Complaint Review: SolarCity/Tesla - Palo Alto California

First, as consumers we have been called Cheats, Thieves and Liars by Solar City Representatives. This is a company that is quick to state they can provide consumers savings over coal, oil and natural gas, but they state they did not include "electrical power". So, initially we were sold a Solar panel system that was too small to provide us with the savings we were looking for. Since this is new computerized technology we wanted to lease the technology so Solar City was responsible for the upgrades in technology for better service (we were told was similar to new generations of pool service technology, for us to better understand). We were told we could log-on and monitor our technology, but as part of the service it was being monitored for us. So, when we did not receive the value we were sold, we questioned about more panels. in 10/2015 our property suffered roofing damages in excess of $60K, so while coordinating the roofing, the initial panels had to be removed and replaced after all repairs. For the past two years we have been called Thieves, Cheats and Liars because Solar City could not find our panel removal/replacement payment. After sending them numerous copies of our banking documents we had to ask for our banks help against further Solar City collection representative harassment. On 11/27/2017 we received a call from Solar City stating they had finally found our payment and applied it to our account. We have never received a written document from Solar City providing an end to this issue. This from a company that handles customer financial transactions daily, and obviously without a daily, weekly, monthly or annually financial balance trail.

Additionally, when our roof damages were repaired and the Solar City panels were replaced we contracted another 32-38 panels as a separate contract with Solar City, in order to boost our electrical power savings to maximize our solar benefit. We were told there was no problem with adding panels, but it would be a separate contract since the lease was for 20-years, and we were already going into the third year of our initial contract, but that the contracts would mirror each other for terms. Just, another Solar City misrepresentation! Now, as we entered the second year of the second contract the pricing increased by up to 2.9%. We continue to question this annual increase on the second contract, to be told the Solar City contract always changes from year to year "based upon what the market will support", and at least we were fortunate to have a contract that would not increase more than 2.9% each year. We had decided to relocate now that we have retired and we also chose a Solar City lease in order to keep the cost of our home reduced to a buyer. We felt with a Solar City lease we could show the savings due to our previous "electric bills" as opposed to our current "electric bills", plus the Solar City lease payments. However, we have removed our home from the market since our real estate agent stated buyers were having a hard time qualifying for both the mortgage and the extra inflated value of the Solar City leased equipment, even though we can show the savings to the buyer above regular monthly "electric bills" without the solar lease. So, never before have utility bills (water, sewage and power) been included in mortgage "debt" assessment, now with Solar leasing it is considered a "debt" assessment, and we found to refinance our home we found "no property lien", but as a property sale it may actually exist?

So, in further actuality Solar City has cost us the sell of our home with their misrepresentation. We were told to sell a home many sellers have had to purchase their Solar City contracts out-right so a buyer could get through closing. This has been a huge Solar City misrepresentation by Solar City. Our real estate agent stated Solar leases are a growing problem for the real estate industry as well as the seller, and the buyer. This is a huge fraud against consumers.