Most landlords with more than one rental property default to fixing the worst-rated one first. It’s an understandable instinct — and it’s usually not the cheapest way to get a whole portfolio compliant.
Why "worst first" costs more overall
The government’s proposed cost cap — part of its confirmed 2030 policy direction, with legislation targeted for 2027 — applies per property, not per portfolio. If your worst-rated property needs the most expensive band of work, spending your first budget there moves exactly one property toward compliance. Spreading the same money across two or three properties with smaller gaps can move more of the portfolio for the same total spend.
The calculation that actually matters
Ranking properties by indicative cost-to-close-the-gap, cheapest first, clears the most properties per pound spent — a genuinely different answer from ranking by current EPC band. A property at D might be cheaper to move to C than a property at E, depending on what’s actually missing on each one.
Why this needs more than one property’s data
This only works as a comparison across your actual portfolio — a single-property checker can’t tell you which of your properties to prioritise. Add each property’s postcode and Instilus ranks them cheapest-gap-first automatically, using the same real government EPC data as the single-property check.
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