[sheeeep86]

I disagree, not installing solar and heatpumps will increase the energy consumption of the house, potentially for the entire lifetime of the building. Installing them makes it cheaper to live in the building, increases the home value and pays off in years, so really it should be a no brainer. Some countries offer special financing for the costs of energy efficient building, this would be a better option at addressing your concern than removing the requirement.

[kelnos]

People may not have the up-front money, though.

Think about it this way: we take on mortgages and car loans and other sorts of debt because we can't afford the full cost of something up front, and accept the tradeoff that, over time, we'll be spending more money than if we had that up-front money.

Same thing applies here. Requiring solar on new homes will just make homes cost more, and will put home ownership out of reach in cases where people were already stretching. Either that, or it'll just increase the problem of people being in too much debt.

If the government wants solar on all new homes, they should be paying for it. I believe in renewables, and in distributed power generation, but forcing people to spend another $20k or whatever to buy a new home is a heavy lift.

[robocat]

Supply/demand argument fallacy: because the price of a home is not driven by the costs of construction. Homes are nothing like normal goods.

Property prices are driven by the amount people can afford to pay on their mortgage, with the free variables being land price and house size.

Housing booms and crashes are only slightly linked to the cost of building a home.

[twblalock]

I think the average cost is about $25k.