Summary of my Three Solar Bids:

In the pursuit of solar power for my home, I requested 3 quotations.  One of the companies deals almost exclusively with leased systems, the other two primarily with outright purchases.  For the purposes of this comparison, I am simply calling the companies Company A, Company B, and Company C.  I am also talking costs only on a comparative basis, but not listing actual prices.

As I learned more about the various types of leases, I realized that the first major decision I needed to make was whether I wanted to lease or buy my system.

Lease Types, Pros, and Cons

Most of this information on leases was obtained from Company A, as they are the only one who quoted me leased systems.  Ninty five percent of their business is leasing.  The Company B website states that they offer leasing, butI didn't receive any leasing information from them, as I only requested bids for the outright purchase of a system.  I saw no reference to leasing on Company C's site. 

There are typically 3 forms of a lease offered which I discuss here.  I believe they are similar among different companies, but details may vary widely.
No money down
This system is offered as a simple replacement for the power company.  You start paying for your kWh usage fee to the solar company instead of APS.  The rate you pay is almost 30% less than the APS rate.  You still have a monthly fee of around $9 to APS for the taxes and fees to maintain your connection.  (Note of 10/24/13:  Apparently this figure has now increased to about $13 with a recent rate hike.)  This is true with all the variations of grid-tied solar panel systems.  The electricity cost will increase at 2.9% a year for the 20 year lease, while the average utility company rates have been increasing at about 4.8% a year.  With this no money down plan, the savings start immediately and are very impressive over a 20 year period.

Partial money down
The second type of plan is still for a 20 year lease, but involves making a down payment of your choice.  The more you pay down, the less the power costs you.  With a down payment, the cost of the power does not increase each year, but stays constant.  This produces much better 20 year savings, but it does take time to repay your investment before being "in the black".

Full lease prepay
If you pay off the lease at the beginning, there are no further payments.  For 20 years, it is like you bought the system.  Other than the ~$9  ~$13 APS payment, your designed level of power is free.  This takes the longest to pay back your investment, but yields a much higher savings over the 20 year period.

Cons of Leasing
I thought I would mention the negatives first. 
(1)  The main problem for me with all the leases is that you do not own the system - ever!*  At the end of 20 years, you may renew for 5 more years, then once more for a max of 30 years total, you may have the company replace the equipment with the latest and greatest  (for a new lease, of course), or you may have them remove the equipment and repair any damage from the installation.  There is no provision to buy the equipment at lease end.  All of this presupposes that the company will still be around by then.  They supposedly have insurance to cover you for maintenance for the lease term, but the other factors are an unknown. 
* Company B states that you can buy out your lease with them at "market value" when it expires.
(2)  If you (or your heirs) sell the house before the lease is up, and you have one of the first two lease types, the new owner must take over the remaining lease if he qualifies with a high enough credit score.  If he does not qualify, your only option is to buy out the remainder of the lease or find another buyer.  Of course if you prepaid the lease, or bought the system there is no problem. 
(3)  If it is late in the lease, the new owner might well balk at having to renew the lease, or have equipment taken away in the near future.

Pros of Leasing
There are a number of positive aspects to leasing: 
(1)  You can get a solar electric system for little or no down, but beware of item 2 above.
(2)  The company owns and warranties the entire system for the duration of the lease.  If there are any problems, they come out and fix them at their expense.
(3)  They guarantee the power output of the system.  If the system under performs, they will either update it or pay you the value of the power you are not receiving.  If there is a failure, this gives them an incentive to fix the problem quickly, as they are paying you for the lost power.
(4)  They monitor your system via the Internet and will respond even if you don't realize there is a problem.
(5)  Since they own your system, there is no impact on your homeowner's insurance.
(6)  They carry insurance totally covering the system against fire, theft, damage, etc. for the duration of the lease.

Of course, remember that any of this information can vary from company to company.

Company A

This is a large national company which will sell you a system outright, but is primarily in the business of leasing systems.  This is the company that set up the computer and printer and produced a design and quotations right in my house.  They offer all three leasing structures in addition to the purchase option:  All the lease and purchase options that I considered were for the same configuration, a 5880 watt system consisting of 24 panels (each rated at 245 watts), each with an attached SolarEdge optimizer and a single central inverter.  They cannot tell us what panels they will be using.  They buy from many companies.  They could be American, Chinese, Taiwanese, or ?.

 This was the first company to provide me my quotations.  After the rep produced a quote for the standard single inverter system, I stated that I would prefer a micro-inverter system. He said they do not offer a micro-inverter system, then he told me about a SolarEdge system they do offer, but could not tell me much about it or how it worked.  He did quote me a SolarEdge system.  After he left, I researched this system on the Internet, discovered it was an optimizer system, and I was quite pleased with what I saw.

They also quoted a figure to purchase the system outright.  It is about 2 1/2 times the prepaid lease price before incentives, and due to the higher payment, offers less savings over the 20 years, but your savings continue for the life of the system, 30 to 40 years.  The incentives will reduce the purchase price by about one third.  This is the only plan from Company A that lets you have the incentives.  With all the lease plans the company receives all the government incentives, you still get the smaller APS one. 

I convinced myself that if nothing better showed up, this SolarEdge optimizer system would probably work well for me.  Since their outright purchase system was so expensive, I am not considering it.  After evaluating the various options this company offers, I decided that if I went with them it would be with the pre-paid lease.

Company B

Company B is a local company about a 60 minute drive from here.  I received their system quote by email a few days after receiving my first quote.  This quote is for an outright purchase only, which is what I requested.  I was very pleasantly surprised by how much less it was than the purchase price from Company A.  We now have a horse race!  I must evaluate the comparisons between these two companies and at least make a preliminary elimination until my final bid comes in..

The system they quoted consists of 24 solar panels (245 watts each), each with an attached micro-inverter.  The total system capacity is 5880 watts.  All the panels and micro-inverters are American made, and are guaranteed for 30 years.  The full price was less than 2/3 that of Company A's purchase price.  After incentives, the net price was over $1000 less than Company A's prepaid lease.  Of course that means I have to do the paperwork, and wait for several years for the incentives to be paid off as tax credits.  The state and federal credits are several times my annual taxes.

Company C

This is also a local company located about 30 minutes from here.  I received their bid by email the day following the last one.  It is also for an outright purchase.  They quoted all American made equipment for a micro-inverter system with a 25 year guarantee.  It was for almost the same amount as Company B,  but was for a 20 panel (250 watts each), 5000 watt system instead of a 24 panel 5880 watt system as quoted by the two previous companies.  The 24 panel systems should provide somewhat more energy than I have been using per year, the 20 panel system, much less.



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