Solar for Dummies

[Anonymous]

Please go easy on me. I find this decision and process a difficult one because I keep getting conflicting information, so I need some guidance. I'm approaching this from a financial perspective as I am clear there are environmental reasons for installing solar. So with that in mind:

1) Do I buy or lease the panels? Why?

2) I love Costco and see they offer solar via SunRun- is this a good option or should I be looking at other companies that are more the "gold standard" in solar?

3) If you have solar are their any negatives? I live in a climate that offers an average of 280+ days of sun if that matters

[Anonymous]

Thanks for posting, I have these questions too. So ... following!

[Anonymous]

What state are you in? The answers depend very much on local conditions.

[Anonymous]

I think it depends. My first house, we leased. Signed a contact for 25 years. Then decided to move. The new buyers had to agree to keep solar or we could remove for a huge penalty. Basically for cancellation of the contract. It was very stressful. We did sell and the new buyers agreed to the panels but it was very stressful. This we 10 years ago when solar was relatively new so many people did not know about it.
We vowed never to do solar on our new house.

But, we recently looked into buying panels. With all the state and federal tax credits in Maryland, it is a much better option for us to own. Our panels are also on the back of the house and will produce 100% of power we need. You do not want to over produce. Selling power back to electric company is not really a good deal. We also for esthetic reasons did not want any panels in the front of the house. You can have a company come out and look at your roof and ensure it is structurally sound to support all the panels and determine how many panels you need and how much you can produce. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Look at price per panel and length of warranty. Shop around.

[Anonymous]

Do you have electric or gas water heater and furnace? If your systems are on gas (excluding seasonal electric A/C and laundry) and you are not planning on adding battery storage to your system or selling back electricity will it even be worthwhile financially to either buy or lease?

I’ve been looking into solar for my house and keep coming back to this question. My neighbor spent $30k on solar panels and says that they will recoup the money in only 10 years. That seems like a lot of time to me and in that time the technology can change considerably.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What state are you in? The answers depend very much on local conditions.

Southern California

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it depends. My first house, we leased. Signed a contact for 25 years. Then decided to move. The new buyers had to agree to keep solar or we could remove for a huge penalty. Basically for cancellation of the contract. It was very stressful. We did sell and the new buyers agreed to the panels but it was very stressful. This we 10 years ago when solar was relatively new so many people did not know about it.
We vowed never to do solar on our new house.

But, we recently looked into buying panels. With all the state and federal tax credits in Maryland, it is a much better option for us to own. Our panels are also on the back of the house and will produce 100% of power we need. You do not want to over produce. Selling power back to electric company is not really a good deal. We also for esthetic reasons did not want any panels in the front of the house. You can have a company come out and look at your roof and ensure it is structurally sound to support all the panels and determine how many panels you need and how much you can produce. Good luck!

So much great info here, thank you! I'm really curious as to why selling power back to the electric company isn't a good deal. I'll research that on my end - I'm in Southern California (by way of Bethesda ), so will look to see what SDGE says about this. Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you have electric or gas water heater and furnace? If your systems are on gas (excluding seasonal electric A/C and laundry) and you are not planning on adding battery storage to your system or selling back electricity will it even be worthwhile financially to either buy or lease?

I’ve been looking into solar for my house and keep coming back to this question. My neighbor spent $30k on solar panels and says that they will recoup the money in only 10 years. That seems like a lot of time to me and in that time the technology can change considerably.

Whoa - $30K in 10 years seems like a long time to me too. I was under the assumption that since solar has become much more competitive over the last decade and the systems have improved, that the costs would be lower and the time to recoup also lower.

To answer your first question, yes we have both gas and electric. Gas water heater, furnace, cooktop, dryer. Electric for all else. Will have to look at what SDGE says about selling energy back to them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have electric or gas water heater and furnace? If your systems are on gas (excluding seasonal electric A/C and laundry) and you are not planning on adding battery storage to your system or selling back electricity will it even be worthwhile financially to either buy or lease?

I’ve been looking into solar for my house and keep coming back to this question. My neighbor spent $30k on solar panels and says that they will recoup the money in only 10 years. That seems like a lot of time to me and in that time the technology can change considerably.

Whoa - $30K in 10 years seems like a long time to me too. I was under the assumption that since solar has become much more competitive over the last decade and the systems have improved, that the costs would be lower and the time to recoup also lower.

To answer your first question, yes we have both gas and electric. Gas water heater, furnace, cooktop, dryer. Electric for all else. Will have to look at what SDGE says about selling energy back to them.

I’m the pp who wrote this. If you live in Southern California your cooling needs are probably greater than your heating needs unlike us in Bethesda so solar would make more sense.

I forgot that we recently got an online quote from a MoCo solar panel program for our 2100 sf Bethesda split level for $27k for the purchase of solar panels. It seems ridiculously high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have electric or gas water heater and furnace? If your systems are on gas (excluding seasonal electric A/C and laundry) and you are not planning on adding battery storage to your system or selling back electricity will it even be worthwhile financially to either buy or lease?

I’ve been looking into solar for my house and keep coming back to this question. My neighbor spent $30k on solar panels and says that they will recoup the money in only 10 years. That seems like a lot of time to me and in that time the technology can change considerably.

Whoa - $30K in 10 years seems like a long time to me too. I was under the assumption that since solar has become much more competitive over the last decade and the systems have improved, that the costs would be lower and the time to recoup also lower.

To answer your first question, yes we have both gas and electric. Gas water heater, furnace, cooktop, dryer. Electric for all else. Will have to look at what SDGE says about selling energy back to them.

I’m the pp who wrote this. If you live in Southern California your cooling needs are probably greater than your heating needs unlike us in Bethesda so solar would make more sense.

I forgot that we recently got an online quote from a MoCo solar panel program for our 2100 sf Bethesda split level for $27k for the purchase of solar panels. It seems ridiculously high.

See that's the part that confuses me. $27K-$30K it's going to take forever to recoup that. This is where I need more education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have electric or gas water heater and furnace? If your systems are on gas (excluding seasonal electric A/C and laundry) and you are not planning on adding battery storage to your system or selling back electricity will it even be worthwhile financially to either buy or lease?

I’ve been looking into solar for my house and keep coming back to this question. My neighbor spent $30k on solar panels and says that they will recoup the money in only 10 years. That seems like a lot of time to me and in that time the technology can change considerably.

Whoa - $30K in 10 years seems like a long time to me too. I was under the assumption that since solar has become much more competitive over the last decade and the systems have improved, that the costs would be lower and the time to recoup also lower.

To answer your first question, yes we have both gas and electric. Gas water heater, furnace, cooktop, dryer. Electric for all else. Will have to look at what SDGE says about selling energy back to them.

I’m the pp who wrote this. If you live in Southern California your cooling needs are probably greater than your heating needs unlike us in Bethesda so solar would make more sense.

I forgot that we recently got an online quote from a MoCo solar panel program for our 2100 sf Bethesda split level for $27k for the purchase of solar panels. It seems ridiculously high.

See that's the part that confuses me. $27K-$30K it's going to take forever to recoup that. This is where I need more education.

Well you get a 30% federal tax credit so the $30k immediately becomes $21k. Then some states have add’l tax credits or SREC markets where you can sell credits to help utilities meet their renewable portfolio requirements.

[Anonymous]

You really need state specific info on this, or even more local. Subsidies and tax breaks vary by location, as does the price for selling electricity back to the grid.

We bought a house with leased solar panels on it and it has been great. The original owners paid extra up front to keep the monthly cost low, which helped keep it an easy economic choice. We are in Silver Speong but only use Pepco power for June, July and august when we need to run the Ac so much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it depends. My first house, we leased. Signed a contact for 25 years. Then decided to move. The new buyers had to agree to keep solar or we could remove for a huge penalty. Basically for cancellation of the contract. It was very stressful. We did sell and the new buyers agreed to the panels but it was very stressful. This we 10 years ago when solar was relatively new so many people did not know about it.
We vowed never to do solar on our new house.

But, we recently looked into buying panels. With all the state and federal tax credits in Maryland, it is a much better option for us to own. Our panels are also on the back of the house and will produce 100% of power we need. You do not want to over produce. Selling power back to electric company is not really a good deal. We also for esthetic reasons did not want any panels in the front of the house. You can have a company come out and look at your roof and ensure it is structurally sound to support all the panels and determine how many panels you need and how much you can produce. Good luck!

So much great info here, thank you! I'm really curious as to why selling power back to the electric company isn't a good deal. I'll research that on my end - I'm in Southern California (by way of Bethesda ), so will look to see what SDGE says about this. Thanks!

So, in general electric providers underpay for electricity sold to them, but in CA they just changed the net metering rules to make it EVEN LESS PROFITABLE for folks trying to sell back to the grid.

Short answer is that time-of-use charges may make it still useful to install solar with battery, in order to bank power and run off of battery when buying from the grid is super expensive, but there is still going to be a fairly long payback period, and that's even if you pay cash. Most financing for solar is completely rapacious right now, so it's not going to make sense to try to get a loan.

Read about california and NEM 3.0 here: https://www.energysage.com/blog/net-metering-3-0/

[Anonymous]

If you have the cash it certainly makes sense to pay upfront. Usually it works out to be about a 7 yr payback, on panels with a 25 year warranty