Swedish House Owners’ Intentions Towards Renovations: Is there a Market for One-Stop-Shop?

Abstract

In this paper, we examine factors affecting owners’ intention for renovation of their detached houses. Furthermore, we analyze their interest in choosing a one-stop-shop (OSS) service for the renovation, even though such a concept is not yet established in Sweden, but emerging in other parts of Europe. Our study is based on responses to an online questionnaire survey of 971 house owners residing in Kronoberg Region in Sweden. About 76% of the respondents intend to renovate in the near future, with approximately 71% of them preferring to renovate individual components of their dwelling and 5% to renovate their whole house in steps. House owners of younger age, higher income, higher education, and those with an interest for environmental issues, were the ones most interested in physical renovations, which improves energy efficiency of the building. For those house owners, one-stop-shop can facilitate the decision-making process, and help them to choose those measures that will improve their quality of life. Approximately 20% of the respondents had a positive view towards an one-stop-shop, which is an indicator that market for such a service exists. Parameters such as quality of work, cost and energy savings and specification of measures to be adopted are the key for the promotion of one-stop-shop. Additionally, house owners want to have a certain level of involvement in the selection of actors performing the renovation. Moreover, financial incentives, e.g., loans, do not play a significant role for the selection of one-stop-shop, but act as complementary motive for house owners.

One-Stop-Shops for Energy Renovation of Dwellings in Europe—Approach to the Factors That Determine Success and Future Lines of Action

“…They indicated that among the actors, financial entities find it hard to assess credit risk or repayment without the assistance of specialised technicians (as they do not know the real savings of energy improvements and their future benefits). Likewise, householders generally lack knowledge of the type of suppliers, contractors and specialists who can help them to renovate their homes or simply, according to Pardalis et al [35], do not have time to investigate this, which is another problem. Similarly, Mahapatra et al [14] highlighted the difficulty in finding reliable suppliers in the renovation sector, which tends to be small-scale and does not always guarantee energy savings.…”

“…Any renovation that does not include such measures in a substantial way is a wasted opportunity, as it "fossilises" situations of inefficiency during the time required to amortise the renovations [54]. In general, empirical evidence suggests that any improvement that is undertaken in the past limits the willingness to undertake further improvements, although the level of education and income favours the implementation of energy measures [17,35]. In this line, national proposals such as the aforementioned PAS-E or the Pasaporte del Edificio (Building Passport) of the Fundación la Casa que Ahorra are progressing.…”

“…Notably, the general model of the OSS guides homeowners through several or all stages of the renovation. They enable measures to be adopted that improve the energy efficiency of the dwelling, at the same time as they offer a renovated dwelling that meets the homeowner's real needs [35].…”

The role of one-stop shops in energy renovation - a comparative analysis of OSSs cases in Europe

“…While all energy efficiency projects could be good candidates, OSSs are particularly well equipped in addressing the market fragmentation barrier on both demand and supply sides , overcoming some of the sociotechnical barriers surrounding the decision to renovate in a holistic way (Mahapatra et al, 2013(Mahapatra et al, , 2011). Yet, there are only a few studies specifically investigating the OSS approach (Brown, 2018;De Nigris, 2019;Mahapatra et al, 2013;Pandelieva-Dimova, 2017;Pardalis, Mahapatra, Bravo, & Mainali, 2019;Pardalis, Mahapatra, Mainali, & Bravo, 2021;, in part because it has only recently started to emerge in Europe (Boza-Kiss & Bertoldi, 2018). In the "Smart Financing for Smart Buildings initiative" published in Annex 1 to the Clean Energy Package, the European Commission encourages Member States to develop dedicated local or regional OSSs as a means of promoting more locally developed project pipelines and strong and trustworthy partnerships with local actors such as SMEs, financial institutions, and energy agencies.…”

Strategies for deep renovation market of detached houses

“…The research is based on the systematic literature review, expert consultation, and findings of market gap analyses of deep renovation in Sweden and Denmark conducted as a part of INNOVATE project under EU Horizon 2020 [6,27]. Defining the object under study and purpose of the study is the first step in defining the analytical framework.…”