When it comes to selling a home in Seattle with solar panels, you need to be able to educate your potential buyers about the required maintenance. People often believe that solar powered energy systems are far harder to maintain than regular energy systems, though all they require is a decent cleaning every two to three months.
Homeowners can often do all of the necessary work themselves or hire solar installers to regularly clean the panels.
If your solar panels were installed by a reputable solar company, it is important to let buyers know. In doing so, you can help get rid of any fears about repair or maintenance costs down the road. The solar panel inverter, which is the one part of a solar system that typically has the most issues, should come with an extended warranty coverage.
Any damage to other solar system components is pretty rare, which is why it is crucial to let buyers know that there isn’t any cause for worry.
Financial Implications
One of the great things about solar panels is that they can reduce overall monthly energy costs by anywhere from 70% to 100%. It offsets the cost of installation tenfold over the course of its lifetime.
Most state utility companies provide energy credits to help cover electricity costs during darker periods of the year if the solar panels you use produce more energy than you need to power your house. The system is known as net metering.
For every 1,000 kilowatt hours that your solar system produces, you will receive solar renewable energy certificates. You can register these to sell them and earn a bit of additional income, which is a big selling point for buyers.
Selling a Home When The Solar Panels are Leased
If you are leasing your solar panels, a buyer will need to take over the cost. While it might seem like an additional cost for a buyer, it is important to make sure that they understand just how much money they will save on energy costs.
Unfortunately, even with those potential benefits, an active lease on solar panels can drive the sale price of a home down. Luckily, there are a few options you have when it comes time to proceed:
For starters, you could advertise the potential savings within your listing’s marketing materials. Lead with an explanation as to how the energy savings offset the lease cost. A buyer’s monthly lease payments will remain the same, even when energy costs climb. If you are planning to transfer the lease, however, you will have to make sure that the buyer meets the credit requirements of the solar company.
Secondly, you could buy out the lease. Not only will this help you sell your home faster, but you will also be able to achieve a much higher selling price.
Lastly, you could choose to sell your home off the market if you can’t afford to buy the lease out. While there are buyers who might be deterred by a solar panel lease, investor companies like HelloPad are ready to help by buying your property as-is.