View article

An increasing number of homes with existing photovoltaic (PV) energy systems have sold in the US, yet relatively little research exists that estimates the marginal impacts of those PV systems on home sales prices. A clearer understanding of these effects might influence the decisions of homeowners considering installing PV on their home or selling their home with PV already installed, of home buyers considering purchasing a home with PV already installed, and of new home builders considering installing PV on their production homes. This research analyzes a large dataset of California homes that sold from 2000 through mid-2009 with PV installed. Across a large number of hedonic and repeat sales model specifications and robustness tests, the analysis finds strong evidence that California homes with PV systems have sold for a premium over comparable homes without PV systems. The effects range, on average, from approximately $3.9 to $6.4 per installed watt (DC) of PV, with most coalescing near $5.5/watt, which corresponds to a home sales price premium of approximately $17,000 for a relatively new 3,100 watt PV system (the average size of PV systems in the study). These average sales price premiums appear to be comparable to the investment that homeowners have made to install PV systems in California, which from 2001 through 2009 averaged approximately $5/watt (DC), and homeowners with PV also benefit from electricity cost savings after PV system installation and prior to home sale. When expressed as a ratio of the sales price premium to estimated annual electricity cost savings associated with PV, an average ratio of 14 …