Energy Efficient Homes in BC: What Buyers Want

Why heat pumps are the question

A heat pump heats in winter and cools in summer from one system, runs on electricity, and in our mild coastal climate works very efficiently. The summers of the last few years have made air conditioning a real want in White Rock and South Surrey, where most older homes were built without it. A heat pump answers both needs at once. Buyers now treat a recently installed one as a genuine feature, in the way they treat a new roof, and homes without any cooling are a harder sell in July than they were.

New homes: the Step Codes

BC's Energy Step Code sets performance tiers for new construction, and municipalities choose which step to require. The Zero Carbon Step Code adds limits on greenhouse gas emissions, which in practice pushes new homes toward electric heat and hot water. Surrey and White Rock require steps that make new homes considerably tighter and better insulated than anything built before about 2018. For a buyer this means a new townhome in Grandview Heights will have lower utility costs and better comfort than a 2005 one, and that difference is real money over a decade. Ask the builder which step the home was built to, and for the EnerGuide rating if there is one.

Older homes: what actually pays back

Most of the Peninsula's housing is from the 1960s through the 1990s, and you can make it efficient without rebuilding it. In rough order of payback from what I have seen clients do:

• Air sealing and attic insulation. Cheap, boring, and the best return on the list.
• A heat pump replacing an old furnace or baseboards, especially where there is no air conditioning to begin with.
• A heat pump water heater when the tank is due anyway.
• Windows, when the originals are single-glazed or the seals have failed. Otherwise the payback is slow and the benefit is comfort rather than savings.
• Solar, which in our climate is a longer payback than people hope, and worth running the numbers on rather than assuming.

An EnerGuide home evaluation before you renovate tells you where the house is actually losing energy, and it is usually required to access rebates.

Rebates: check before you commit

Provincial CleanBC programs, BC Hydro and FortisBC offers, and federal programs have all provided money for heat pumps, insulation and other upgrades, and they change frequently; some have closed and reopened in different forms. I will not list amounts here because they will be wrong by the time you read them. Before you sign a contractor's quote, check the current CleanBC Better Homes site and your utility, and ask the contractor what they are registered for. The right program can cover a meaningful share of a heat pump, and the paperwork usually has to be done before the work.

The questions I ask on every showing now

• What heats the home, how old is it, and when was it last serviced?
• Is there cooling? If a heat pump, is it whole-home or a single ductless head?
• Can we see twelve months of hydro and gas bills?
• Has the attic been topped up? Are the windows original?
• For a new home: which Step Code step, and is there an EnerGuide label?
• For a strata: does the building allow heat pumps on balconies or roofs, and has the strata done any envelope or mechanical upgrades?

The short version

• Heat pumps answer both heating and the new demand for cooling, and buyers now value them like a new roof.
• New homes under the Step Codes are substantially more efficient than anything pre-2018. Ask which step.
• In older homes, air sealing and insulation pay back first, then a heat pump, then hot water, then windows.
• Check current rebates before you commit, and get the EnerGuide evaluation first.

If you are weighing an older house against a newer one on the Peninsula, I can help you estimate the running cost difference and what it would take to close it. It is often less than buyers fear, and sometimes more than sellers admit.