Checking the energy label before you buy a Dutch home

Before you bid, look up the energy label in EP-Online, the official register run by RVO. Check the letter and the expiry date, and ask for the full report.

The label affects your financing and helps decide which improvements you want to look into. The listing alone does not give you enough for that.

Look at the registration and the report

A label is valid for ten years, so check the expiry date as well. If there is no valid label, ask the seller or the agent when one will be arranged. Put the registration next to the listing and the report you receive.

In the report, look at which insulation, which glazing and which installations the house has, and take the heating, the ventilation and any solar panels along with it. Two homes with label C can need very different improvements. Replacing glazing is a different job from insulating a crawl space you can barely reach.

Where work has been done recently, ask for invoices or photographs. That shows you what was actually carried out and what is only listed in the report as an option.

Keep purchase and sustainability apart

The 2026 lending norms give extra room at purchase and separate room for energy-saving measures.

Those amounts do not mean you can simply borrow them. Your income, the interest rate and your commitments still count. And the limit based on the value of the house applies as well. How both tests work is in calculating your maximum mortgage.

Judge the structural condition too

A poor label calls for research into the cost and the feasibility. Look at the roof, the foundations, the pipework and the space to carry the measures out. A good label gives no certainty about those parts either.

With solar panels, ask whether they are owned or fall under a rental or lease agreement. Read what happens to that contract on sale.

Take the label into your bid

Put the improvements you want to look into next to your budget. Ask your mortgage adviser which borrowing room applies on the basis of your income and the value of the house, and how much room there is for energy-saving measures. That way you use the label information for your bid and your conditions, instead of discovering it during the mortgage application.

Other questions to ask about the house are in the viewing checklist.

What to do now

• Look up the address in EP-Online and check whether there is a valid label, and until when.
• Ask for the underlying report and not just the letter, so you can see what has already been done.
• With solar panels, ask whether they are owned or rented, and what happens to the contract on sale.
• Before you bid, have it calculated what the label does to your borrowing room for the purchase and for energy-saving measures.