Residential People First UK Portal to Let Users Search by EPC Rating

British challenger portal Residential People has launched a new filter that lets its users search by Energy Performance Certificate rating. The new functionality lets users select listings with ratings from A to G that they would like to view on the results page, thus encouraging users to make a more environmentally-friendly choice of property.

Speaking to The Negotiator, Residential People Director Christopher May said:

“During the pandemic, we have all spent more time indoors than we’d normally do and as such, many of us are finding that our energy bills are subsequently skyrocketing as a result.

“While there are several companies out there who can help property owners and renters save money on their existing bills, we found that there are very little resources in place to help property hunters make informed energy-related decisions before being enticed or committed to a purchase.”

“With our new energy efficiency class filtering system we can not only help property seekers to make better purchasing decisions, but also help the environment by promoting energy efficient homes.”

Until now property portal users in many European markets have been able to see EPC ratings on individual listings pages with some property portals showing the EPC ratings on results pages. As far as we at Online Marketplaces can tell (and we have just spent the last few weeks looking through 650 portal filters for an upcoming project) Residential People's filter is the first of its kind in the UK (Daft.ie in Ireland lets users search by local BER rating) that actually lets users refine their property searches based on EPC score - a functionality that is sure to catch on elsewhere.

The EPC filter is the latest in a long line of Residential People functionalities released over the last year or so. In May the portal debuted its Prospr housing market data tool and prior to that it launched an omnichannel marketing CRM named nurturingAI which tracks user behaviour and helps agencies grow valuation leads.