Solar Lease Buyout: How the Number Is Built

How is a solar lease buyout number built?

A solar lease buyout is priced by your contract, and no statute sets the figure. A contract may state a buyout price or tie it to “fair market value” set by an appraisal, and the company holding the lease produces the quote. You test it by comparing it with what you would pay if you simply finished the term.

Tesla’s published terms show both pricing models. For its current leases, a buyout is available “After year five (price outlined in contract).” For its PPAs, the first purchase date “falls on the six-year anniversary” of permission to operate, and the price is fair market value “calculated by an independent third-party appraisal company,” plus taxes.

Where does a buyout fit in the order?

A buyout is a route to consider after the free ones. Our guide to getting out of a solar contract sets out the full order; here it is for a lease or PPA.

1. Inside a cancellation window? If the lease or PPA was signed only days ago, cancel it in writing, using the method your contract and the law require. The FTC’s Cooling-Off Rule can apply to “a sale, lease, or rental” made at your home, and state windows vary and can be longer than three days (state table, deadline tool). Cancellation is never automatic.

2. Identify your contract and every company. Confirm whether you have a lease or a PPA, and who holds and services it now. Connecticut’s attorney general describes SunStrong Management as a company that “manages loans, leases and power purchase agreements from solar companies that entered bankruptcy, such as Sunnova and SunPower,” and says Spruce Power acquired a portfolio of solar contracts from NRG Energy.

3. Ask in writing, and complain for free. If the system never produced what the contract promises, or was never switched on, put that to the company in writing before you discuss a price; our lease and PPA guides cover those disputes. The FTC tells shoppers to check “whether the contract guarantees a minimum level of power, and how the company will pay if the system doesn’t produce the minimum amount of power.” The CFPB’s complaint menu doesn’t list leases or PPAs, so file with your state attorney general and the FTC; Treasury, the CFPB and the FTC jointly “encourage consumers that believe they have been a victim of unfair or deceptive practices to file a complaint with CFPB, FTC, or their relevant state consumer protection office.”

Disclosure: Candid Yak works with Titan Advocacy Group, a solar consumer advocacy firm, and may be paid when readers hire it.

4. If they refuse, get a free case review.

When the company won’t fix a performance problem or explain its numbers, and your papers show a gap between the pitch and the contract (a payment that rises when you were told it was fixed, a promised tax credit on a lease, a production promise the system never met), a review comes before any buyout check. As a 2024 CFPB consumer advisory put it, “You can submit a complaint to multiple places, and you can also consult an attorney at the same time.” A firm that offers a free case review should read the lease before quoting, tell you if a free route is still open, name an attorney licensed in your state, put its fee and refund terms in writing, never tell you to stop paying the lease, and never guarantee a result or claim a tie to your lessor.

5. Other routes. A buyout belongs here, alongside a transfer when you sell. The rest of this page is about pricing it.

What is a buyout competing against?

Price the alternative first: finishing the term. The CFPB’s 2024 solar report says typical solar leases last 15 to 20 years and that “in many cases the payments increase each year by a predetermined amount.” For PPAs, it says escalators “range from 1 to 5 percent.” Tesla’s current lease terms list a 3 percent annual escalator.

A worked example, using 3 percent. Your own contract’s escalator is the one that matters, and the arithmetic below is ours. Take a 20-year lease that started at $150 a month, eight years in:

Payment in year one	$150
Payment now, in year nine	$190
Payment in the final year	$263
Remaining 12 years, added up	$32,360
The same 12 years if the payment stayed at today’s $190	$27,360
Our arithmetic: the remaining payments discounted at 5 percent a year, each year’s payments counted at the start of that year	about $24,700

Three readings follow. The escalator adds about $5,000 over the last 12 years. The full remaining stream, $32,360, is what finishing the term costs in payments. And if the company discounts that stream for getting paid early, the figure falls; at 5 percent a year, our discounting puts it near $24,700. A quote of $28,000 on this lease would be most of what you would pay by staying, collected sooner. A quote well under the discounted figure is worth a closer look.

Ask in writing how the figure was derived: the remaining term, the escalator, any discount rate, and any appraisal. If the company won’t show its method, treat the quote as an opening number.

What does “fair market value” mean in your contract?

Treasury’s advisory says that at the end of a lease “you will not automatically own the system. You may be able to purchase it from the company at ‘fair market value.’” Its PPA guide is firmer: “You will need to purchase it from the company at ‘fair market value.’” Neither defines the phrase, so your contract does.

Read three things in the definition: who picks the appraiser, what the appraisal is allowed to count, and whether you can see the report. Tesla, for its PPAs, says it orders the appraisal from “an independent third-party appraisal company” and that you can request an estimate within ”+/-$200 of the FMV” before you commit.

End-of-term rights also vary. The CFPB says that at the end of a lease, “the lessor is responsible for uninstalling and removing the panels,” and the FTC says the company “must remove the system and put your roof back in its original condition.” Tesla’s current lease terms list three end-of-term options: renew, buy at fair market value, or have Tesla remove the system, with “removal cost applies.” What your contract says about removal at the end of the term changes what a buyout is worth to you, so read that clause before you negotiate.

What do companies charge on top of the price?

Processing charges come on top of the buyout figure. Spruce Power’s schedule, effective March 1, 2026, lists a $300 “System Buyout Service Charge (Without Filing),” a $400 charge “With Filing,” and a $50 rush charge for a one-to-two-day buyout demand. Ask your company for its fee schedule in writing.

When does a buyout beat a transfer at sale?

A buyout is worth pricing when you are staying in the house, the quote sits well below the remaining payments, and you can pay it without borrowing at a rate that cancels the saving.

A transfer usually costs less when you are moving anyway, but it is not always free. Spruce lists a $400 charge for processing a home sale, and Tesla says a buyer who doesn’t meet its credit criteria or pay cash can qualify by paying a $250 credit fee. Those charges are small next to a buyout, and our guide to selling a house with a solar lease covers the steps. Put both side by side in the solar exit cost calculator.

What should you check before you pay?

• Who you are paying. Get the figure in writing from the company that holds your contract today. The court entered the order confirming Sunnova’s Chapter 11 plan on November 12, 2025, the plan took effect November 14, 2025, and Sunnova’s page says SunStrong “has assumed responsibility for servicing and managing most in-service customer systems.”
• The filing. Lessors often record a UCC filing on the panels. Get a written commitment to terminate it once the buyout clears, then check the record; our guide to solar liens and UCC filings shows where.
• The tax credit. A buyout does not create one. The IRS says the residential clean energy credit “is not available for any property placed in service after December 31, 2025,” and Treasury notes that with a lease or PPA “The tax credits and incentives go to the system’s owner.”

If you borrow to fund a buyout

A buyout turns a lease payment into a lump sum, and a borrowed lump sum is ordinary consumer debt you can shop, refinance or pay off early. Compare the all-in cost of the loan with the escalating payments you are escaping, and compare consolidation and personal loan rates before you accept financing offered alongside the quote. Keep making lease payments until the buyout is complete.

Disclosure: Candid Yak works with Titan Advocacy Group, a solar consumer advocacy firm, and may be paid when readers hire it. This page’s author, Kira Fairbank, is a manager at Vacation Ownership Consultants, a timeshare exit firm.

This is general information, not legal advice. Buyout pricing, fair market value and removal rights come from your own agreement, read under your state’s law, so have an attorney licensed in your state review the contract and any written quote before you sign a buyout or a release.