Home Insurer Revises Policy on Residential Solar Panels

[azdave]

Update:

Making the change to a new insurance company. They have no restrictions on my solar and just added the value of the system to the dwelling coverage. Since we paid off our house recently, I took the opportunity to increase our liability coverage and still came out $750 less annually for the house and cars combined.

[jay galan]

I'm also with State Farm but only cover 2/3 of my electric usage so the issue doesn't apply to me. It does sound stupid and not thought through. I had a recent review of my insurance coverage and the agent never mentioned it although I did mention the change in status of my solar (bought-out lease.). He did recommend that I up my building coverage to deal with the solar and today's cost of rebuild (not revamped in at least a decade). I am considering getting quotes from other companies but may wait until we move next year.

That is a great deal on that system... do you mind telling who the contractor was and what year u got into that deal? i got a prepaid lease from Solartopps and paid 11k for 5.8k system and $1,100 at the end of 7 year

[Ian S]

That is a great deal on that system... do you mind telling who the contractor was and what year u got into that deal? i got a prepaid lease from Solartopps and paid 11k for 5.8k system and $1,100 at the end of 7 year

Well, the contractor, Perfect Power went belly up a few months after my system was installed in May 2012 although the prepaid lease was actually signed in October, 2011. At that time, the power company, APS was providing a $1 per watt rebate for solar, all of which went to the lessor. Yes, it was a great deal!

[JSchnee21]

So how does a Lease work when your installer goes belly up? Do you still owe the terms of the contract to the leasing agency? Or was the contract with the now defunct installer and the system is yours? I'm just curious how all of this is going to work when the Sunrun's and NRG's of the world go into restructuring. Presumably they've commoditized and sold off all of the their contracts already (like mortgages) so you're still liable to the leasing/finance company.