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What is an Energy performance certificate?

Introduced in August 2007 their aim is to give a clear picture of the efficiency of a commercial or residential property, the headline assessment works in a similar way to the ratings you see on domestic appliances, with the colour bar chart showing how it performs. With the EPC, the bar chart is much the same and will give a property a grade ranging from A, being the best, to G being the worst, the average property in the UK will be in band D/E, the grade will be given for how efficient a property is and a second grade for the impact on the environment.

As an overview the rating will have been establish by an assessor taking into consideration emissions and cost of running, the EPC will also give you an indication of the potential grade the property could achieve, if improvements are made.

By law you must have an EPC for a property if you are planning to rent out the property, or if you are selling, this is the same if the property is residential or commercial. The EPC should be available to view when the property is marketed, and the EPC is valid for 10 years.

Many people have chosen to have an EPC produced even though they are not moving or renting, as the EPC can be very helpful in highlighting improvements that can be made to save you money on energy.

If you are looking to receive payments from the Governments feed in tariff for solar PV you must prove that your property attains a rating of D or above, you will therefore need a current EPC.

How can you get an Energy Performance Certificates?

If you are buying, selling or renting through an Agent the chances are that they have a contact with a Domestic Energy Assessor (DEA) , only a DEA can produce a valid Performance certificate. If you would like to arrange your own certificate you can do and a list of DEA's if available online via Landmark (epcregister.com)

If you would like to see how other properties have performed in your area you can go to the Landmark web site, they display all EPCs and have a handy postcode search, if you don't want your own EPC displayed, you can opt out.

The main areas an EPC will give recommendations on are

Insulation - What loft and cavity wall insulation do you have, glazing etc?

Lighting - Do you have low energy lighting?

Heat - What boiler do you have and is it rated band A, and how do you deal with Hot water.

With Energy Prices going up substantially higher than inflation and the cost of living, the importance of highlighting the Energy Performance of a property is becoming more and more important, and research shows that whilst location is still the most important criteria for a property, fuel bills, double glazing, insulation all feature in a person's top 10 most important Features when buying or renting.

For more information and to find an Assessor visit
https://www.epcregister.com/

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