Increasing energy efficiency in residential dwellings remains one of the top climate protection priorities in many European countries. In Germany regulatory instruments and subsidy programs, together with communicative instruments, represent the most important measures for motivating homeowners to pursue energy-efficient retrofitting to date, however, with little success; a tremendous potential for energy savings still exists particularly in the category of single-family houses. The present article primarily addresses the question of how to improve or supplement the political instruments in order to increase refurbishment rates and tap these potential savings; it presents the results of an analysis of existing policy instruments in Germany focussing on the most promising types of building and refurbishment measures that also takes into account the barriers responsible for the discrepancy between potential and actual refurbishment rates. It is shown that consideration of the specific peculiarities and situations homeowners face, coupled with an analysis of the energy saving potentials of their buildings, offers valuable insights and is critical for evaluating policy instruments and finding the mix of instruments that will purposefully encourage the most effective refurbishment measures. Drawing on these results, recommendations for the improvement of current policy instruments and implementation of new instruments are provided. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.