California Solar Exit announced on June 3 a significant increase in requests from California residents seeking to legally exit predatory solar agreements. The company, which serves homeowners statewide, said it has helped more than 500 households cancel or renegotiate solar leases, power purchase agreements, and loans with major providers including Sunrun, SunPower, Tesla Energy, Sunnova, and Vivint Solar.
The rise in demand follows California’s transition to NEM 3.0 (Net Billing Tariff), which reduced the value of exported solar energy for new installations. Many homeowners who purchased systems under projections based on the previous NEM 2.0 policy now face financial outcomes that differ significantly from what was promised at the time of sale.
Daniel Merritt, Senior Case Analyst at California Solar Exit, said, “We’re hearing the same story from homeowners in San Diego’s Chula Vista neighborhoods, from families in Riverside County, from retirees in Sacramento’s Elk Grove suburbs. A sales rep came to the door, showed them a spreadsheet projecting their electric bill going to zero, and rushed them through a 25-year contract. Then NEM 3.0 hit, or the system underperformed, or they discovered a UCC-1 lien on their home’s title they were never told about. These homeowners aren’t deadbeats — they were deceived.” Merritt also said, “Most homeowners don’t realize they have legal leverage… In our experience, if the salesperson made a material misrepresentation — about savings, about the lien, about NEM policy… there are legal avenues to challenge that contract that most people have never been told about.”
According to California Solar Exit’s statement and public data cited within it—such as figures from the California Energy Commission—California is home to over 1.5 million residential solar installations as of 2024 and has seen thousands of consumer complaints filed with state and federal agencies over issues like misrepresented savings projections and undisclosed liens.
The consultancy reviews homeowner contracts for potential violations under laws such as the California Consumer Legal Remedies Act and Business and Professions Code Section 7159. It consults remotely across all regions of California with no-obligation assessments before mapping out cancellation or dispute strategies tailored for each case.
Merritt concluded, “NEM 3.0 created a class of homeowners who were quite literally sold a system based on financial projections that were already obsolete at the time of sale… If the utility policy had changed and the solar company’s own internal team knew it… that’s not just bad luck. That’s misrepresentation.”