The infamous question our industry asks, a million times over, is what is the future of EPCs. I believe that they do have a future, but not quite yet.
From personal experience EPCs have been, so far, a means of ‘complying with the legals’. That is, as soon as a property is up for sale or a new rental agreement, the phone rings and your client is demanding that an EPC be completed within two weeks. This of course means juggling your already precious resource to meet the most demanding priority. Others, who have some sense of corporate social responsibility, have taken it on board to have a target for getting a certain amount of properties rated to present in glossy brochures.
So, does the client care? Some do, some don’t. Some know that the sale has gone through, and therefore no matter what the rating is, the agreement is in the bag. Some are influenced by their clients, for example thinking: “if my building is not ‘A’ rated and does not get a BREEAM Excellent, then my client is not moving in.”
Others ask why one service provider can assess and lodge one part of a building and come up with an lower rating than another provider. The quality and value of the EPC assessor, and therefore the future of EPCs, is starting to show, and pertinent questions are being asked in certain circumstances.
So, what would change attitudes and drive change? We are all familiar with climate change, we’ve experienced it, and sceptics of climate change are no longer in the majority. I believe one crucial element will be the requirement under the second part of the European Buildings Performance Directive (EPBD Part II) to market the EPC rating prior to sale – a little like HIPs – meaning that an estate agent cannot preview properties until the HIP is completed.
For domestic property, HIPs seem to play little part in actual sales – location and transport facilities still come top of the pops for a potential vendor – and I believe that this is still also the case for commercial. However, I also believe that a corporately responsible client will go one step further and take the rating into account for the potential purchase or let, not only from a marketing and PR standpoint, but also in terms of the operational costs and the impact of something much more important – their Carbon Reduction Commitment obligations.
Rajvant Nijjhar
Founder
Consortio
07989 407 426
rnijjhar@hotmail.com