Recently I had to waste my money on one of those energy Performance certificates (EPC).
For my sins, a legal requirement was made for all landlords in October 2008. Since then, landlords have been legally required to show all potential tenants (that is, before any official lease is formed) the report of energy performance. The idea is that the EPC will give prospective tenants an indication of how energy performance a property is, so that they can determine how expensive (or cheap) it will be to heat a property during the winter.
Great, another useless legislation that we have to look for in our pockets. I say "useless" because, in my experience, tenants don't give a shit about how "energy performance" a property is. In fact, most of them do not even know that there are EPCs, much less show interest in the document when I shake it casually under their noses. Maybe it's like beer: we will eventually learn to love it, even though the first taste is often compared to a barrel of urine.
While the EPC seems like a good idea in theory (I will give you that), there is much to say about your lack of practicality. It is really difficult to assign a monitoring value to a property that receives an energy performance rating. If you don't know, that's generally what the EPC does: rate the property from A to G ("A" is the best, as in school) in energy performance.
The only saving grace, if you can call it that, is that they remain valid for 10 years and do not cost an arm and a leg. Don't get me wrong, it's money down the drain, but relatively speaking, that is to say compared to all the other meaningless and scandalous financial hoops we've made to jump), it's not so much money.
How much they cost?
Before getting my first EPC, I wasn't completely sure how much I was expected to pay for one. I have heard that people murmur prices ranging from £ 60 to £ 100. A local rental agent quoted me £ 80. You know that when a rental agent quotes you a price, you can probably get the same bloody thing at least 30% cheaper elsewhere.
That said, I took a look at the Internet and the cheapest one I found was £ 39.99. That's almost half the price the agent quoted me. I called it.
The EPC company operates in Essex (I'm not affiliated with the company. And a fair warning, its website looks like crap), but I'm sure they will have similar prices across the country. I think £ 40 is a good deal. For more info click here
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