All across the United States homeowners want to capitalize on the benefits of solar. Increasing urgency to get a system installed while there are incentives available is compounding to create massive growth in the sector. However, HOAs (Home Owners Associations) are making it increasingly difficult to go solar. Several states have challenged the HOA’s ability to prevent homeowners from going solar, and have created legislation that limits an HOAs ability to restrict any homeowner from going solar.
What can’t (and can) an HOA do?
Most of the legislation in different states does allow HOAs to give rules on how the solar can look. For example, in Texas an HOA can prevent a homeowner from having a ground mounted system on their property or from using tilt racking on their roof. In California, an HOA can require the conduit to be painted the same color of the home, so it blends in better with the aesthetic of the neighborhood. In most states, HOAs are not able to prevent a homeowner from putting panels on the front of their home if it changes production by more than 5%. This effectually results in no prevention from putting solar on the front roof planes of one’s home.
How can I navigate all the rules?
At Power Solar, we have HOA teams that interface with your HOA when we can (some HOA rules require only interaction from the homeowner directly, in which case we prepare you for what needs to be submitted) in order to see the smoothest transition to solar. We will work with their requirements and recommendations to ensure a happy HOA and happy neighbors. We want you to relax, and not worry about a thing in your project. Make sure to connect with your Residential Energy Expert and let them know about your HOA, so they can ensure all difficulties are handed off to our HOA teams.
State Specific Rules
Read more about the Texas law passed, by clicking here: https://programs.dsireusa.org/system/program/detail/1253
