Property Factors and the Net-Zero Retrofit

Retrofitting those buildings — insulating them, decarbonising their heating, fixing long-standing fabric problems — is one of the biggest domestic policy challenges of the decade. And quietly sitting at the centre of it all, often underestimated, is the property factor.

A March 2025 toolkit from the University of Strathclyde and tenement charity Under One Roof, Factoring in Tenement Retrofit, makes the case plainly: as demand for retrofit services grows among flat owners, factors will increasingly be the first point of contact — the trusted intermediary who can turn aspiration into action.

A building stock in trouble

There are approximately 895,000 properties legally defined as tenements in Scotland — around 37% of all housing. Roughly a third predate 1919, another third were built between 1919 and 1982, and only the final third are post-1982. That means the majority were built before modern energy standards existed.

The condition picture is stark. Scottish House Condition Survey data shows that 48% of all Scottish dwellings have elements in critical disrepair — rising to 67% in pre-1919 stock. In Glasgow alone, 46,600 tenement properties are in urgent need of repair, carrying a maintenance backlog estimated at £2.9 billion.

All 2.25 million homes in Scotland will need some form of retrofit to reach net zero. For tenements, that means tackling fabric failure, replacing fossil-fuel heating systems, and navigating the legal and social complexity of multi-ownership — often simultaneously.

Tenement homes currently emit around 5.6 tonnes of carbon per year in lost heat, compared with 3.6 tonnes for homes built after 1982. Closing that 35% gap is not optional: it is a legal obligation in the making, with the Scottish Government's Heat in Buildings Bill set to make low-carbon heating mandatory in private homes.

Why factors are the critical interface

Multi-owned tenements present a governance problem that no single flat owner can solve alone. Common repairs, shared infrastructure and whole-building energy upgrades all require collective agreement and project management. That is exactly the territory a factor occupies.

Factors already hold the relationships, the maintenance records, and — crucially — the legal standing to organise owners' meetings, instruct repairs, and manage contractor relationships across an entire block. No other actor in the retrofit ecosystem has that combination of access and authority.

The Strathclyde toolkit, led by researchers Emma Miller and Iain Cairns of the Hunter Centre for Entrepreneurship, is direct on this point: "As demand for retrofit services grows in response to higher energy efficiency regulatory standards and rising awareness amongst tenement owners, property factors will increasingly be approached by flat owners for assistance for the transition to a net zero building."

Mike Heffron, Chief Executive of Under One Roof, echoes it: "Factors across Scotland can use [the toolkit] to gain a commercial advantage, as tenement flat owners are increasingly seeking trusted sources of information about what retrofit projects are the best fit for their homes."

In short: owners will ask. Factors who are prepared will lead. Those who are not will find themselves bypassed — or blamed when retrofit decisions go wrong.

The supply problem: contractors, skills, and the gap no one wants to talk about

Even if every factor in Scotland were ready to lead on retrofit tomorrow, the supply chain is not ready to deliver. The construction skills shortage is real, acute, and getting worse — and retrofit work is particularly exposed.

In late 2024, 55% of construction firms reported difficulty finding skilled tradespeople, up from 29% just two years earlier. In Scotland specifically, 53% of builders struggled to recruit carpenters and joiners, and 47% struggled to hire bricklayers — the very trades needed for fabric-first retrofit work: insulation, pointing, window replacement, airtightness detailing.

Heat pump installation, the technology at the heart of decarbonising heating, has its own crisis. Only around 3,000–4,000 qualified specialists exist nationally against projections requiring tens of thousands by 2030. The sector needs 4,000–6,000 new entrants per year to close the gap. Meanwhile, just half of all UK HVAC installers regularly work on heat pumps, and four in ten are not up to date with current environmental legislation.

For factors, this matters in a concrete way: rushed, underskilled retrofit work creates liability. Pre-retrofit maintenance — fixing the fabric before adding new systems — is not just good practice, it is how you protect building owners from paying twice.

The upsides: maintenance, environment, community

Retrofit is frequently framed as a burden: costs, disruption, difficult decisions. But the case for action is compelling, and factors are well placed to make it.

Pre-retrofit maintenance as a gateway

Buildings that are properly maintained before energy upgrades are installed are significantly cheaper to retrofit and less likely to suffer system failures. Fixing damp penetration, repointing stonework, clearing drainage, and upgrading common-area lighting are all within a factor's normal remit — and they lay the groundwork for insulation, ventilation and heat pump installation. The Strathclyde toolkit explicitly positions factors as able to introduce retrofit concepts through routine maintenance conversations, normalising the topic before the bigger work begins.

Residents' indoor environment

Better-insulated, properly ventilated homes are healthier homes. Reduced condensation, lower heating bills, quieter interiors and more even temperatures all directly benefit residents. Cold, damp housing is a public health problem — the NHS costs associated with cold homes in Scotland run into hundreds of millions annually. Retrofit addresses this at source.

Local and global environment

At the neighbourhood scale, better-maintained buildings reduce blight, support property values, and improve streetscapes. Collectively, decarbonising Scotland's tenement stock would remove millions of tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere over coming decades — a contribution that matters well beyond any one city block.

Where 7days stands

At 7days, we take the Strathclyde toolkit's central argument seriously: factors who are not engaged with retrofit are falling behind. We believe the factor's role is expanding — from reactive maintenance manager to proactive building steward — and we're committed to staying ahead of that curve.

That means giving flat owners honest, informed guidance on what their building actually needs before any contractor sets foot on site. It means knowing the difference between a pre-retrofit repair that saves money and a rushed intervention that costs more than it gains. And it means being transparent about the constraints — the skill gaps, the planning requirements, the complexities of consensus — rather than papering over them.

Scotland's tenements are worth preserving. They are dense, walkable, sociable housing that any urban planner would struggle to replicate today. Getting them to net zero is a harder problem than any single policy document acknowledges. But it starts with factors who know their buildings, trust their owners, and have the relationships to get things moving. That is what we're here to do.