The Adventure Of Installing Solar Panels On My Townhouse With A Shared Roof – CleanTechnica

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I’ve wanted to install solar for a long time, but there has always been a reason it doesn’t make sense for me.

• When I first wanted to install solar about 8 years ago, it didn’t make sense, since my roof was 15 years old, and it adds a lot to your costs (maybe $4,000 or so in my area for 22 panels) if you install them and then have to have them taken down and reinstalled in just a few years.
• I got a new roof a few years later, but then it didn’t make sense to get solar, since my kids had all moved out and I was preparing to downsize. In a perfect world, having solar panels would be a great asset in selling your house, since you have done all the work to get them installed and the new owner just gets the benefits. But we don’t live in a perfect world. In the real world, solar is very appealing to some and a disadvantage to others. Many appraisers don’t know how to properly appraise solar. What sometimes happens is the buyer likes having solar, but the appraiser won’t value it properly, so the seller has to take a lower price for the home.  It shouldn’t be that way, but many times that is the way it works in Florida.  So I didn’t install solar.
• I successfully downsized to a smaller new townhouse and now I didn’t want to install solar in the first year, since if there was an issue with the new roof, I wanted the builder to fix it and not blame the solar company.
• I had a plan to add solar in 2021 after the builder warranty was over. But there were 2 issues. First, my homeowners association (HOA) was against it. Now, Florida state law is clear that the HOA can’t stop you, they can only ask you to submit your plan and they can ask for reasonable changes to the plan (not a lawyer, but that’s my understanding of the law). I didn’t feel like a big fight. Second, when I discussed with Tesla and other installers, they weren’t interested in helping me navigate the complexities of installing solar on a roof that I own, but which is maintained by the HOA.
• Everything changed in early 2024 when I was driving around town running some errands and drove by another subdivision of townhomes, and I saw solar panels on a home. I immediately stopped and knocked on the door of that house to ask them how they did it! Unfortunately, they didn’t answer the door. I took some pictures of the inverter. I looked up the company, but it seemed like they were out of Miami, and I didn’t want work with a company that wasn’t local to Tampa. I went to the pool in the neighborhood and they had the phone number of the company that manages the HOA. I called them during the week and they explained that they approved it on 3 conditions to protect the HOA (I’ll cover those conditions later in the article).
• So I checked with Tesla, a company that lets you rent the panels called Terra Energy, and a company that was selected the non-profit organization called Solar United Neighbors organized cooperative in 2024 called Transform Solar. If you live in Florida and want to use them, they gave me a referral link that gives you $500 off of your solar system. Tesla still wasn’t willing to help me convince the HOA to allow it and they cost a bit more than Transform Solar. Terra Energy had a great solution if I wanted flexibility since it was only a 3-year commitment and they were experienced with installing it on townhomes. Transform Solar had great pricing and was also experienced at installing it on townhomes and willing to help me work with the HOA. So I liked both Terra Energy and Transform Solar. I decided that Transform Solar would be better if I stay in the townhome for more than 7 years, since once the panels are paid off, I would have free electricity. Terra Energy would be a better deal if I stay in my home less than 7 years since I would see immediate savings. I don’t know what the future holds, but went with Transform Solar since I think I’ll be here a while. The after-tax cost of the whole system was only a little over $10,000, so if I do move before I reach breakeven, the cost of the system is a rounding error on a $500,000 home anyway. So I don’t care if the appraiser adds much to my home value.  Since I signed the contract, my local utility has raised their prices twice! Once for hurricane-related costs and once for fuel costs. Every time they raise their rates, my payback period is decreased.

Home Owners Agreement

Luckily for me, the members of the HOA board had changed and although I wouldn’t say they were pro-solar, they definitely weren’t anti-solar. They spoke to their lawyer and realized they can’t stop it and just need to protect the community. They requested I sign an agreement that obligates me and all future owners of my property to do 3 things.

1. That I insure and maintain my solar panels. Luckily, my insurance said they were covered at no extra cost (some insurance companies are not so solar-friendly).
2. That if my solar panels cause the HOA’s insurance costs to increase, I have to have to pay the increase. Right now, their company doesn’t charge any extra (since they are my responsibility), but that could change in the future. That was a risk I was willing to take (since I REALLY wanted solar).
3. In the event of roof damage, I have to pay to have the panels removed and replaced if they need to repair or replace the roof. This will be a pain when it is needed, but hopefully it will be after 7 years when the panels are just making free electricity.

Installation

Installation went smoothly. The only issue was the inverter couldn’t reliably connect to my home’s Wi-Fi. This doesn’t affect the production of energy production of the system, but I love playing with the application on my phone and monitoring both the solar production and my home’s energy consumption, and that doesn’t work if it isn’t connected to Wi-Fi. I’ve heard this is a common issue. They solved it by installing a Wi-Fi extender in my garage. That worked, but if the inverter had a better antenna, it would have saved a fair amount of time and hassle.  My cellphone had decent Wi-Fi in the same location as the inverter, so I know there is signal there.

My First Utility Bill

As I mentioned above, it wasn’t a great month, since we had some cloudy days, days are short in February, and consumption was higher than normal due to some unseasonably cold and warm weather. But it’s a start. I expect to produce more power than I use during some months and then have some power banked for the other months. I get to bank power for 12 months and then any excess is paid out (at full retail prices!) in utility credits that I can use to pay my fixed fees.

Conclusion

I’m very happy with the results. I don’t know how much money I will save. It could be $64,000 or more, or it could be a lot less. It really depends how many times I have to remove and replace the panels over the next 30 years and how much utility rates go up. If electricity costs go up by 4% a year, I expect the panels to produce about $84,000 worth of electricity and the cost of installation is about $10,000 and 2 removals and reinstalls are also about $10,000, so $84,000 less $20,000 is $64,000. But I didn’t get the panels just to save money, I got them mostly because I like the technology and wanted to experience it myself. Obviously, I like the environmental benefits of reducing fossil fuel consumption (my utility is 80% natural gas, 10% solar, and 10% purchased power at this time), but the technology and playing with the application and technology was a bigger driver for me.

Disclosure: I am a shareholder in Tesla [TSLA], BYD [BYDDY], Nio [NIO], XPeng [XPEV], NextEra Energy [NEP], and several ARK ETFs. But I offer no investment advice of any sort here.