Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: questions about financing solar

[Philip Semanchuk (philip]

> On Jul 16, 2023, at 10:55 PM, Lisa Wolf <tigerlisa [at] gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I am Lisa Wolf, a member of the Eco Team at Bay State Cohousing in Malden,
> MA. We just moved in to our newly-built building last November, and are
> investigating the best way to install solar, including how to finance it.
> 
> How did you finance your solar panels? Did you do it through your HOA or an
> LLC? Were you able to get any or all of the new Federal incentives from the
> Inflation Reduction Act?

Hi Lisa, 
The IRA contains significant incentives for solar. Non-profits get the tax 
benefit immediately as a rebate, if I understand correctly. However being a 
non-profit comes with certain legal obligations, so some (many? almost all?) 
HOAs are set up as for-profit entities. Ours (Pacifica in Carrboro, NC) is one 
of them, so I've been investigating our options for reaping the solar tax 
benefits in the IRA.

For-profit entities (and private homeowners) get the federal solar benefit as 
an income tax credit. This is a problem for our HOA because we pay a nominal 
amount in income taxes (< $100/year) so it would take decades to reap the 
benefit of a solar tax credit in the $5-10k range.

The IRA includes a "transferability" clause which allows for the sale of these 
tax credits. That's a potential avenue for us to turn our tax credits into 
cash. However, the practical details of transferability are still being figured 
out, so it remains to be seen whether or not it we can use it.

Hope this helps
Philip