Seeking feedback for my newly signed 20-yr SolarCity 'prepay' SolarLease in Plano, TX

[Chieu]

Well firstly, I want to apologize to MIB. Feels like I hijacked his thread.

I hope you don't take this the wrong way. Your best bet is to do an energy audit, go total CFL or LED lighting, seal some leaks and not get Solar PV. The best way to "save money" on electricity is to cut usage. Going from large TV to smaller LED TV and putting DVRs on timers is one of the bigger steps to cutting usage.

I respect every ones opinion and will not take any of it personal. Nine out of ten of my appliances are energy star appliance. My home only uses CFL and LEDs. The CFLs are either 9w or 13w depending on where I need more lighting and I use a few 1w LED night light auto on/off in the hallways. I don’t leave lights on outside all night, instead I have lots of LED solar lamps. I have 2 plasmas TVs the rest are LED. My home is only 6 years old so it’s probably too soon to get reinsulated. I’m really into conserving energy so I’m always looking for ways to do so.

I agree my avg. electric bill is fairly low. My friend that lives down the street tells me he pays around $600 a month. I don’t know how the hell he’s using all that electric and I didn’t ask. He also signed up for solar after he heard I did, btw.
I don’t know but this just makes a lot of sense to me. My avg. bill is $147/month, $1,764/year. $1,764 times 20 years is $35,280. I did not include the electric bills annual increase if there is any, people are saying 3% to 5%.

With the Solar Lease I’ll pay $9,890 for the 20 years not a penny more. I will still get a monthly bill from the electric company for like $4 or $5 dollars if I don’t use more then I generate. If my system over produce at the end of the year I get a check from the electric company. Ok so $1,754 times 6 is $10,584. After 6 years the system is paid off. Year 7 to year 20, $1,764 times 14 is $24,696 of free electric. I see a big profit.

[russ]

1) You are forgetting the future value of the 9,890$ you pay up front - makes a big difference in comparing returns over the years

2) Have you sealed your house well? Around all openings such as electric plugs, ceiling lamps, windows, doors etc? Most homes and especially older ones leak like a sieve.

3) The 3 to 5% electric cost increases are smoke blown by whoever - they have no idea.

[Chieu]

1) You are forgetting the future value of the 9,890$ you pay up front - makes a big difference in comparing returns over the years

I’m not sure what you’re saying here. Could you explain? Thanks.

2) Have you sealed your house well? Around all openings such as electric plugs, ceiling lamps, windows, doors etc.? Most homes and especially older ones leak like a sieve.

No, I haven’t gone that far. Although I did just order some draft guards for my doors and been thinking about tinting my windows. But those are good ideas and i will look into them. Thanks.

3) The 3 to 5% electric cost increases are smoke blown by whoever - they have no idea.

I know 3% to 5% increase each year is unlikely and I did not include that but are you saying that the electric rates are going to stay this way for the next 20 years? What are you basing this on? Plz explain thanks.

[inetdog]

I’m not sure what you’re saying here. Could you explain? Thanks. .

The idea is that money which you have to spend or to invest right now has more value than the same amount of money say ten years from now.
Even if you do not account for inflation, or other changes in the value of the money, having something right now is generally perceived as better than getting it at some time in the future.
But when you are dealing with interest rates, you can actually write formulas to calculate their effect on the equivalent value.

The future value of $9000 after ten years is what you would have if you invested that $9000 now and held the investment for 10 years (using compound interest, since you will invest the interest which you earn each year.)
In the same way, the present value of $9000 which you will get ten years in the future is amount of money that you would have to invest right now to have a total of $9000 at the end of ten years.

The reason that you need to do this calculation is that you are spending money right now to avoid spending money at some time in the future. You cannot just multiply out 10 years of power bills and compare that number to what you would have to spend right now to avoid paying those bills.

I will not try to go into the details of the math, but you should see the general idea.

[russ]

Comments within the text.

I’m not sure what you’re saying here. Could you explain? Thanks. If you bought a good stock with that money (9,890$)and had a decent return you would make more.

I know 3% to 5% increase each year is unlikely and I did not include that but are you saying that the electric rates are going to stay this way for the next 20 years? What are you basing this on? Plz explain thanks. I am saying no one knows - the power companies routinely miss demand forecasts - those are a big part of the basis of cost.

[Chieu]

Anyway - think about it. I just don't think you need such a large system for such a small amount of electricity usage. I honestly don't need it but want to fuel my Volt from home and hedge against power price and gasoline price increases. We still have room to conserve and I just picked up some CFL bulbs for our kitchen chandelier which used incandescents up until tomorrow.

Thanks for the advice. I actually signed the contract last month. So, I probably can’t cancel even if I wanted to. I feel I have made a good decision going solar.
That’s awesome that you have a Volt. My car is fairly new and gets good mileage, probably around 25mpg. So I’m going to stick with it for a while. I have been looking into hybrids and all electric cars. I figure it’s a good Idea to wait on that because it’s new technology and has a lot of room for improvements. But please give a quick review on it. I am very interested to hear.


Ok, I get what you guys are saying. I have very little knowledge when it comes to stock. Wish I could get into it and make millions but it’s not going to happen any time soon. I think I have a better chance going to the casino and bet $10,000 on a Black Jack game(have considered doing this but naa) then playing stock and pulling out my hair waiting for my investments. I work at the Revel casino by the way so its tempting. The $10,000 I’m using for this project, I consider it as extra money I have. I could go and blow it on a trip or put it as a down payment on a Volt. I wouldn’t miss it. Interest rates are so low now it’s not even worth considering.

So this is a gamble. There are risks. I can’t predict what’s going to happen. I do know that electric has been and is currently mainly produced by non-renewable resources (Coal, oil etc.). I know that the prices on those non-renewable resources will never really go down; it’ll stay the same or more likely go up.

I don’t know but it seems to me that you guys are against going solar, lol. Have you gone solar or consider ever going solar. Did you buy or lease. What kind of a deal did you get? Are you satisfied with you system? Do you think it’s a bad idea to invest in solar?

[russ]

Not at all against solar - just get into whatever with good knowledge of where you are going.

You do NOT play the stock market - in that case just give them your money and save headaches. You invest in a solid company (like Warren Buffet but in a small way) long term.

I have solar water heating here - works well. Will never pay for itself but what to say.

Solar PV here? There are no freebies associated with it so there is virtually no solar PV in the country. Without the incentives, rebates etc solar can not compete with anything.

[Chieu]

I would never give money a stock broker or anyone else, even my dear brother to play the stock market for me. If I’m going to lose my hard earn money, I want it to be me that loses it.

I’m hoping this project pays off but even if it doesn’t. I would feel a tiny bit better knowing I did not mainly use electric produced from coal and oil and that i tried.

Sorry your government has no incentives or rebates for such a good thing. Thanks for your inputs by the way.

[russ]

I’m hoping this project pays off but even if it doesn’t. I would feel a tiny bit better knowing I did not mainly use electric produced from coal and oil and that i tried.

Sorry your government has no incentives or rebates for such a good thing. Thanks for your inputs by the way.

There are far more pressing needs both here and in the US for available cash - borrowing money to piss away on luxuries seems to come under the general classification of silly.

Oil is generally not used for power production. The amount of coal solar replaces is mini-mini-mini or is that micro-micro-micro

[MIB]

Well firstly, I want to apologize to MIB. Feels like I hijacked his thread.

Thanks, but no worries, plenty of room for all! I hope we both get more feedback on our situations.

[bonaire]

>> I know 3% to 5% increase each year is unlikely and I did not include that but are you saying that the electric rates are going to stay this way for the next 20 years? What are you basing this on? Plz explain thanks.
<<

This year, my power price went down for our generation component. I'm paying about .01/kWh less this summer than last year. I have to think it is due to the glut of Natural Gas in PA. They say, and who knows if it is right, that Natural Gas in PA has a 50-year or more production window. So, could that hold down electricity prices? Perhaps. They can always increase the distribution component for the grid at the same time. My kWh price now is about .167/kWh. Two years ago, the Solar installers were using numbers like 2-3% annual increase. I saw that in the 1995-2009 range of years when we lived in the house. I started with .09/kWh and am now at .167 over 14 years. During the low-priced time, we did things like added a hot tub, used a lot of power for cooking and so on. Fixed a failing well pump which was a heavy-draw. Today, things have turned. The hot tub is turned off, we have less cooking cycles, less lighting cycles and also more CFL and LED lighting. The population curve is impacted by the economy so they're conserving out there and even consolidating (kids moving back home with parents). The biggest population growth that I see is in apartment buildings with lower-income families having lots of kids. Who knows how that turns out but surely those kids are not going to be resource hogs in their future.

There was a power company merger this year where the CEO of one of them was on CNBC. The guy was actually saying they hoped for hotter temperatures in the mid-west so they could sell more power. Statements like that indicate that they are not really hurting for peak production but rather want more customers to burn more kWh. They also were saying prices will be stable due to the Natural Gas guys "giving away their product". If we really have a Natural Gas glut in the USA - then this implies electricity production costs and prices will be stable for a while. Great news for Electric Car buyers but not so good for Solar PV installers in states without big incentives. PA's SunShine program is over so our only incentive is Federal Tax Credit incentives.

On to my Volt. Love it. I bought a 2011 model in July of 2012. Saved $5K. I would be happier if my grid-price of electricity was cheaper or if we had a Time of Use Meter program to keep cost-per-mile down. But no matter, getting some great mileage out of it after moving over from a 27mpg highway Mazda6. Now, I get 40-48 miles on a charge (in warmer weather - 70*F is optimal) and 41-43 mpg on the highway. It's a 4-seater so my two kids can't bring along a friend if we wanted to go somewhere. But we also have a family mini-van received through a family member passing away.

What's the one thing that is certain with an EV? The fuel you use when driving electric is produced by local resources - local power plants, local jobs, local fuel. If you have a Solar PV array, maybe some of it is from the sun. So, it helps our local economies. Far better than even buying a 100% imported Prius, filling it with gas and driving at 50mpg using possibly foreign oil. Prius sales are still skyrocketing - our population is not drawn on helping local economies. As Ayn Rand pointed out - there is some kind of "virtue of selfishness".

I'd recommend a Volt test drive to anyone who is in the market for a new, small car. It's not really a hybrid - it's an electric car with a range extender engine. I know it's not always a good financial move to buy a new car versus a slightly used one. They also have pretty-low price leases. You can run it 100% on electric but if you do that - you may as well have a Nissan Leaf (ugly car, 100% imported) or one of the others. I hope Chevy does more with electric vehicles using their R&D work already done. They have more models on the drawing board and I hope to see a CUV model soon along with the Cadillac ELR 2-door Voltec-powered model coming out in 2014 (summer 2013). Where do EVs and Volts make sense? In states where your delivered kWh price is .10-.11/kWh and gas is up at $4 and higher. In areas of Quebec, Canada - prices are like .06/kWh and gas is well over $5.00/gallon. They have a shortage of Volts in such areas.

[Ian S]

Thanks for the advice. I actually signed the contract last month. So, I probably can’t cancel even if I wanted to. I feel I have made a good decision going solar.

Yes you did! It's a no-brainer: you would have to get between 6 and 7% for a full 20 years on any other investment to equal the estimated return on your prepaid solar panel lease. And don't forget, the return on your solar panel investment is free of income taxes - federal state and local. I'm so glad I didn't listen to the naysayers a year ago: wound up choosing a sunpower prepaid lease and have never looked back.

[bobfromnj]

Hope you did your due deligence

Sure hope Solar City is better in TX then in NJ. They have been running around here in those tiny green trucks using big time sales pitches to sell systems in my community. Their reputation sucks in NJ and if you check them out with the BBB...lots of complaints. Good luck although its most likely to late.

[MIB]

Sure hope Solar City is better in TX then in NJ. They have been running around here in those tiny green trucks using big time sales pitches to sell systems in my community. Their reputation sucks in NJ and if you check them out with the BBB...lots of complaints. Good luck although its most likely to late.

As of today, SolarCity's BBB rating is 'A', with 25 complaints in the last 3 years, of which only 4 were not resolved to customer's satisfaction. Considering SolarCity's size, this seems pretty good to me!

[josefaz]

Check feedbacks on Yelp (especially the FILTERED feedbacks). You can also localize your search and get an idea about the service they provide. Likewise, BBB in Phoenix rated them "A".