15/06/2026
There’s a couple of clickbaiters on social media who are scaring people about the proposed energy law coming in in 2030. They say it could make your house worthless and it’s a good move to buy now and make a killing. This is really a load of tosh. 50% of the housing stock in Italy is currently in class F and G.
It’s true that there is a design to introduce this European law, but it is by no means guaranteed that Italy will do so. In fact I’d bet money that it wont be introduced in Italy without huge changes. Why would any government introduce a law that would guarantee alienating 90% of their voters and mean they lose the next election? As a huge proportion of properties south of Rome would fall into the ‘unsellable’ bracket, it’s unthinkable that the powers that be would just pass it without a second glance.
After all there is a European law on the discharge of sewage into rivers lakes and seas which Italy completely ignores and just pays the fines. There are another 74 European laws that Italy does not apply, including waste disposal, renewable energy, discrimination in the work place and road safety. A house having double glazing comes pretty far down the list.
Secondly, there is the complete impossibility to apply some of the remedies as well as the nonsensical parameters laid down in the draft of the law.
In the north of the country, it’s important to keep a house warm – and this is how the energy certification works. In the south it’s a waste of time – houses need to be cool in the summer. A house with one metre thick stone walls will be cooler than a house made of brick. You don’t get points for that. You do get points for have aircon – which is paradoxical given that not having aircon is better energy efficiency all round.
In a centro storico it is not possible in many places to have a points earning condenser boiler on an outside wall, nor thermal cut aluminium double/triple glazing due to the rules regarding historical centres. You cant have photo voltaics or thermal solar in many historic towns. It is therefore nigh on impossible to up your energy rating enough to appease the powers that be – so there will have to be a loophole for historical towns, which is about half of Italy.
You do get lots of points for having hot air blown around your house. Possibly the worst heating system that exists – as going back to my 1 metre thick walls – all it does is heat the air, and as soon as you turn off your fan the house is freezing. What you need in such cases is radiant heating which actually heats the walls and beats back the humidity – no class A for you then –
In synthesis: There doesn’t exist any law to stop you from buying or selling or even renting your house after 2030. There are no sanctions or penalties for any homeowner who has not upgraded their house.
I expect Europe to backtrack wholeheartedly as it has done with petrol cars and gas boilers. The ‘experts’ on the internet have obviously not lived in Italy long enough to know that laws are made to be ignored, and they are just scaremongering. What may come as a surprise to them is that they are here on an elective residency visa, which precludes working in Italy – something that uploading to Instagram and earning from it while in Italy will be of great interest to the taxman.
