For a high-consumption home, the energy rate dominates
Texas has no statewide net-metering mandate, and compensation for exported solar depends on the retail electricity provider and the specific plan selected. Marketing tends to lead with the buyback rate, because it is the number that sounds like it is about solar.
In a household with a heavy summer cooling load, that is the wrong emphasis. If you buy several times more electricity across a year than you export, then the rate you pay for energy moves your annual bill far more than the rate you are credited for exports.
So compare plans on both rates together, weighted by your own consumption rather than by a generic profile. A plan with an eye-catching buyback and an expensive energy rate can cost you more than a plan with a modest buyback and a cheap one.
PowerToChoose.org is the state-run comparison site and the right place to see what is available at your address. Take your last twelve months of bills to the comparison rather than estimating, because your actual summer consumption is the thing that decides the answer.
Size for the electricity you use as it is generated
Electricity you consume as it is generated is worth the plan energy rate, because it avoids a purchase entirely. Electricity you export is worth the export credit, which is usually less. For a high-consumption household that gap is where most of the value sits.
The good news is that a cooling-dominated load lines up well with when a rooftop array produces. Air conditioning runs hardest in the afternoon, which is when the panels are working, so a large share of production is consumed on site rather than exported.
Ask your installer to model the self-consumed share explicitly for your household rather than quoting an annual offset percentage. Two houses with the same array and very different occupancy patterns get very different results, and the model should reflect yours.
That share is also the part of the return that survives every future plan change, since it does not depend on any export credit. A project that works on self-consumption alone is a sturdier purchase than one that needs generous export terms to make sense.
Heat, batteries and honest expectations
A grid-tied array without battery storage shuts down during an outage, as a safety requirement so that crews are not working on lines a rooftop system is energising. If keeping cooling running through an outage is part of your reason for considering solar, storage has to be designed in rather than added to the conversation later.
Ask any installer to be specific about what a proposed system does during an outage: which circuits stay live, for how long, and whether it can recharge while the grid is down. A general assurance about backup capability is not an answer.
Heat affects production as well. Panel output falls somewhat as cell temperature rises, so the hottest afternoons are not the highest-producing ones, and a production estimate should reflect real conditions rather than laboratory ratings. Ask what temperature assumptions sit behind the estimate you were given.
Check the roof before anything is ordered. Panels outlast most coverings, so one within a few years of replacement should be replaced first rather than paying later to remove and reinstall the array.
The exemption you have to claim, and the credit that ended
Texas Tax Code Section 11.27 exempts 100 percent of the appraised home value added by an installed solar energy device from property tax. It is not automatic. Form 50-123 must be filed with your county appraisal district, and the deadline for the current tax year is generally April 30.
Ask whether your installer assists with the filing, and put the deadline in your own calendar regardless. An exemption you qualified for and never claimed is the most avoidable cost in a Texas solar project, and unlike the rest of the arithmetic it is entirely within your control.
The federal position has changed and a great deal of published material has not caught up. The 30 percent Residential Clean Energy Credit under Section 25D expired for property placed in service after December 31, 2025, so a cash or loan purchase now does not receive it. A quote that still applies it is overstating your return substantially.
Section 48E survives at 30 percent for third-party owners under leases and power purchase agreements, so such a provider may claim it and reflect part of that value in the rate they offer. What they claim and what actually reaches you are separate questions, so ask both and confirm with a tax advisor rather than with the sales material.