Are solar panels worth it for an already energy efficient home?
I live in a new home in Florida that's extremely energy efficient. Our electricity bill is usually less than $100/mo, even in the summer. Winter months are usually ~$70-$85. Of that, we have a customer fee of $9.50 that we will always have to pay with or without solar. We are interested in a system that doesn't cost more than our current bill and will help during hurricane outages.
We've been talking to a solar salesman today and he's told us the following (please note that I don't know a whole lot about this so I'm just relaying the info he's given me):
- We will need 17 panels, which will provide 4.1kW of power.
- This will be an offset of 77%.
- They will "throw in" a battery, but this comes with a catch. They will give us the battery and 14 panels. For every referral they get from us, they will give us an additional panel for free to get us to 5.1kW. He swears we will have 17 panels within 6 months.
- The battery will be enough to power the fridge and lights in case of a power outage.
- The total cost will be $20,500 financed at 2.99% for 20 years.
- This will work out to $113/mo (plus the $9.50 charge from the electric company). He swears we will have enough production so that we won't owe the electric company anything more, even though we're having it installed in the winter.
- We will pay $28/mo for the first 18 months as part of an interest only financing deal, then it goes up to $113. He discussed that we won't be subject to energy company price increases this way.
- We will get back a large tax credit, which we can use to refinance our loan at a payment of ~$80/mo (assuming the tax credit amount he told us is correct).
We have scheduled the salesman to come back in the morning. He tried to tell us this battery thrown in was a one day deal, but I told him I wasn't comfortable with being put on the spot and he agreed to come back. Before then, I just want to get opinions on whether this is really a good deal/plan/whatever. Of course, I love the idea of having power paid for, but such a large purchase is intimidating, especially considering we probably won't live here for 20 years. Thanks in advance!
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