Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Tesla Solar: 3 Years Later”.
Portion this video is sponsored by lenovo alright. So when you think of tesla you’re, probably like everybody else, they get electric cars with insane 0-60 and weird steering wheels and maybe some panel gaps. But there is another huge part of the company that does not get the attention that i think it deserves. Uh and that’s solar and fundamentally tesla is mostly an energy company and for them to reach their very well-stated goal of advancing sustainable energy. Solar is a big player in sort of their overall portfolio at the face of it.
Solar does not seem that interesting. I get it. It’S not flashy, it doesn’t drive you around on autopilot, but if there was one tesla product that i would buy again in an instant, it’s tesla, solar, alright, so this video really got sparked from well. All of you watching uh i’ve had tesla solar installed in my house since 2017 uh and after posting this tweet, which i didn’t think much about about my utility bill. Uh. The response was, let’s just say, strong um and the questions were surprising uh.
So i’m here to answer all of those questions and i think ultimately the big one is. Is it worth it? I’M just gon na go and spoil it right now. Yes, for me, it was a hundred percent worth it all right. So, first let me lay out exactly how tesla solar works and what options you have uh and i’ll say upfront. This is almost all dependent on where you live.
So for me, i live in southern california. My electric company is southern california edison. So my experience is based on those circumstances.
You might live where it snows, where electricity has different prices, but for me in southern california it made a lot of sense. So right now, tesla offers generally two solar options for residential stuff. You can get solar panels on your roof, which is vastly easier and more popular. They also offer a solar roof. I actually did an entire video on a solar roof which i don’t have, but i went to actually the very first house where solar roof got installed. I’Ll link to that video down below, if you want to watch it, but obviously you can probably guess what it does. It involves replacing your entire roof with these solar cells. It’S very cool technology, but for most people it is not the best option uh and for me, when i was looking to install solar had recently just moved into a new house. Solar roof wasn’t available yet um and beyond that i didn’t have that much money left after moving in. I certainly didn’t need a brand new roof, so i opted for a little over 11.3 kilowatt array on my roof and i added two tesla powerwall battery packs.
Each has about 13.5 kilowatt, so here’s why i went with solar at first back in 2017, they were insane tax incentives to install solar. Essentially, it was the more you spent the bigger the tax credit that you got and also again, you may vary where you live, but here in southern california i have three kids. It gets very hot. We tend to run our air conditioning at night to keep everybody nice and cool.
I also drive evs, so those were being charged in the summer months and you can see this bill from september 2017. The electric bill was going as high as 540, and that was the highest. It ever got um, but usually in the summer it settled around 400 and then in regular months it kind of came around between 250 and 300.
So it was very expensive and i wasn’t limiting my electric use. I probably could have done a lot to change my lifestyle and limit that um, but solar seemed like a really good option to solve a lot of those problems. So a lot of things i can do with this system with it installed.
I can now power, my entire house uh in fact, there’s a option now inside a tesla app where i can take my whole house off the grid. If i want to which is awesome uh, i can charge up my eevee. I can store energy in the battery packs excess stuff, and i could also use the solar energy that i’m generating to sell it back to the grid. That’S actually what led to that negative power build end of the month, and i should say that negative 199 was not typical at all.
I was on vacation for a week there, so i wasn’t using anything to house and it was all going back to the grid. This is more representative of my electric bill is now sometimes between like 12 and like 25 to 30. Bucks is generally all my bill ends up being so that sounds great, but the biggest question the most overwhelming question uh that i’ve seen is how much did all of this cost, and was it worth it for that price? So when i installed my system, it came out to just under 50 000 for everything. Now i just moved into new house, i did not have fifty thousand dollars laying around, so i opted to finance the system at a low interest rate with no prepayment penalty that equals a payment of around 250 dollars a month for the system. So that meant that what i was paying for the solar array, even on the least expensive month, was generally less than what i was paying for my electricity, then beyond all that, i got a really big tax credit. I believe it was around 15 to twenty thousand dollars back, so i wasn’t spending any more money, but i was saving money on the hot months. At the very least, i was breaking even on the winter months and i’m not renting this system at all, like some solar companies, do i own the panels, and eventually, when i pay off the rest of that loan, i will own them outright and be able to Produce energy for no really no monthly payment at all and again in 2017, these were installed, the tax incentives were were nuts and there still are tax incentives as well, but it’s gon na depend on state and where you live uh, but it made it really worthwhile. So if you take that 15 to 20 thousand dollars, i saved that money.
The whole system cost me, you know around 30 or so, if you, if you back that out, but until i pay that off um, i’m still saving money. So i want to tell you guys about one of the latest from lenovo. It’S lenovo ideapad, duet, 3i and sort of hybrid computer laptop tablet. Things aren’t new, but lenovo’s taking that idea and just kind of streamlined the whole thing. So, on its surface, you are getting a three in one. You are getting a really good tablet.
You are getting a really good, laptop and you’re getting a device with full lte connection that can also enable you to make phone calls, so it’s kind of a phone, but also data on the go. So a lot of things to really like about the computer. First, build quality is absolutely outstanding, but a computer like this or tablet like this. However, you want to phrase it in my mind: it’s only as good as the hinge if it has a weak hinge or a hinge that can’t be adjusted.
It’S not usable. It’S not usable on your lap, it’s barely usable on a table. The hinge here is awesome and obviously being a windows computer. It’S a multitasking beast still snap mode on windows is probably my favorite thing going.
So obviously you can run. However, many apps you’re going to want side by side, you can run a ton of edge tabs under chrome, tabs and you’ll be fully set to go. Also, there’s an eye on privacy here as well. So while the webcam on the front is awesome to have, you do have a little shutter, you can close to give you a bit more privacy and peace of mind if that’s something that you want.
So if you want to learn more or you’re interested in the lenovo ideapad duet 3i, we’ve got a link down below for you to check out. So obviously, the the loan for the solar matters – and i have the option now of paying that off in in full or just continuing to do the monthly payments that i’m doing right now, but also it added a lot of equity to my house. The exact dollar amount it’s kind of hard to gauge. The housing market is nuts right now uh, but i believe it added at least more than fifty thousand dollars to the value of my home.
So when i sold my home, i would have made all that money back anyway, okay, so that leads to the other big question that i got was like. How do i use these solar panels and power walls to be the most effective tool like for me uh? So the whole system runs through the tesla app, which at least on ios got a very nice uh design and a refresh – and this is where i can control and see what the system is doing and also i can determine where the energy is going to go. So you would think the setup would be relatively straightforward right during the day, you’re in your house, with solar energy and at night use the batteries to run your house, and while you certainly can do that, and sometimes i do there’s a lot more, you can do With the system to get the most out of it, so again, i’m in southern california, southern california edison, is my electric provider. I have the ability to sell electricity back to them, and i know some people don’t have that option.
So much companies don’t allow you to do it, so i’ve tried to sort of maximize selling electricity back to the grid and you get the most money for it during peak hours. So i have my system set up where, essentially in the morning when the sun comes up it’ll power, my house excess will go to my battery packs and then, when i hit peak hours, usually around noon ish i have it set to stop going to the batteries And start selling all the electricity back to the grid, and then my house, for five or six hours during peak time is using the electricity that came earlier in the day that was stored in the batteries and then at night electricity is really cheap. I tend to go back to the grid, that’s generally how i do things during peak earning hours during during peak time in the summer when there’s most sun out. So that’s how i set up my system for the best results, but there are some other features that i i like to kind of give me more peace of mind and only possible if you have the combination of batteries and solar.
So, first blackouts, i’ve said it a few times i live in southern california, uh with wildfires in the area and a ton of rolling blackouts. I had to evacuate my house last year there have been a ton of times where power is being cut to my house and honestly. I have not noticed that it’s happened. The only way that i can even tell is, if i’m watching the lights, the flicker for a second and then my house will immediately switch over to being powered by the power walls which is awesome to have, and you can set the power walls up where you Have a reserve – that’s sort of always there in case of power, outages um i’ve got mine, set up to have seven percent extra, which can generally power my whole house for at least long enough for the the blackout uh two to end.
Another awesome feature is for storm’s natural disasters, and the test lab can actually warn you of an upcoming event that might cause disruption and power like a storm, sometimes flash floods here in southern california. So when that happens, i can kind of preemptively charge the power walls. More in the event that i lose power for a longer period of time and again you get an alert on your phone that says like storm coming. You may want to charge your power walls. It’S happened before and it’s been awesome to to have. Is it worth it in every situation, uh, it’s hard to say across the board? What i can say is, if you own your house and you can install solar, you live in a place that has more sun than not like california.
It’S worth an option. I think it makes a lot of sense. It’S certainly an investment up front, but one that’ll eventually pay off.
In the long run. I’Ve seen the comments where i live. Electricity only cost me four dollars.
Where i live, i get hail and snow. Then it’s obviously not going to work for you. This is not a one system is best for every scenario, but for me it’s been awesome for me. It’S worked out.
I also really like the idea of knowing that i am driving my car for essentially free, which is just a very cool thing to have in addition to knowing that my house is covered in case of blackouts or fires have made a power line, uh go down, And also now it’s making money selling power back to the grid. I really like that. Um i’m into tech, and this is tech for my house. So it’s been awesome and on top of all that there was killer tax savings that made it a no-brainer. So there are a lot of other solar companies out there.
I went with tesla because the app worked well, it’s called one app for my car and solar and it’s been an awesome experience. It may not be for you, but for me i would do this again in an absolute heartbeat and it’s probably one of the best things i’ve done to my house since i moved in .