An Act Lowering the Cost of Housing and Freeing the Skilled Trades to Retrofit Zero Emissions Heating Systems

Summary

This bill would sustain licensing requirements for plumbing and electrical work, except in very limited circumstances where an existing residential system will be like-for-like replaced with a new component. In these limited cases, passing an online test will be sufficient for a landlord or contractor to make a repair. Gas and refrigerant, and all service lines and breaker boxes, are excluded.

Supported by Staff
MassLandlords staff drafted or participated materially in the creation of bill text below. Members will be polled at the next update of the policy priorities survey.
Bill Text May Change
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Full Text of the Like-for-Like DIY Bill

To be posted.

Explanation of the Like-for-Like DIY Bill

Meaning and significance
If landlords can conduct our own simple repairs, we won't have to charge so much rent to cover plumbing and electrical bills. Also, these skilled trades can focus on much harder problems, like electrical service upgrades and heat pump installations.
The current law for electrical and plumbing licenses is found in Chapters 141 and Chapters 142. The regulatory bodies in each are a "board of examiners." This law and these boards prevent landlords and handypeople from touching electrical and plumbing systems without a license. This law would allow us to touch these systems in "like for like" replacement.
Landlords and contractors of all kinds would be eligible.
You would need to pass a test, same as for low-risk deleading.
Once you pass the test, you have five years to work.
After five years, you can take the most recent test and re-qualify.
The intent is to allow landlords to do everything we'd need to do to keep an existing rental property in good repair. We would not be allowed to put in new bathrooms, rearrange kitchens, or do any new construction.
All the explosive stuff still requires a license.
All the greenhouse gas stuff still requires a license.
This sentence repeats what we already understand from the list above: no new construction.
Even if you pass the test, you still must pull a permit. You would be pulling the permit yourself, or your handyperson would. There will still be an inspection after if the town wants.
Repairs carried out by landlords or handypeople would count for sanitary code compliance.
The electrical law has clear exemptions; we would add our exemption here. The plumbing law has no comparable list of exemptions to edit.

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