap rent they were.
All my tenants had a choice pay £600pm EPC D or I’ll buy you new build £1000pm EPC A and you’ll save £30pm on your gas bill. By the way the EPC D have already got new boiler windows doors etc.

Sep24
Proper thick he 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 C (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.

I am not sure if any MPs council officials read any of this but I guess it might make one or two of us a bit happier to vent our thoughts in public.
But as an example, we fully refurbed a coach house on a site we own, fully insulated as to regs at the time. 100mm in roof space, 50mm in walls ,100mm in floors etc. Rated E. We asked the guy why when its totally up to modern spec as would be a new build. He said he put the original build date into the computer, ie late 1800s and thats what it said. If we had built it new rated C. How does that work out fairly.
Had we put in night storage not panel heaters and replaced the coach house doors with a wall, planners don't like that of course, its a B.
Can anyone explain how we are supposed to overcome an old property, except knock it down.

EPC scores make very little difference to heating bills.
My own home (occupied by 2 people) is EPC A. Octopus estimate it's annual gas bill will be £836.
My bills inclusive properties are estimated by Octopus or EDF as follows:
3 person, detached EPC C £626
4 person, student, semi EPC C £881
4 person, mid terrace EPC B £800
4 person, mid terrace EPC C £829
4 person, student, terrace EPC C £735
5 person, student, terrace EPC C £1032
5 person, detached EPC C £1052
6 person terrace EPC E £972

The tenants can boost the heating whenever they want or even reprogram the thermostats. They all have the type of thermostat that has several different heat settings a day (various different brands). The main factor seems to be orientation of the house. Both the cheapest to heat one and the EPC E houses are South facing.

Reply to the comment left by CWF at 26/09/2024 - 11:22
Just my own view but I suspect all this is actually geared towards that very outcome - ie tearing down all the old dwellings in the country. Only question is will they be able to get this past the public

those inconsistent energy ratings can really create problems and end up costing us more. Your experience with the storage heaters is a great example of how the system misses the point. We definitely need a more sensible approach that works for both landlords and tenants without just piling on the costs.

Remember last winter when people were encouraged to limit their energy use at peak times?
Remember the very real threat of power cuts if the U.K.’s supplies ran out because we don’t store enough gas?
Well, how will 1.5 million new homes to accommodate our ever-growing population be supplied with gas and electricity. Let’s not forget the new hospitals, schools, and sewage plants that we’ll need. They’ll need energy too. The drive to EPC Rating C is to help the UK’s supply problem.
Maybe fixing the population crisis will help fix the housing crisis? But, of course, that would mean we would jeopardise the all important growth figures. Our economy is a Ponzi scheme and doomed to fail, eventually.

So the government are no longer interested in reducing carbon emissions? Improving EPC grading may well reduce the cost of energy consumption, however, this policy is in conflict with reducing carbon emissions. So investment now to replace storage heaters with gas central heating (for example) to achieve a band C, accepting it will increase carbon emissions. You can bet your life that by 2030 the policy will change again with the introduction of new carbon emission targets. I would suggest we don't waste our money until its absolutely necessary by which time I bet the strategy for reducing carbon emissions has been reintroduced!

The bit I don't get is the mixed messages.
Insulation is supposed to minimise heating costs (which is usually gas or oil) whereas quite a lot of EPC points are awarded for things that are nothing to do with either heating or insulation. Low energy light bulbs or solar panels will gain lots of EPC points but do nothing for heating costs.

As I showed earlier the EPC rating doesn't really impact the gas costs (heating and hot water). Electric bills can be hugely variable but that is usually because of how much cooking is done. It's certainly got nothing to do with insulation in the vast majority of houses.
I know it needs to be a holistic approach but can we get a bit of joined up thinking injected into the whole EPC system?

Of course part of it could be because so many houses currently have the wrong EPC score. At least 3 of mine will be put in a higher band next time they are assessed. As they only need to be assessed every 10 years and we have to pay for the assessment a lot of houses currently have very outdated scores. How is anyone supposed to make policy or ensure adequate funding or tradespeople are available if they haven't got a clue about the scale of the problem?