Question:
“I was looking at a home and the owner was there and said because he had solar panels his home value went up over $70,000. That can’t be true, can it?”
Answer:
Not a chance.
He was referring to a 1998 Appraisal Journal study, often attributed to Wells Fargo. It says that for every $1,000 saved in annual utility costs, a home’s value increases by $20,000.
Not sure who came up with that figure, but while they were busy with their calculations, they forgot to check in with the real world.
There’s no way on God’s green earth (pun intended) that this figure is correct. My SWAG (scientific wildly articulated guess) is that it adds 10-25% of the solar’s cost to a home’s value. So that would mean about $2,500 to $10,000 maximum (on a good day).
So while I’m a proponent of solar for many reasons and have it on my own house, it’s not a great investment when you sell a home.
