BEST Compliance have been asked to carry out a commercial EPC on a Laundrette in the Peak District. The Laundry had been open for 12 years and I learnt whilst on site that the business had moved because of a rent review.
The Laundry had been struggling a little in recent times and the landlord was just keeping things afloat however the landlord had increased costs on the property and as such the rent review was necessary.
After the rent increase via the review had been attached the Landlord decided he could not take on the extra cost of £75 a month and as such refused to pay. This led to the tenant leaving the property and moving elsewhere, leaving the unit vacant.
The sad thing was that the solution was right in front of the Landlord / Tennant and agent.
Entering the building as an Energy Assessor the first thing you do is look up at the lighting and then for the heating elements, as this helps you understand what your dealing with. In this particular property I saw 24 100-watt T12 Tube lighting. Alarm bells start ringing for inefficiency, T12s were introduced in the 1970’s and are highly inefficient as a light source, they are actually more efficient as a heating source.
After doing some quick calculations on site and switching these over to equivalent LED tubes I roughly worked out that the electricity cost savings per month to the tenant would be around £90.
If the landlord had actually stepped up and replaced his highly inefficient lights, the rent review would have been passed, meaning the landlord would still have a tenant instead of a vacant unit, the tenant would be saving a little money each month and the agent would not have the hassle of marketing the property.