Finding Contractors For Solar Installation

[sulaco]

I've been meeting with various solar companies to get prices on purchases and leases. When I look at equipment pricing through equipment wholesalers (like Sun Electronics), total pre-rebate equipment cost looks like it's about 25% of the cost of what most companies are asking for.

It seems like I should be able to find a contractor (or maybe a few) who would install the equipment that I purchased within the same standards as if I were to hire one of the middle men. It seems like I would net out ahead.

Has anyone done this (especially in the Phoenix metro area). How do I get started?

[sulaco]

Bump… no one's bought solar equipment and had it installed themselves?

[DarinC]

There might be, but it's probably less common than DIY installs. It'd be great if someone offered that. I'm guessing a 6kW system only requires ~40-60 man-hours of work, which is only ~$1200-$1800 at $30/hour. But most installers would rather keep the ~$15000 for "installation" than farm out the labor. It'd be a pain coordinating everything, but for $15k, probably worth it.

Having said, that, I'm guessing that by the time you familiarize yourself to the point where you can manage your contractors, you can probably DIY if you don't mind the labor.

I'm guessing that's why there's so much interest in DIY installs. I've been pricing/planning out a system, and even using high efficiency (18%) panels, good mounts for concrete S-tiles, 4/0 cables to minimize resistive losses, etc.... I doubt I'll break $2/W.

Have you asked on solarpaneltalk? Someone might have had experience farming out some or all of the work.

https://www.solarpaneltalk.com/

[Rhoon]

I ended up joining a Co-op in the Western Orlando region (West Orange Coop) and using combined purchasing of many people, we were able to get the costs down to $2.10/KW, permitted and installed. Might be worth looking into a similar setup for your region?