You and Your Home with Solar Power

Solar powered homes represent a trend toward self-sufficiency. Generating enough clean energy to support a home’s devices without having to worry about price spikes from utility companies may sound very tempting for homeowners considering a solar power system for their home.

As you might imagine though, it isn’t a matter of signing a form, going to bed, and waking up to a brand new solar system. There are plenty of steps before, during, and after installation to keep in mind, but with the right information and the right resources you can have clean, reliable solar power for your home.

We’re here to give you both.

At Blue Raven Solar, we want to help you navigate the process of installing solar power for your home to make it as painless as possible.

How the Installation Goes

On paper, installation is straightforward: mount the racks safely on your roof, mount the panels on those racks, and connect it all to your home. If that sounds too easy, then you might be thinking how much more goes into the choices leading up to installing solar power for your home.

Let’s break down what you need for home solar power:

• An idea of how much solar power you want to produce
• Information on how many peak solar hours you can expect in a year
• A design that optimizes the space on your roof to catch sunlight at the right angles
• Permits from your local and state governments to install solar power for your home
• A provider with the correct equipment
• A team that can help you install the solar system
• Knowledge of how to maintain your equipment over the next 2-3 decades.

With all those steps considered, installation probably sounds a lot harder! Luckily there’s an easier way to get it done than just doing it all on your own.

Blue Raven Solar’s Installation Assistance

When you first contact us for a free estimate, we’ll go through the steps to get you a zero commitment savings report. That way we can help you figure out if solar power for your home is a good idea in the first place.

The estimate involves us getting a few details about your home’s location. Your particular state, your address in that state, and the average weather you see is a good, starting glimpse into what kind of electricity you can expect with solar power for your home. We’ll also take a look at your average electricity bill to see what you’re already paying per month and about how much you’re using.

After that review, our contractors come out to inspect the design of your roof. South-facing rooftops have the best exposure to sun over the day, but east- and west-facing rooftops are still viable for generating plenty of home solar power for you.

With all that info, we’ll be able to generate your zero commitment savings report. In some cases, the payment on your solar system might be equal to or less than your normal, monthly electric bill so you won’t even feel a ding to your budget!

On the other side of that coin, if we look at all the factors and it turns out solar power isn’t going to save you money—we’ll tell you honestly. Investing in solar power for your home is a big commitment over many years, and we want you to be satisfied with your choice.

If you decide that solar power for your home is right for you, then we’ll help you start the process. Our consultants are well aware of the kind of forms and permits you’ll need from local governments in order to get your solar system installed correctly, and we can even help file them for you.

Paying for Power? Or Paying to Make Power?

One important thing to note is that there are different options when purchasing solar power for your home: 

• Buy-to-own loan
• A lease agreement
• A Power Purchase Agreement (PPA)

For leasing and PPAs, there’s one big pro: you aren’t buying a system. 

But both leasing and PPAs come with a lot of problems stemming from one big con: you don’t own the system.

Depending on your situation, not paying for the system itself might sound tempting. But hear us out…

With a leasing arrangement, your partner company installs the system and you’ll essentially rent the solar system from them. It’s home solar power for your needs, but you’re stuck with whatever contract they have you on and every monthly payment you make on your lease goes toward filling their pocket as opposed to paying down an equity investment. When your lease contract expires, you can either have them remove the solar system or re-up the contract (and who knows if the details will all stay the same).

Power Purchase Agreements are sort of the same thing. The partner company installs the system, but instead of a monthly rental payment, you’ll be buying power from them. Generally this arrangement is at a reduced cost compared to your monthly bill, but the fact remains the same: you’re still paying for power that isn’t yours. And that agreement doesn’t necessarily mean they won’t raise your power prices over time to keep up with the market.

On top of not owning your power and not having a guaranteed, steady payment, these agreements tack a contract onto your property. If the time comes to sell your house and you’re still under contract, you’ll have to convince any homebuyer that your property is worth its value AND the expense of the lease or PPA. 

When you buy-to-own your system, you transform a monthly expense into a payment that works toward home equity. Not only that, when you buy-to-own with Blue Raven, that payment stays the same for the entire length of your loan. Power prices have been steadily rising—they’ve gained 60% in the last 20 years—but neither you nor your home buyers will have to worry about that. Solar power is all about immediate benefits and long-term value.

For example, investing in solar power for your home has the short-term gain of having the equipment to produce your own power. Generating that electricity not only powers your appliances and utilities, in some states you can also sell your power back to the energy company for cash or credits from any surplus your solar system produces. 

Long-term benefits after paying off your solar system include increasing your home value by the solar system’s cost or even more. When you buy-to-own solar power for your home, you take control.

Maintenance After Installation

Solar panels are layered pieces made up of photovoltaic cells, and those cells are what convert solar radiation into electricity. Their design is a durable form to weather all sorts of climates, but as the owner of a new solar system, you’ll want to know the basic guidelines of maintenance over the next couple decades.

The moment you’re installed, you immediately get access to solar power for your home. All you have to do is keep an eye with our solar monitoring app and wait for the sun to come up. Most days, you won’t even have to think about it.

But because solar panels rely on exposure to the sun there are times when occasional maintenance is required. A reduction in performance might happen because of winter snows that cover the cells or a build-up of dirt if you live in a particularly dry or dusty location. In these situations, we’d advise cleaning your panels using all the necessary safety precautions. Our consulting team can even help you with best practices, but you should be able to keep your system in tip-top shape just fine.

If you find that your power output has dipped at any point, that might mean a failure in a cell or worse—something external may have damaged a panel. Our solar panels have a sturdy design to withstand the usual (weather, wind, hailstorms, etc.), but there’s no planning for everything.

When you need help with the solar power for your home, you want a partner that has your back.

The Blue Raven Solar Promise

Once you get our zero commitment savings report and approve a design, we’ll get you started on owning your solar system. Our BluePower Plus+™ financing plan includes the first 18 months free. Not only does this window without a payment let you save on not paying your monthly bill, it lets you see how solar power works for you and if the solar system we installed is doing its job without you spending a dime.

That’s where our Blue Raven Solar product guarantee comes into play. We’ll upgrade the system with more panels free of charge if your solar energy system produces less than originally estimated over two distinct timeframes:

• Less than 50% of original estimates over any three-month period
  OR
• Less than 85% of original estimates over any 18-month period

And you’ll have all the information to make informed decisions at your fingertips with our solar power monitoring app.

On top of our product guarantee, all BluePower Plus+™ plans come with the 25-year manufacturer warranty, making sure the rare failure of a panel gets replaced right away.

And that brings up our prepayment benefit: pay off your system at any time! We want you to enjoy clean power for life and if you pay off the loan ahead of time, that’s just more months of not worrying about a power bill-sized payment.

We’re here to help you understand absolutely every benefit you can access depending on your state and location. With our 25-year warranty, our product guarantee, and a constant partnership built on trust, we want investing in solar power for your home to be the easiest investment you’ve ever made.

Generating Clean Energy in Your Neighborhood

Working toward sustainable energy is a process that everyone can be a part of. As a nation, we still get over 67% of our electricity from the burning of fossil fuels. But even as legislation works toward green initiatives, homeowners can take things into their own hands in their own little way. When you get control of your energy by installing solar power for your home, you:

• Save money
• Raise the equity of your home
• Offset an average of 175 tons of carbon dioxide over the system’s lifetime
• Make a difference in the world

With our free estimate and zero commitment savings report, you can know right away how much solar power for your home might save you.