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Engage homeowners at key decision points including selling/buying a home, renting a home, replacing old or broken fixtures and/or undertaking other home renovations. Target messaging through influential sources by operating at a community (including online communities) or regional scale. This will allow information to flow from family, friends, and neighbours as well as local trades people Consider the opportunity for messaging through more general channels such as TV and internet information sources Do specific customer preference and insight analysis for the target markets identified, exploring the detail of which retrofits are preferred, what specific messages about their benefits are impactful, and from whom it would be best to hear the messages Establish clear success criteria to assist with monitoring the scheme’s progress against expectations. Promote, develop, maintain, and recognise quality and performance so owners have confidence in the scheme.
Funding and Finance Models Currently in Australia there are some financial products available commercially or through government to encourage energy efficiency and thermal efficiency retrofits. Bank Australia with the support of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation offers a Green Home Loan. The homeowner receives a 0.4 percentage point discount on their home loan rate if their home is either: • •
NatHERS 7 Star+ (new homes) Have made ambitious green upgrades in the last 12 months and can show a 1-star improvement based on Residential Efficiency Scorecard assessments (existing homes)
To date 140 homes have taken up the offer. The Commonwealth Bank offers a Green Loan where customers with an eligible CommBank home loan or investment home loan can buy and install eligible clean energy products at the property secured by their existing home loan. The loan offers a 0.99% PA 10-year fixed rate no establishment fee, monthly loan service fee or early repayment fee. The minimum loan size is $5,000, maximum loan size is $20,000. Some State governments have also created structures that allow finance to be accessed for energy retrofits. In Victoria from 6 April 2020, Environmental Upgrade Finance (EUF) able to be offered to homeowners. EUF is a council-based financing mechanism where the lender provides finance to the property owner and the local council collects repayments through the rates system. The council then passes the repayments onto the lender.
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Pathways to Scale: Retrofitting One Million+ Homes
