EPC rules for rented properties: the minimum rating, exemptions and the planned EPC C by 2030

To let a home in England or Wales it needs an Energy Performance Certificate rated E or better, or a valid exemption registered on the PRS Exemptions Register. That has been the rule for every private tenancy, new or continuing, since 1 April 2020. The EPC itself lasts ten years and has to exist before the property is marketed. The rest of this page is the detail: what counts, the six exemptions, what a council can charge, and what the government’s decision to require EPC C by 1 October 2030, which still needs legislation, means for a portfolio today. The government's landlord guidance on the minimum standard is the source for everything here.

When an EPC is needed at all

An EPC is needed before a property is marketed to let, and it must be shown to prospective tenants. It rates the property from A to G and is valid for ten years from the date it was produced. Validity and the duty to get a new one are different things: the duty is tied to marketing and letting, so a new EPC is needed when the property is next marketed or let without a valid one, and the guidance does not treat a lease renewal or extension as a new let. Commissioning one sooner is worth it when improvement work should earn a better rating. The minimum standard below applies while the property is legally required to have an EPC, which the guidance says is probably the case if it was marketed for sale or let, or modified, in the past ten years. The GOV.UK guidance on EPCs covers who can produce one and where existing certificates are looked up; a landlord can be fined for letting without one.

The minimum standard: E or better

The Minimum Energy Efficiency Standard (MEES) applies to domestic private rented property in England and Wales that is legally required to have an EPC. A property rated F or G cannot be let, and cannot continue to be let, unless an exemption applies and has been registered. The standard is enforced by the local authority, not by the tenant, and a tenancy that breaches it is still a valid tenancy: the consequence is a penalty against the landlord, not the end of the letting.

The six exemptions

An exemption is not automatic. It has to be registered on the PRS Exemptions Register with evidence, it lasts five years (or six months for the last one below), and it belongs to the landlord who registered it, so a buyer cannot inherit it. The six are:

1. All relevant improvements made. Every cost-effective improvement has been done and the property is still below E.
2. High cost. The cheapest recommended improvement would exceed the cost cap the guidance sets.
3. Wall insulation. A written expert opinion says cavity, external or internal wall insulation would damage the fabric or the building.
4. Third-party consent. A tenant, freeholder, planning authority or similar refused consent for the work.
5. Property devaluation. An independent surveyor's report says the work would reduce the market value by more than five percent.
6. New landlord. A temporary six-month exemption for someone who has recently become a landlord in circumstances the guidance lists, to give time to comply.

Listed buildings are a separate case: an EPC is not required where the work needed to meet the standard would unacceptably alter the building's character or appearance, and that is a judgement to record, not assume.

The penalties

The local authority can serve a penalty notice for each breach. The maximums in the guidance are:

• up to £2,000 for letting a non-compliant property for less than three months;
• up to £4,000 for letting it for three months or more;
• up to £1,000 for a false or misleading entry on the exemptions register;
• up to £2,000 for not complying with a compliance notice;
• and a total of no more than £5,000 per property for all breaches together.

The council can also publish details of the breach. The £5,000 per-property ceiling is the figure that appears on the landlord penalties page beside every other obligation.

EPC C by 1 October 2030: decided, not yet law

On 21 January 2026 the government published its response to the consultation on privately rented homes. For England and Wales it confirms:

• One deadline: every private tenancy in scope, new or existing, must meet the higher standard by 1 October 2030.
• A cost cap: no landlord will have to spend more than £10,000 per property, or 10% of the property’s value where that is lower. A home that still falls short after that spend can be registered for an exemption lasting ten years.
• A new way of measuring “C”: compliance will be judged on new EPC metrics from the Home Energy Model, a fabric performance standard plus either a heating system or a smart readiness standard, rather than the single rating on today’s certificates.
• Existing C ratings count: a home rated C or above on the current rating, on an EPC produced before 1 October 2029, is treated as compliant until that EPC expires.
• Higher penalties: a proposed maximum of £30,000 per property per breach.

None of that is law yet. The government will take the powers by Act of Parliament and then make regulations, which it aims to bring into force in 2027, and until the higher standard applies the legal minimum stays at E. What a portfolio can sensibly do now is know which properties sit at D or below, because those are the ones the 2030 deadline reaches, keep the EPC expiry date tracked so a renewal is never the moment a poor rating is discovered, and note that a C rating recorded before October 2029 buys time until that certificate expires.

What to keep on record

• The EPC itself, its rating, its date and its expiry date (ten years on).
• Any exemption: the type, the register reference, the evidence and the date it expires.
• Evidence the EPC was available before marketing and shown to the tenant.
• Improvement work, with dates and costs, so a future exemption claim has its paperwork.

In Verixad an EPC is a document on its property with an expiry date and a rating, its status follows from the date, and it sits in the compliance timeline beside the gas and electrical certificates. See documents and compliance. The EPC is one of several dated certificates a rented home needs; the full list is in what certificates a UK rental property needs, and the expiry checker works out the ten-year date from the certificate date.