No extra warranty. The only warranty offered is through the manufacturer. I am not too worried about that since both installers I reached out to use the same panels and inverters.
No suggestions. I am not really stressing about this since it is out of my control. Hopefully, it does not happen to my installer since they seem to be getting a lot of business.
Why itâs important to go with a national company over a local âusuallyâ, with a national company less likely to go out of business or have issues down the road.
Most companies offer their own warranty on top of the manufacturer.
For example my company does:
25 year hardware & parts warranty
10 workmanship guarantee
25 power production guarantee (probably the most important of all warranties and not every company has one)
Both installers I reached out to use these panels along with Enphase inverters. The panels do have a 25-year product and performance warranty. Enphase offers a 25-year warranty on their microinverters.
As for the workmanship, one company is offering a 10-year warranty while another is offering an 8-year warranty (it could also be 10 years, but I do not recall).
Am I missing something?
I work for a large electrical manufacturer and am not a fan of enphase. Check reviews of their products.
Might want to find out if the 3.99% includes a âdealer feeâ given itâs significantly lower than the market rate. Not necessarily a bad thing but if you were ever planning on paying off the loan early, that cost wonât be recouped⌠similar to buying points with a mortgage.
The 10% discount you arenât getting for paying cash is the origination fee. The loan is costing you 10% plus 3.99%
Ahhh good point. I missed this in his previous post. They always bake in them fees somehow.
Can anyone confirm that the change from Net Metering 2.0-3.0 on April 14 does NOT affect LADWP customers? I have spoken with Tesla who told me that they didnât think LADWP was changing with some of the other California Utilities, and I had a couple of others who are giving me some quotes tell me the same.
Thatâs my understanding as well, just based on this LA Times article: California just slashed rooftop solar incentives. What happens next?
Homes and businesses that already have solar wonât see their payments go down. And nothing will change for Los Angeles Department of Water and Power customers who decide to go solar. The decision affects only the rates paid for solar power by the stateâs three big monopoly utility companies: Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and San Diego Gas & Electric.
Hey thanks for all the info. What are you thoughts on a non-Tesla solar roofs, specifically a company like LUMA or Forward? Weâre putting on a new roof; it seems to make sense to just buy mildly attractive solar tiles rather than pay $40K for a new slate only to cover it up with those shitty solar panels which cost an additional $30k.
Also, if you live in sunny locale (SoCal) does it make any sense to wait to see if you need a wall battery, or are there significant cost savings to installing the battery at the same time as the roofâŚespcially if you get a hybrid inverter for midnight TOU rates.
Got a 7.6kw system in socal just got PTO yesterday after one week from install on 3/17
My favorite solar hack is to use the federal tax credit to help pay for a carport structure, roofed by solar panels. âHey it is a ground-mounted solar array.â Being 7â off the ground is just a minor detail. Might also be a hack to get around HOAs that donât approve carports.
Anyone have recommendations for installer in SoCal (LA, LADWP customer)? Also open to advice.
I went through @cyak - he can do SoCal. If you want higher-end panels and inverters (ie REC panels) he may not be able to help, but heâs got equivalent Freedom panels that are about on par with Q-Cells. Not sure what pricing looks like anymore but timing will probably suck since everyone was rushing to get grandfathered in to NEM 2.0. Corbinâs a good dude and very responsive if you choose to go with him.
Looking for the latest guidance on the tax credit and solar projects. My house was built in 2004 using a 20-year shingle, so itâs at the end of itâs warranty life. Thus, my project includes a new roof and solar install.
I have priced it out from Tesla and my roofer.
I have priced it out from a solar company that does both.
Trying to understand if I can claim the 30% tax credit across the entire project cost or just the solar costs. And if the entire project, does it matter if I piece together my own provider(s), or must I use a single provider?
Hopefully @cyak has a little more guidance on this however this is what a quick search on the irs guidance shows. Looks like solar shingles or tiles are covered and traditional shingles are not. I know this doesnât answer all your questions.
I agree the IRS guidance looks pretty straight forward, but Iâve still heard of people who, based on accountant guidance, claim the roof costs. Iâm trying to figure out if I am missing some loophole whereby a traditional composite shingle roof can be included.
That may be the throw it against the wall and hope it sticks strategyâŚ.maybe keep a little money set aside in case it gets flagged?
âappropriate cooling granules in the asphaltâ
find the appropriate roofing material and accountant and I think you can get this done.
The roofing âloopholeâ came from a liberal interpretation of the definition of labor costs
Expenditures for labor costs properly allocable to the onsite preparation, assembly, or
original installation of the property described
in subsection (d) and for piping or wiring to
interconnect such property to the dwelling
unit shall be taken into account for purposes
of this section.
IRS has since made clarifying statements, so if youâre not using one of the materials described above, the only remaining loophole is the fact that the IRS lacks the manpower to audit all taxpayers and there are probably some roofers out there who would be happy to call your shingles solar collectors on an invoice.
On the question of using multiple providers, I read it as being allowed (and I will be doing it).
Iâm basing that on the fact that thereâs no annual maximum for solar, no mention of needing to do things as part of a single transaction, and this text:
Except as provided in subparagraph (B), an
expenditure with respect to an item shall be
treated as made when the original installation of the item is completed.
Which suggests that all expenditures over time related to a given original installation are effectively treated as having occurred together.
