Nationwide is chairing the LENDERS project, which is comprised of lenders, building industry experts, green energy groups and sustainability bodies.
The project will use the Energy Performance Certificate to estimate energy costs on individual homes and look at the whether they can be incorporated into affordability calculations.
The research group is supported and part funded by Innovate UK, while it will comprise of Principality Building Society, UK Green Building Council, Zero Carbon Hub, Constructing Excellence in Wales, BRE, Energy Saving Trust, Arup and University College London.
Andrew Baddeley-Chappell, head of mortgage policy at Nationwide, said: “The research will look at ways of moving away from current estimates of energy costs and towards more detailed affordability calculations based on the individual property.
“Fuel charges are the largest unavoidable household costs and may vary by a large degree. Such detailed data could allow lenders to acknowledge that smaller fuel costs could allow more to be borrowed on the mortgage, nudge buyers towards more efficient buildings and potentially reflect the added value of such properties.”
Nationwide is already a proponent of ‘green mortgage lending. The society’s Green Further Advance allows all existing mortgage customers to take out loans of between £5,000 and £20,000 to undertake approved energy efficiency measures such as cavity wall insulation, rated boiler installation and solar panels.
Loans have a 0.25% rate reduction from Nationwide’s existing range of 2-year fixed rate and tracker further advance deals, with current rates starting from 1.64% and 1.49% respectively.
