How Do Solar Panels Affect House Sales?
A recent study from Zillow compared sale prices of houses with and without solar energy systems. The study used all transactions on Zillow to determine the impact of solar panels on house sales. The data included information about size, age, location, market value at listing, and time of year. In addition, Zillow controlled for factors like home size and age, time of year, and local market dynamics. Results showed that houses with solar panels typically sold for more than those without.
Increase in value of a home with solar panels
A recent study from the website Zillow showed that a home with solar panels resold for 4.1% more than a similar one without a solar panel. This increased value was not uniform across all markets, however. The study controlled for age, location, and size of the house, as well as the market value at the time of listing. Homeowners in hot markets such as San Francisco enjoyed a 5.4% premium.
According to Zillow, a solar-panel-equipped home will increase in value by about $20 for every $1 reduction in energy costs. The researchers said that the average solar-panel-equipped home would gain in value by about $9,274 a year. This increase in value is much higher than the median price for a house without solar panels. However, it may vary by city or state.
Property tax exemptions for solar energy systems
A lot depends on how your state handles property taxes, but in general, if you have a solar energy system, the state should offer you a tax exemption. For a typical-sized system, you would not need to pay more than two thousand dollars in property taxes to qualify for a tax exemption. Although solar systems increase the value of your home, they are not taxable. As a result, property tax exemptions for solar systems can be a big factor when selling your house.
However, it’s important to remember that this new tax policy doesn’t apply to existing solar installations. In fact, the value of solar energy systems installed on leased land or building rooftops is not included in the base year value. The same applies if you’re leasing land or space on a building. In these cases, your solar system will be worth nothing, since you don’t intend to use the new building as your primary residence.
Increase in price of a home with solar panels
Adding solar panels to a home can boost the overall price tag by as much as 4%, according to a recent study published in the Appraisal Journal, the nation’s largest professional real estate appraiser association. In fact, the increase in price of a home with solar panels is so large that it has a significant effect on the price of the house when it is listed for sale. But this increase isn’t uniform. It varies based on geographic location and the amount of solar literacy among local homeowners.
Researchers from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) compared 3,951 homes equipped with solar panels to 18,871 comparable homes without the solar panels. The comparison was based on data from homes built prior to the housing bubble, which was followed by the crash of 2008.