Success for the Great British Refurb!  For the last year we have been calling for the Government to introduce financial incentives such as Stamp Duty or Council Tax rebates for people who improve their home energy efficiency.

This is vital to give the home eco-refurb market a kick start. Yesterday, we received some exciting news via the British media. The Times, Telegraph, and Daily Mail (twice in one day for them!) all wrote about the potential reforms to Stamp Duty being investigated by the government’s energy department – the net result would be a cash boost to anyone improving the insulation of their newly bought house.

The proposals include targeting those worst properties with an Energy Performance Certificate of an F or G.  These homes are incredibly inefficient and are the worst of the worst of the housing stock. 

Shockingly, they make up 20% of the British housing stock – about five and a half million homes.  
If the home owner improves the property, they will be refunded 0.5% of their stamp duty bill -Excellent news for those thinking of buying and looking to refurbish an F or G property.  The changes being investigated by the government will also work the other way, which is that if you buy and don’t insulate these band F or G homes, an extra 0.5% will be added onto the stamp duty rates – targeting the least efficient homes. Recent work by the Energy Saving Trust has shown that the majority of these F and G homes will cost under £3000 to upgrade to a Band E and under the Green Deal the homeowner wouldn’t have to put their hand into their pocket to pay for that £3,000. You would be profiting from making your home cheaper to run and more environmentally friendly.

We’re sure the thousands of you that signed our petition will agree this is a significant step in the right direction from Chris Huhne and Greg Barker – the politicos looking after energy and climate change issues in the UK.  We applaud DECC on pursuing this eminently sensible idea that will be key to ensuring the Green Deal is a success.