How to turn climate legislation into profit for your building

Many real estate people bemoan climate legislation for the added costs and complexity.
But in a few years, many of those people will be thanking that legislation!

Here’s why:

Much of the new climate legislation is aimed at making buildings more energy efficient, which means less money wasted on generating excess energy.

Those savings are then directly passed on to building owners.

Take NYC’s Local Law 97, for example.

There’s been much grumbling that it will be a pain in the ass for building owners to comply with. Many are saying it costs millions of dollars of extra costs to get up to code.

But guess what?

89% of buildings are already compliant through 2024.

Many buildings can be compliant through 2030 by doing just a handful of essential things (like smart controls, insulation, venting, and LEDs).

These measures combined can reduce energy costs by 20-40% and typically pay for themselves in less than a year.

In fact, these measures typically offer significantly better returns on investment than most treasury bonds or stock market index funds.

Besides the societal good this will do in lowering pollution, building owners are being pushed to make their buildings more energy-efficient.

It is hard to see why building owners wouldn’t want to waste less money on unnecessary emissions.

In my experience, many of the emerging climate laws basically enforce energy-efficient practices that many buildings already adopted years ago.