Energy Performance Certificate Legislation Changes (Residential Property) Effective 6th April 2012

Commissioning an EPC before marketing

A number of changes will be made to regulation 5A of the EPB Regulations. In general, the onus remains on the ‘relevant person’ (i.e. the seller or landlord) to commission an EPC before marketing. The main changes are as follows:

• the duty to commission an EPC before marketing will be extended to the sale and rent of residential and non-residential buildings;

• the current 28 day period within which an EPC is to be secured using ‘reasonable efforts’ will be reduced to 7 days;

• if after that 7 day period the EPC has not been secured the relevant person will have a further 21 days in which to do so.

Power to Require the Production of Documents

Trading Standards Officers (TSOs) currently have the power to require the ’relevant person’ (i.e. the seller or landlord) to produce copies of the EPC for inspection and to take copies if necessary. The power to require the production of documents will be extended to include persons acting on behalf of the seller or landlord – e.g. estate agents and letting agents. This means, for example, that TSOs will be authorised to require estate agents to produce evidence showing that an EPC has been commissioned where they are marketing a building without one.

Clarifying when an EPC is required

This technical amendment to Regulation 5 is intended to remove the erroneous belief that the provision of the EPC can be delayed until shortly before the parties enter into a contract for sale or rent. This will be achieved by deleting the words “before entering into a contract to sell or rent the building or, if sooner” in Regulation 5(2)(b) of the EPB Regulations

Consequential changes

A number of consequential changes will be made to enable TSOs to enforce the new duties.

EPC Information in Written Particulars

Currently, for residential sales only, the relevant person or his agent is under a duty to either attach the EPC to written particulars or include the asset rating on those particulars. The amendments will require the EPC to be attached to written particulars in relation to buildings sold or rented out. The option to include the asset rating will no longer apply.
The existing definition of ‘written particulars’ will be expanded to ensure that particulars produced for rented out buildings and commercial properties are captured by the new requirements.
As an exception to this requirement, provision is made to allow the person subject to the duty to provide the written particulars to omit the address of the building from a copy of the EPC where the address has been omitted from those particulars. A further amendment to the Regulations which will also come into force on the 6th April will require that the omission of the address from the copy of the first page of the EPC is carried out by the keeper of the register. The further amendment to the Regulations will restrict this exception to properties which are non-residential.

Statutory lodgement of air conditioning inspection reports

The requirement to lodge air conditioning inspection reports on the central Non Domestic EPC Register will become a statutory requirement, replacing the current voluntary approach.

Commencement


The amended Regulations will come into force on 6 April 2012. A copy of the amendments and the Explanatory Memoranda can be downloaded at: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2011/2452/introduction/made 
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2012/809/regulation/1/made

The landlord holds responsibility as the ‘Relevant Person’ they therefore carry responsibility to ensure compliance with the EPC regulations, however they may if they choose engage an agent to act on their behalf in procuring the EPC. Should the landlord, as the ‘Relevant Person’ not produce an EPC for a marketed property within the time limits set out in the regulations i.e. ideally within 7 days but certainly by 28 days from the commencement of marketing the landlord will be liable to a fine, currently at £200.

If you have any questions please feel free to contact us info@livingproperty.co or phone 0845 459 4095

15% stamp duty tax on homes worth more than £2m

The UK government 2012 budget has introduced a 15% stamp duty tax on homes worth more than £2m that are bought through a company. Whilst this might come as unwelcome news to some it ensures that the majority of those active in the buy-to-let business sector purchasing residential property via company vehicles are unaffected.
The government also introduced a new 7% stamp duty rate on residential property bought personally above £2m.
Find the HMRC stamp duty land tax schedule here.
If you are considering investing in residential property within the Waveney Valley, Living Property Waveney offers a ‘Buying Agent’ service which includes sourcing suitable property, negotiation and acquisition. To find out more call 0845 459 4095 or email info@livingproperty.co

Facebook vanity URL for Living Property Waveney Lettings & Management

We are delighted to announce that with the support of our highly valued clients we have here at Living Property Waveney been able to secure a much converted Facebook vanity URL to make finding our Page so much easier....its www.facebook.com/LivingPropertyWaveneyLettings Please feel free to pass this onto anyone thinking of renting or letting in the North Suffolk / South Norfolk region of East Anglia. Thank you.  

Living Property Lettings & Management ramps up their social media marketing

Living Property, the independent specialist in residential property rental and management, based in Beccles and covering Norfolk, Suffolk and the Waveney Valley, have further developed their user experience on the Facebook and Twitter.

Kim Davies, co director explains, “Since we launched Living Property Waveney we have been present on facebook, however we wanted our friends and followers of our brand to have access to all our property content and it’s this we have now developed. You can now see all our rental properties on our ‘Listing’ page and search just as you can on our website www.livingproperty.co. We recognise that many people now use Facebook in a similar way to Google, searching for product or service provider, so developing our page in this way makes sense for us and our customers”.

Paula Cunningham, co director continues, “We also recognised that Twitter is a fantastic broadcast tool and that we can use it to let potential renters know about new rental instructions to the market, all you do if follow us @LivingProp_NEW. Each tweet gives the property address and a link to the full property details so you can arrange a viewing even when you’re on the go via a smart phone. In addition to broadcasting new property listings we have a twitter feed dedicated to giving news and information relevant to the lettings industry, this can be followed @LivingProperty”.

 If you have a property to rent Living Property are always happy to provide a rental appraisal without obligation, simply call 01502 558538 or email info@livingproperty.co

Living Property Lettings & Management launch all new website

Living Property, the independent specialist in residential property rental and management, based in Beccles and covering Norfolk, Suffolk and the Waveney Valley, are delighted to unveil their all new website, which can be found at www.livingproperty.co

Paula Cunningham and Kim Davies, co directors, have made a substantial investment in livingproperty.co with the aim in providing tenants and landlords an enjoyable, informative browsing experience.

Kim Davies, said, “We hope customers like the detailed presentation of our rental homes, in particular our approach in publishing multiple photographs of the properties. We have also built in ‘Live Agent’ functionality which allows renters and landlords to communicate with us immediately via the livingproperty.co saving the need to email or phone in, we believe we are the first dedicated lettings agency in the region to use this communications medium”.

Paula Cunningham additionally comments, “We view our site as being our shop window to the world on-line, on the site we provide useful information to would-be landlords and tenants. Additionally we also publish some of the many testimonials we get from our landlords which we hope will make interesting reading to new customers looking at engaging the services of a letting agent”.

On-line Living Property also publish their rental properties onto the UK’s leading property portals, rightmove and the Zoopla network which includes homes24.co.uk, The Times, The Sunday Times and The Sun plus another six websites. Off-line Living Property use Archant Community Media’s titles, The Waveney Advertiser and Beccles & Bungay Journal.

If you have a property to rent Living Property are always happy to provide a rental appraisal without obligation, simply call 01502 558538 or email info@livingproperty.co

Water industry proposals reviewed

As reported in The Property Drum today the Government is considering pulling back from powers that would force landlords to share information on changes of tenancy with water companies, and even make them liable for their tenants’ debts.

Proposed under The Flood and Water Management Act, the Government’s current plan is to make owners liable for payment of water and sewerage bills if they fail to provide specified details of occupiers.

Mindful of the burden that regulation may impose on landlords, the Government is considering whether ‘bad debt’ can be tackled through a voluntary and non-regulatory approach.

Government believes that the lack of consequences of non-payment has contributed to unpaid bills from domestic water customers spiralling from £705m in 1998-99 to £1.635bn in 20010-11. The industry wrote off approximately £328 million of household debt in 2010-11 an increase of £168 million from the previous year.

New EU regulation risks UK BTL market

As reported in the property trade title Property Drum the proposed EU regulation on mortgages, designed to combat fraud, which is due to be voted on early in 2012, could change the way some buy-to-let lending is regulated to bring it into line with rules governing conventional residential mortgages.

Critics are expressing fears that the new rules could seriously reduce the number of buy to let mortgages that are granted. This is because lenders would be required to test affordability using standard residential mortgage criteria: relative size of deposit, existing income, other debts, but they would not be able to include potential rental income, meaning that a landlord investor would have to be able to afford to pay the mortgage on the property without receiving any income from it.

Everyone will appreciate the need to reduce fraud but is this yet another hammer to crack a nut? In a country populated by large numbers of frustrated first-time buyers forced into the private rented sector, high rents with longer tenancies, low property purchase prices and better returns than other investment opportunities, the buy to let sector is growing, and the number of mortgages servicing it is growing too.

In the third quarter, buy-to-let lending as a proportion of total lending hit its highest level in three years, jumping 16 per cent in value. According to one lender, 10 per cent of its applications last year were from prospective landlords. This year, the proportion reached 80 per cent. A spokesperson for Lloyds recently forecast 20 per cent growth in the buy-to-let mortgage market in 2012.

Of course, this situation is rather different in many EU countries, where most people have always rented and the change from aspiration to home ownership to reconciled to long term renting is not an issue, and there are many more properties available to rent.

But in the UK, where buy to let is one of the few areas of the property business that is doing well, heavy handed EU legislation could affect our rental housings stocks far more dramatically than in other countries.

If the new legislation is passed, potential new investors and landlords wanting to develop their portfolios, and / or remortgage current assets, should get a plan underway soon; the new rules would take effect from 2013. At least an increase in activity in the short term would be good for the market; if 50 per cent of the estimated 1.4 million landlords in the UK bought a new property before the new legislation hits, we’d have 700,000 more rental properties available for tenants.