While solar panels are free for our ECO4 customers, and return on investment (ROI) isn’t relevant, there is still disruption that naturally occurs when you are carrying out any building works or changes to your home.
We get asked quite a lot, “Is it really worth it?”
There are the obvious benefits ECO4 provides overall – a significantly warmer house, and lower bills being the top of the list, but until now we have not had data to support industry claims that solar panels improve the value of your house. Enter computer science expertise combined with Zoopla’s extensive database of sales history.
Recently, UK data scientists have shared the results of their analysis which used multiple machine learning techniques (similar to AI, but more simple) across 5 million data points, or single pieces of information, about properties stored in Zoopla and cross referenced with sales prices from the Land Registry over a 6 year period (2012-2018).
Depending on the model they applied, results showed an increase of 6% – 7.1% in the value of properties with solar panels.
We hope they continue this research with more recent sales, as home owners increasingly choose to install solar panels, either through a government scheme like ECO4, or privately through a qualified and reputable contractor.
You can view the full findings in the “Returns to solar panels in the housing market: A meta learner approach”, published in Energy Economics