From June 3, 2026 — the first working day after the transposition deadline of the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD IV) — Italy's Energy Performance Certificate becomes a more detailed and more market-relevant instrument. The market is already pricing it in: energy-efficient properties command up to 15% more.
May 29, 2026 was the deadline by which all EU member states should have formally transposed Directive EU 2024/1275, known as EPBD IV or the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive. Italy did not make it: the government failed to present the draft National Building Renovation Plan — a document due by December 31, 2025 — and the infringement procedure opened by the European Commission in March 2026 now risks escalating. Nevertheless, from June 3, 2026, the first available working day, Italy's Energy Performance Certificate (APE in Italian) officially changed its nature.
The new EPC is no longer the largely formal document that for years accompanied property sales and tenancy agreements as a bureaucratic requirement. Under the new European framework, it becomes the property's climate identity card: it continues to report energy consumption in kWh per square metre per year, but now also includes the Global Warming Potential (GWP) indicator and more detailed information on building systems. For less efficient properties — those in class F or G — the certificate's validity may be reduced to five years rather than the current ten, unless certified periodic maintenance of systems is documented.
A critical point worth noting concerns reclassification. The new European A-G scale, once fully operational through national transposition, will classify as class G the worst-performing 15% of each member state's building stock: a moving threshold that in Italy could result in a downward reclassification of properties currently rated class E or F. According to ENEA data, 70% of Italy's residential buildings currently fall into class E, F or G — a proportion that makes this issue far from marginal.
That said, the Directive introduces no ban on buying, selling or renting low-rated properties: there is no obligation for individual owners to renovate before selling. The approach is at the national portfolio level, with consumption reduction targets of 16% by 2030 and 20-22% by 2035, to be achieved through state-defined plans and incentives. Tools such as the Bonus Casa and Conto Termico 3.0 remain available for those who choose to act voluntarily.
The most immediate — and already measurable — impact is commercial, not regulatory. Market analysis consistently shows that highly energy-rated properties already sell at 10-15% premiums over low-rated equivalents in the same area. Banks and lenders are progressively incorporating energy class into financing conditions, offering more favourable mortgage terms for efficient assets. Anyone requesting a new EPC after June 3, 2026 will be assessed under updated evaluation criteria; those holding a still-valid certificate are not required to renew it, absent structural modifications to the property.
In short, the direction is unambiguous: the market is not waiting for regulation — it is pricing it in ahead of time. Informed buyers and institutional investors already treat energy class as a value variable, and this trend will intensify as Italian transposition is completed and, from 2028, as ETS2 — the European carbon tax — makes gas heating in low-efficiency buildings structurally more expensive.