If you’ve been keeping up with the news or the extreme weather that nations across the world have been experiencing, then it should come as no surprise to anyone that the world is currently in the middle of a bit of a climate crisis (I’m understating this so as to not ruin the vibe of this article but if you’re considering solar power then you probably already understand that it’s actually more than “a bit of” a climate crisis).
In the wake of all the issues that are becoming more prevalent due to the climate, more and more people have been turning to alternative solutions to everyday needs.
Reusing, recycling, upcycling, zero-waste, slow fashion: all of these practices are slowly being adopted by more people in an effort to become greener.
Another way that people have been altering their resource consumption is by switching to renewable energy sources, like solar power.
This is nothing new, in fact, solar power plants have been around since the 1980s. Due to the low cost, they are also one of the only renewable energy sources that can be installed in residential homes that can actually power the household efficiently and effectively.
There are many companies that will outfit your home with solar panels, and in this article, we will be reviewing whether POWERHOME SOLAR is one that you can trust to help you cut carbon emissions from your home and bring you to a more sustainable way of living.
The Basics
With its headquarters in North Carolina, POWERHOME SOLAR is one of the nation’s leading providers of residential solar power.
This company was launched in 2014 and has grown from having 15 employees to over 2,000. POWERHOME has blown up in under a decade, securing its place among the top residential power suppliers in the country.
Although it may sound as if they have popped up out of nowhere, on their website POWERHOME assures that this is due to “dedication, passion, and hard work”.
But it’s easy for a company to advertise itself as the result of persistence and dedication to quality, but it’s another for them to actually deliver on that promise.
So let’s go over some of the pros and cons that come from working with POWERHOME, as well as what the online reviews are claiming.
Services
POWERHOME SOLAR has specialized in bringing solar energy panels to residential properties as well as commercial.
They are able to provide every aspect of the service, which streamlines the process as you don’t need to communicate with multiple companies in order to organize the designing, procurements, permitting, interconnection, and construction of the solar panel systems.
They also sort out the additional equipment and little extra things using their licensed electricians.
POWERHOME SOLAR will send over a technician once you’ve expressed an interest who will be able to give you an on-site audit and give you an expected invoice.
If you decide to sign the contract then you will be able to go through the entire design and implementation of the panels with POWERHOME and their own employees – no external commissions.
There are several different packages that you can choose from, the most popular being one that comes with the panels, a battery backup in case anything goes wrong, and up to 10 energy-saving upgrades. But that’s not all they offer.
In order to optimise your energy efficiency, you could also purchase faucet aerators, attic baffles, a Nest Thermostat, and many more.
This is a company that doesn’t want to just give you solar panels and be done, this is a company that is seemingly dedicated to setting you up with the necessary equipment to maximize your energy efficiency and reduce your carbon footprint.
Customer Service
If something happens to go wrong then you can rest assured that SOLARHOME will have your back with a dedicated customer service team, as well as a manufacturer’s 30-year linear power performance guarantee and a 25-year product workmanship guarantee.
This way, if your panels happen to stop working, or if they cause power outages or other problems, then there will be someone around to listen to the complaints and then figure out the best way to resolve the issue.
There are several great reviews online complimenting the customer service, to which someone on an official POWERHOME SOLAR account always seems to respond, thanking the reviewer for their custom.
It’s that kind of personal touch that elevates POWERHOME to another level when it comes to their service.
The Negatives
Unfortunately, there are still some negatives that come with working with this company, first and foremost being that they don’t actually provide coverage in every location, and in fact, are only available in 15 states across America.
Unfortunately, this currently limits the people that can access this service quite significantly, however, it also means that the services they provide can be more tailored and personal because the company is not stretched across the entire country.
To find a full list of the states that POWERHOME has offices in, follow this link.
Another thing that could be considered a negative is that the site does not publicly disclose any average or starting costs. This is because the prices can vary significantly depending on your area and power usage, as well as other circumstances.
This is obviously understandable as they don’t want clients to have an expectation of what it’s going to cost suddenly be blown out of the water by reality. However, as a consumer, it can be very difficult to initiate the process when you have no idea how to begin to budget.
You should be able to compare other companies and how much they might charge, but do bear in mind that with POWERHOME you get every aspect of the process through them instead of them having to go to external companies, so the pricing may be way off.
If you want an evaluation, then you can contact the nearest office and get a completely free quote to get an estimate of what you could be looking at paying for your new system.
However, if being able to plan well in advance is your preference, you may have a hard time working with POWERHOME.
Now, something important to note is that there are quite a lot of quite seriously negative comments lefts regarding the quality of the solar panels that get installed.
Users from across all the different states where POWERHOME is available have complained about the systems not working as advertised, or simply breaking down and not working at all.
Some people have complained that their solar power system has caused black or brownouts across their homes.
And then also some of these complaints have claimed that they’ve had a lot of trouble getting any response from the customer service team in an urgent situation.
This is not the kind of thing you want to hear when you’re about to drop tens of thousands of dollars on a brand new power system.
If there’s no guarantee that the panels are going to work efficiently for a significant period of time, then it can be difficult to justify the hefty cost of replacing your power system.
That said, for every negative review, it’s easy to find a just-as-passionate positive review, and so guessing at the average quality and construction of your system is going to be really difficult.
Most likely, it will depend on the regional managers and who the electricians and contractors are in each area, so if you’re still considering POWERHOME for your upgrade then you should do some significant research into what people from your region have said in reviews specifically.
Final Thoughts
This is a tough one. There’s no way that a company can gain so much traction in such a short amount of time, and become one of the nations top providers of residential solar power, if the quality of their systems was consistently as bad as some reviewers suggest, and it is far more likely that these are the minority of cases.
However, there is apparently always that risk that the system you purchase or take a loan out for, which takes weeks to be installed and that you then need to rely on to keep power running through your home, will not function as you were promised.
I would seriously recommend that you do more significant research into this company and into their regional offices before you pursue buying from them because this many negative reviews should definitely be ringing some alarm bells.
