Vast majority of housing consumers want information on the energy efficiency of homes

92% of housing consumers in Australia would like information on the energy efficiency of homes from service providers as part of sale and lease processes, while 89% said that an energy-efficient home would be more attractive to buy or rent, recent research by the CSIRO and Common Capital for the Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) for Low Carbon Living's EnergyFit Homes project, due to be released at the end of June, has been able to find.

The survey showed that more than half (56%) would be willing to pay for energy-efficiency information, and 44% said that they would pay up to $250. With such a strong consumer-led push for green houses, and mounting evidence that sustainable features can increase the value of property, it seems that real estate agents need simply to showcase the environmental credentials of a property to make more money. However, there are still relatively few listings that do inform potential buyers/renters of a property's efficiency or sustainability.

Anthony Wright, CSIRO's principal research consultant for energy, hopes that a sustainability framework would not only help push education on the need for sustainable property, but also help generate more research data on existing building stock.

"Our intention is to understand the value proposition of sustainability in property better, because it's one of the keys to transforming housing stock in the longer term [and] getting people to really value sustainability in their housing," he says.

"Although we'd like to be able to say categorically that we think the framework would save x amount of tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, I don't think we're at that point yet in its development. That's something we'll have to work on and learn to codify as we progress with the framework."

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