Would you buy a house with a solar lease?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking at a home that checks all the boxes, but it has a solar lease - electricity is free but we can’t sell any SERCs. Seller says it’s irrevocable and they save about $2000 in electricity a year. I don’t see the downside other than the lost SERC income. Reg flag or good thing?

It looks like the panels were installed under this program: https://www.solarsolutiondc.com/power-to-the-people

Basically, the PPA that exists for this house means that power purchase is set to $0.00 instead of say $0.03 (what solar solution offered for power costs under their traditional lease, when we got solar) or $0.11 (pepco's current residential rate). It's not clear to me what happens to the array and the PPA once the contract ends, but otherwise it's a good deal. In the normal lease scenario they sell the array/equip to the homeowner for $1 at contract end.

We have this deal with Solar Solutions. It’s a good one.

I don’t understand most of these responses. I assume you all don’t live in DC? The solar market here is great and solar leases, particularly with a known company like Solar Solutions, are really common.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, let them pay it off before the sale.

OP here. It can’t be paid off/revoked.

to clarify, they don’t pay for the lease - the solar company gets the roof and they get free electricity.

This is in DC.

Do you have a copy of the lease? How long is it for? I'd be surprised if it was longer than 15 years, maybe 20.

20 years and they are two years in. It’s with Solar Solutions which seems to be very reputable.

OP, what are the clauses on getting it fixed in case something goes wrong? If the solar company goes out of business and it is sold to a new company then you are SOL. Also, discuss how high your insurance rates would be with this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are looking at a home that checks all the boxes, but it has a solar lease - electricity is free but we can’t sell any SERCs. Seller says it’s irrevocable and they save about $2000 in electricity a year. I don’t see the downside other than the lost SERC income. Reg flag or good thing?

It looks like the panels were installed under this program: https://www.solarsolutiondc.com/power-to-the-people

Basically, the PPA that exists for this house means that power purchase is set to $0.00 instead of say $0.03 (what solar solution offered for power costs under their traditional lease, when we got solar) or $0.11 (pepco's current residential rate). It's not clear to me what happens to the array and the PPA once the contract ends, but otherwise it's a good deal. In the normal lease scenario they sell the array/equip to the homeowner for $1 at contract end.

We have this deal with Solar Solutions. It’s a good one.

I don’t understand most of these responses. I assume you all don’t live in DC? The solar market here is great and solar leases, particularly with a known company like Solar Solutions, are really common.

yeah, the reality is that solar solutions gets to offload older hardware in their warehouse that folks spending actual money don't want (say iq7s that can't form a microgrid, and maybe 350w panels), they get the 30% federal rebate themselves, and THEN they get all the SREC income. our similar-sized system has generated around $14,000 in two years. The real question, again, is what happens when the lease ends, and also what happens if you start regularly exceeding your power generation, if there is a clause in the PPA about that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, let them pay it off before the sale.

OP here. It can’t be paid off/revoked.

to clarify, they don’t pay for the lease - the solar company gets the roof and they get free electricity.

This is in DC.

Do you have a copy of the lease? How long is it for? I'd be surprised if it was longer than 15 years, maybe 20.

20 years and they are two years in. It’s with Solar Solutions which seems to be very reputable.

OP, what are the clauses on getting it fixed in case something goes wrong? If the solar company goes out of business and it is sold to a new company then you are SOL. Also, discuss how high your insurance rates would be with this.

I don't know how much your insurance rate changes between a solar lease or owning the equipment.

My homeowners insurance went up a whopping $25 for the year when I added an 8 MW system (owned).