Whether you’ve inherited a property or taken it on as a business venture, being a buy-to-let landlord is a big responsibility. Owning a property with multiple rental tenants could also leave quite a considerable carbon footprint and impact the planet.
With this in mind, we’ve come up with these helpful tips for eco-conscious landlords of rental properties.
Equip the home with eco-friendly appliances and technology
The first step, check the energy rating of any appliances and technology you introduce into your rental property, even if it is already advertised to you as being ‘eco-friendly’. Be sure to only provide tenants with eco-friendly white goods such as dishwashers and washing machines.
Want to move away from using gas or oil-based central heating for your rental property and go for a more energy-efficient greener alternative? Install a green heat pump at your property, this should also reduce the amount you spend on gas and oil which have boomed in price during the energy crisis.
Install a smart meter
Smart meters provide better estimates of energy demand so you can maximise the amount of renewable power your rental property uses. Therefore, installing a smart meter will mean you’re doing your bit as a landlord to ensure your property relies less and less on fossil fuels.
Educate your tenants on sustainable home habits
If you have young or student tenants, it may well be the first time they have lived independently away from their family, so you can’t expect them to know everything about the best green practices to follow at home.
So, try educating your tenants on sustainable practices. You can do this by putting up signs and notices around your property informing them about things such as the different materials they can recycle, the days recycling gets collected, efficient household energy usage, turning lights off when leaving a room, and so on.
If have a large number of tenants living in your property, then it will also be a sensible idea to ensure you cover your back by taking out specialist landlord insurance.
Leave out plenty of recycling containers
Encourage tenants to recycle as much as possible by leaving out a copious amount of recycling containers. Remember to put recycling containers in obvious places in the house where tenants simply won’t be able to miss them!
Provide compost bins
Composting is good for the planet since it helps the soil retain moisture and suppress plant diseases and pests. Overall, composting enriches the soil and prevents soil erosion.
Therefore, you should provide your tenants with plenty of compost bins, inside and outside. Examples of everyday items you may use at home which make fantastic compost include fruit and vegetable scraps, eggshells, coffee grounds, grass clippings, and dry herbs.
Be mindful of how you position furniture
Does your rental property come ready furnished for tenants? Well, simply thinking carefully about how you position household furniture items like sofas and armchairs in the lounge area can greatly improve the energy efficiency of your home.
Moving your sofa a little bit away from the radiator for instance will allow the heat to circulate around the lounge more freely.
Only fit LED-powered lighting
LED light bulbs are capable of 50-70%+ energy savings compared to traditional lighting technology. What’s more, LED lights do not contain harmful chemicals like mercury.
Want to considerably reduce the carbon footprint of your rental property? Make sure you only install LED light fixtures.
Install low-flow shower heads in bathrooms
In many poor countries across the world, there is a lack of clean water. Droughts and water wastage are climate change issues that can be easily alleviated, it’s frankly shocking how many people needlessly waste large quantities of water at home on a daily basis.
A solution to reduce water wastage at your rental property? Get low-flow shower heads installed for the bathrooms. Fear not, it will still feel like a normal shower with normal pressure, but with the benefit of only using half as much water!
So, after reading through these eco-friendly tips, you should now know more about how you can go about finding solutions to make your rental properties more sustainable and greener.