The last couple years has seen a reckoning in the solar industry. Solar, as great as it is, was promoted, sold, financed, and installed incorrectly by many, to many. The lies and incompetence has caught up with a lot of these solar miscreants. If you watch the industry news, you may have heard of several large solar sales organizations, finance companies, and contractors being sued, criminally prosecuted, and/or otherwise closing down. By no means have all the bad actors been caught, so don’t let your guard down, but the industry is now much safer for solar prospects.
We feel that, in part, a salesperson’s responsibility in any industry is to be an expert on a product or service so the prospective customer doesn’t have to become one. The salesperson takes all the relevant information about a product and imparts it to the prospect in such a way that they understand the good, the bad, and the ugly of that product or service. This is how a prospect is able to make an informed decision about making a purchase.
There are downsides, the ugly, to every single product on the planet, even if it is just the price. Misrepresenting these downsides is unethical but extremely profitable. We watched marketing and sales organizations use lies to launch themselves from nothing into multimillion dollar companies in very short amounts of time. We want to cover some of these ugly points about solar in order to arm our readers should they come across some of the remnant miscreants of the dishonest solar industry.
1. Solar does not work effectively in the shade.
If you are a commission only salesperson and have one shot to make money that day and the home is not situated well for solar, telling the customer the truth pays nothing. Heavily shaded south-, east-, or west-facing roof will not let enough sun hit panels to create enough electricity to matter.
2. Leases are not as good as buying.
Leasing is just switching power companies. Instead of paying Duke or FPL your monthly electric bills you pay the leasing company. Many of these leasing companies are in financial and legal trouble. Many customers are hiring lawyers to get out of their lease agreements.
In addition to leases being a raw deal financially, your new power company now has their property on your roof. If you were going to buy a home and one of your options was encumbered with a third-party’s property on the roof, would you want to try and sort that out? Most home buyers agree.
Because of the public outrage and ensuing legal disputes, the solar leasing industry is in the process of being overhauled. There are new terms, policies, and methods being promoted and we don’t know enough about them yet to opine. Maybe the future of solar leasing will improve.
3. Solar alone will not power your home if the grid fails.
There are many solar customers who were shocked when they lost power, just like their neighbors without solar, when the grid failed. This is because their salesperson lied to them. They were told that if the grid failed, their solar would take over and power their home. It did not.
There are system designs that can create a “mini grid” with solar alone, but the amount they can power is extremely limited and depends on sunshine, so cloudy days and nighttime will limit functionality. It should not be promoted as a reliable backup power option.
To stay lit up during a grid-down situation you need batteries or a generator.
4. The government will not pay for 30% of your solar expense.
Not now, as the federal solar tax credit has ended as of 12/31/2025, but not before either. It was a lie. Varieties of that lie were told to prospective solar buyers all over the country and many bought because of this pseudo-benefit. They got the cold hard truth from their tax preparer, or the IRS, come tax time and it was financially devastating for many.
The Residential Clean Energy Credit gave eligible homeowners who purchased solar a reduction of their tax burden by 30% of the cost to install solar. Tax burden is key here. If the taxpayer did not have a tax burden, or owe money to the IRS, to apply that 30% credit against, then there was no benefit to them.
Always get your tax advice from a tax professional instead of a solar salesperson. We are not giving tax advice here. We are merely retelling tales some grumpy solar customers have shared with us.
Some customers are now facing IRS scrutiny because system prices were artificially inflated or non-qualifying costs were rolled into the “solar” price to increase the claimed credit. In those cases, the IRS has disallowed portions of the credit, leaving homeowners responsible for unexpected tax bills.
The fact is that many solar customers were not able to take advantage of the full 30% tax credit for going solar. It was one of the biggest lies told to manipulate the solar buying public and we are glad that nightmare is over. It’s really not completely over. Hopefully, no new solar customers will get got, but many will still be finding out they were lied to and are in trouble for years to come.
5. Many solar lenders charge a preposterous dealer fee.
By preposterous, we mean as much as 37% on top of what your solar system costs. Finance companies tried to forbid solar sales organizations from disclosing this to their customers. Many salespeople needed to find out if the customer planned to pay cash or finance before they quoted. If the cost was $20,000 and the customer revealed they planned to get a loan, the salesperson had to quote the customer $27,400 on the contract.
The additional $7,400 largely went to the finance company on top of whatever additional fees and interest they charged on the loan. In addition to this being an additional and unfair burden to the consumer, it made matching the solar loan payment to the consumer’s current electric bill practically impossible.
6. Your electric bill will not go to zero.
The typical grid-tied solar installation is still … grid-tied. Because you are still connected to the grid, the grid (Duke, FPL, TECo, etc.) will charge you just for the privilege of being connected. Unless you are going to add a substantial amount of storage (Batteries), you want to stay connected to the grid.
At night, your solar panels produce nothing. So even if your system is sized properly and produces 100% of the power you consume every single day, without grid power, you will not have access to electricity. Your options are to use grid power at night or put on enough batteries to get you through the night and have a system large enough to run your home and recharge your batteries throughout the day. Many people opt to pay the $20 to $30/month connection fee than dive into the pricey world of batteries.
7. Net Metering may not be forever.
Net metering, where the power company gives you credit for every kWh you produce equivalent to what they charge for every kWh you consume, may not last forever. In many states they have allowed power companies to charge customers full price but buy electricity back at preposterously low prices. This makes it impossible to zero-out consumption without batteries.
In Florida, the power companies have tried to end net metering a few times. The governor vetoed their attempts for the publicly traded power companies like Duke, FPL, and TECo, but some of the smaller power companies are already selling at premium retails (13 to 15 cents per kWh) and buying back at bargain basement wholesale (2 to 3.5 cents per kWh). This forces battery sales or solar customers are in the position of paying their power bill in addition to their solar loan.
8. Solar increases home value.
It does. If you own it. Many people leased their solar and thought it would be fun to mention to prospective buyers of their home. It wasn’t. As previously mentioned, in a lease agreement the leasing company retains ownership of the solar system. That is a third party’s property on the property you are trying to sell. Many prospective home buyers do not want to deal with the possible legal ramifications.
9. Be careful of quotes for $4 or more per watt and less than $2.50 per watt.
Everybody wants a good deal. A good deal is one where all parties are happy. We know the numbers in Florida and if you have a three-story home, with a metal or tile roof, and you buy the “designer” panels and solar components, installed by the best in the industry, that’s when you might be justified in paying on the higher end. It’s fine, solar will pay for itself, but still ill-advised from just a financial standpoint. Anything more than $4/watt and you are getting taken advantage of.
On the other hand, if you are quoted less than $2.50/watt, you have to wonder what corners are being cut to get to that price. It is going to be quality of equipment and materials, competence of labor, longevity of the contractor, and sometimes all three. Even one of those are headaches you want to avoid. They will eat up any money you thought you saved in stress, damage to your home, functionality, production, paying another contractor to fix what was done incorrectly, and possibly legal fees.
A lot of solar customers are now dealing with the longevity of the contractor shortcut woes. You want your solar contractor to be in business forever. If anything goes wrong, they have intimate knowledge of your equipment, the way it was installed, and an established relationship with the manufacturers of the components. We adopt orphaned solar customers whose original contractors are no longer in business. We charge extra to unravel knots created by others. We have to. Some of the installations we take over are a confusing mess. Solar will still save these customers more than all this will cost them, but it is a hassle most don’t want to deal with, and we don’t blame them.
10. Solar Electric is not maintenance free.
Just like most things, you are going to have to perform some upkeep from time to time. This will be an additional expense on top of what the solar cost. In the grand financial scheme of things, we think the expense is negligible. What solar saves far outperforms what it costs in price of install, interest, the rare repair, and maintenance combined.
The main maintenance expense is cleaning. Clean solar panels produce more electricity than grubby ones. Once, maybe twice, a year you will want us, or someone like us, to come out and carefully clean your panels. We (currently) charge $10/panel and a trip fee. We spoke to a window cleaning company recently that wants to offer their services to our client base at $24/panel. You have options.
Be selective in who you choose for this maintenance. If they knock a wire loose in the cleaning process, you want them to know how to reconnect it. You want them to be very careful about any chemicals they use. You want to be sure they leave no residue behind on your panels to attract more schmutz.
In addition to cleaning, you want monitoring on your system. Most manufacturers do not charge for monitoring. It’s a free application you can download. In addition to you monitoring your system, we also monitor our customer’s systems, and so does the manufacturer. While it is free now, my auto manufacturer has decided to charge me to use certain features on my car. I think solar manufacturers may soon charge for this.
Repairs. They are rare from a component standpoint. Panels and inverters and wiring in these systems are all pretty robust and outlive their warranties. However, weather and animals can cause damage. Squirrels have been known to chew wires. Critter guard for solar is a thing. Weather can blow debris around and cause damage too. Don’t let these instances take you by surprise or the expense make you worry about your solar savings.
Solar will save you more than it can ever cost you. Check our math on the following at www.costtodonothing.com.
According to Google, which gives a different answer every time we ask, the average power bill in Florida is $164/month. Historically, rates have increased about 5% every year. Experts are predicting that increases will dwarf that over the coming years. Let’s stay conservative and pretend power bills will increase just the 5% per year.
$164 in five years will grow to $209.31 for the same amount of electricity. In fifteen years, it will more than double to $340.94. In thirty years that $164 will have grown to over $700/month. The average Florida family will have paid a total of $137,289.23 just for electricity.
That same family could go solar and produce the same amount of electricity they are going to pay $137,000 for over the next thirty years, for about $20,000.
You can finance solar with a high interest rate, preposterous bank fees, recover from a botched install, and pay to repair critter and storm damage every year, and still not get even close to $137K in expenses.
We don’t recommend you do it like that. We recommend you get your quote from a reputable solar contractor who has been in business for decades. Read their reviews and check the BBB and DBPR. Scrutinize their quote carefully and ask a lot of questions. Once you have vetted them and are comfortable with the company, trust them. Trust that they will get you the best rate possible, avoid unethical lenders, not botch the install, and will be around to monitor and maintain your system for the life of it. If you need a recommendation … we know a guy.
