news
WINTER 2023
Words by Andreea Dulgheru
Cash in hand for greener loans You might think lenders would be less eager to bring in green loans in the wake of EPC rule changes. But Redwood Bank doesn’t agree—and is offering an incentive to gain cashback on all of its BTL mortgages
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fter years of uncertainty, Rishi Sunak said at the end of September he was going to scrap plans to require rental homes to have a minimum C EPC rating before they could be let to new tenants. With this sudden change, some are expecting landlords to put the task of improving their properties’ energy efficiency on the back-burner—but not Redwood Bank. Just a couple of weeks after the prime minister’s announcement, the specialist lender unveiled its Green Reward cashback offer to support landlords still keen to increase their rental homes’ energy efficiency. The proposition is available across Redwood Bank’s entire BTL product range for residential, commercial and mixed-use properties. For any new loans completed on properties with an A-C EPC rating, the bank will give borrowers cashback for a certain percentage of the net loan value—0.2% for C-rated properties, 0.4% for B-rated ones and 0.5% for A-rated properties.