The Impact of Energy Performance on Single-Family Home Sales Prices in Sweden

The EU Energy Performance Certificates provide new information and measure energy performance more exactly than many earlier (proxy) variables. This is one of the first studies to test the effect of this information, and the first one using Swedish data. The purpose of the paper is to test whether energy performance affects single-family house sales prices, and whether such impact is heterogeneous over house size, age and distance from city center. The paper also examines whether recommendations for supposedly cost-effective energy efficiency measures, by intervention category (construction, installation or operation/control technical measures), are perceived as untapped potential affecting sales prices. Energy performance measurement and dummy variables for three categories of improvement recommendations were included as explanatory variables in a hedonic regression analysis using transaction data and Energy Performance Certificates data for 1073 observations. The results indicate that better energy performance has a positive impact on sales price. Energy efficiency recommendations seem to have an impact on sales price; home buyers seem to require a larger “discount” for more complex types of measures. The results may imply that energy efficiency in buildings will become more important in the future, which may strengthen house owners’/sellers’ incentives to improve energy efficiency.