Landlords hit with £20bn bill to meet EPC C standards

Landlords hit with £20bn bill to meet EPC C standards

0:02 AM, 22nd November 2024, About 5 hours ago

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Landlords in England could face a £20bn bill to upgrade their properties to meet EPC C standards by 2030.

The claim by energy-efficiency platform epIMS, says currently more than half of properties in the private rented sector (50.1%) have an EPC rating below C.

Government figures estimate the average cost of upgrading a property to an EPC rating of C in England at £8,000, meaning landlords will need to spend an estimated total of £19.8 billion to bring all substandard properties up to the required standard.

London landlords face the largest bill to upgrade their properties

Landlords in London face the largest bill to upgrade their properties to meet EPC C standards.

According to epIMS, the capital has 1.2 million private rental properties, more than double the number found in any other region.

Despite having the nation’s lowest proportion of properties with an EPC rating below C (44.6%), landlords in the capital still face a total upgrade bill of £4.7 billion, based on an average upgrade cost of £9,000 per property.

The second-largest bill facing landlords is in the West Midlands, where the average cost of upgrading a rental property to a C rating is £8,148. This means a total of £2.2bn is needed to bring all substandard properties in the region up to the required standard.

A major concern for landlords

Craig Cooper, chief operating officer of epIMS, warns that Ed Miliband’s plan to bring all rental properties up to an EPC C standard is a major concern for landlords.

He said: “Labour has proposed a deadline of 2030 for all landlords to bring their rental properties up to a minimum EPC rating of C. This is an ambitious plan that is yet to be enshrined in law, but it shows clear intent from the government which means a legal minimum rating is almost certainly going to be introduced at some point in the near future.

“This will understandably be a concern for landlords, especially with the government suggesting that the average cost of completing the required upgrades is around £8,000 per property.”

The South East would require £2.1bn to upgrade all sub-C properties, followed by the North West (£2.1bn), East Midlands (£2bn), East of England (£2bn), South West (£1.7bn), and Yorkshire & Humber (£1.5bn).

Landlords in the North East are facing the smallest upgrade bill of £517 million due to just 103,394 properties having an EPC rating below C and the region’s lowest average upgrade bill of £5,000 per property.


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