The mismatch to resolve before anything else
A purchased solar system in Texas typically takes years to return its cost through avoided electricity purchases. A permanent change of station can arrive considerably sooner than that.
If you sell before the system has paid for itself, the return depends entirely on whether the buyer pays more for the house because of it. Sometimes they do, sometimes they do not, and it is not something you control.
So the honest first exercise is to estimate how long you will hold the property, then ask your installer what the position looks like if you sell at that point rather than at the end of the modelled payback. Ask for both numbers.
If the answer only works on the assumption you stay fifteen years, and you do not expect to, then the system is being sold on a premise that does not apply to you. That is worth establishing before the design conversation, not after.
Owned, financed and third-party owned behave differently on a move
A system bought outright is part of the house and transfers with it. Whether it adds to the sale price is a market question, but there is nothing to assign and nobody to notify.
A system on a loan is different: the loan is yours, and unless it is settled at closing you can end up paying for equipment on a house you no longer own. Ask exactly how the loan is discharged on a sale, in writing.
A lease or power purchase agreement introduces a third party who must agree to the transfer, and the buyer must qualify and be willing to take it on. That is a real complication in a market with frequent turnover, and it is the structure most likely to slow a sale.
Ask each installer offering a financed or third-party structure what the assignment process is, how long it takes, and what happens if a buyer refuses it. A vague answer here is a significant warning in this city specifically.
If you are renting, or living on post
Solar on a roof you do not own is not your decision. If you rent, the array belongs to the property owner and so does the benefit, and the arrangement only works if the landlord is buying it.
That is worth saying plainly because a large part of the Killeen market is rental, and a household paying the electricity bill has every incentive to want solar and no authority to install it.
What a renter can control is the electricity plan. Texas retail choice means you select your provider, and the plan you are on determines your rate whether or not there are panels above you. Comparing plans on PowerToChoose.org costs nothing and is available to you now.
If you own a rental property here, the calculation runs the other way: you pay for the system and your tenant receives the bill savings, unless the arrangement is structured to reflect that. Work out who captures the benefit before buying.
And if you are staying, what the numbers rest on
For a household that expects to remain, the ordinary Texas arithmetic applies. There is no statewide net-metering mandate, so what you are paid for export comes from the retail plan you choose, and plans differ enormously.
Compare the buyback rate and the energy rate together rather than chasing the highest buyback, because across a year you will buy considerably more electricity than you export.
Texas Tax Code Section 11.27 exempts 100 percent of the appraised value a solar energy device adds to your home, claimed on Form 50-123 with your county appraisal district, generally by 30 April. It is not automatic.
The 30 percent Residential Clean Energy Credit under Section 25D expired for property placed in service after 31 December 2025, so a cash or loan purchase receives no federal credit. Section 48E survives at 30 percent for third-party owners under a lease or PPA.