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This paper analyzes the potential for deep renovation of an apartment building to the level of a passive house in different contexts in the continental part of Europe. The examined variables include different local climatic conditions, levels of economic development, and levels of market development (energy prices, energy footprint, labor prices, etc.) as well as different energy efficiency retrofit scenarios in four different countries. The adequate methodology was developed here in order to obtain an optimal solution for deep renovation in each context. The proposed methodology was based on the interaction of energy simulation and mathematical optimization. In this model, the energy performances of a building are determined with the EnergyPlus package and the optimal solution was obtained by using a mixed-integer non-linear programming model. The results demonstrate that the optimal solution for each analyzed location cannot provide cost-effectiveness over the lifetime of a building, so the introduction of additional subsidies or incentives, such as carbon taxes and upfront subsidies, is necessary. © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.