I just wanted to take the time to briefly share my Tesla Solar story here in San Diego. Just wanted to say thanks to all the people who post their stories and provide information on this forum as it helped immensely when it came to my decision to purchase solar.
So, back on on 07/19/20 I ordered a small system (12 Panels) through the Tesla website for my townhouse where there are 3 units in a single building. The first design, which I received had some issues with the panel layout based on the panels not being in the optimal locations and being on the roof above other units in the building. So, over the course a week and a half, 2 phone calls and receiving two more designs, I approved the design on 08/02/20.
Based on the shared roof situation, I had a couple more HOA hoops to jump through than most, which took some time. Tesla was also a little slow on obtaining the permit from the city. Using my city's citizen access permit site I saw that Tesla had to make 3 revisions to the permit. Tesla was granted the permit by my city on 09/15/20. During that time I was going back and forth with my HOA trying to fulfill their requirements.
My HOA wouldn't approve anything until they had an approved permit from the city, which I had to try and obtain from Tesla. For people having to deal with HOAs, Tesla has a specific email address to provide you things for your HOA and to help you with that process. I found the communication to that specific address to be very slow. I requested the approved permit from Tesla shortly after seeing it was sent by the city but did not hear back from the HOA email address, so I sent a request about 1.5 weeks later to the generic Tesla Energy email. I ended up hearing back from that email with what I requested the same day. So, if you have to deal with the HOA tesla email, I wouldn't wait as long as I did to get a response before just trying the regular "energy order" address.
I ended up submitting everything to my HOA on 09/30/20 for approval. On 10/07/20 I received a partial approval from my HOA, stating they were going to approve the application but I had paperwork to sign off that then had to be signed off on their end until I could have the system installed.
On 11/3/20, I finally received approval from my HOA for the installation. On 11/05/20, I contacted Tesla and was able to schedule installation for 11/12/20. On installation day a crew of 2 showed up around 7:20AM and spoke with me about things. The 2 waited about another 30 minutes until 2 others showed up before they all started working. I was able to go over some specifics about small changes to the panel layout, the location for a conduit run, and where in my garage I wanted the inverter and shutoff installed. At about 1PM the work was done.
The next day (Friday), I received a call and was told the inspection with the city had been scheduled for that coming Monday the 16th. On inspection day, Tesla had someone come out and speak with the inspector who only spent about 5-10 minutes talking to the Tesla rep and looking at my inverter and breaker panel. The work passed inspection and the rep was just told by the inspector to add a couple additional specific red warning signs to the exterior of the building.
Later that day after the inspection I received my invoice from Tesla, which I immediately paid and notification from SDG&E that they had processed a NEM application for me and had received payment for the NEM application fee.
On 11/19/20, I received my PTO from SDG&E and 11/20 was my first day generating electricity from my system
Thanks again for all the info on this forum. I attached some pix of the final install and of my first day of production.
I'm willing to answer any questions to those that have any!
So, back on on 07/19/20 I ordered a small system (12 Panels) through the Tesla website for my townhouse where there are 3 units in a single building. The first design, which I received had some issues with the panel layout based on the panels not being in the optimal locations and being on the roof above other units in the building. So, over the course a week and a half, 2 phone calls and receiving two more designs, I approved the design on 08/02/20.
Based on the shared roof situation, I had a couple more HOA hoops to jump through than most, which took some time. Tesla was also a little slow on obtaining the permit from the city. Using my city's citizen access permit site I saw that Tesla had to make 3 revisions to the permit. Tesla was granted the permit by my city on 09/15/20. During that time I was going back and forth with my HOA trying to fulfill their requirements.
My HOA wouldn't approve anything until they had an approved permit from the city, which I had to try and obtain from Tesla. For people having to deal with HOAs, Tesla has a specific email address to provide you things for your HOA and to help you with that process. I found the communication to that specific address to be very slow. I requested the approved permit from Tesla shortly after seeing it was sent by the city but did not hear back from the HOA email address, so I sent a request about 1.5 weeks later to the generic Tesla Energy email. I ended up hearing back from that email with what I requested the same day. So, if you have to deal with the HOA tesla email, I wouldn't wait as long as I did to get a response before just trying the regular "energy order" address.
I ended up submitting everything to my HOA on 09/30/20 for approval. On 10/07/20 I received a partial approval from my HOA, stating they were going to approve the application but I had paperwork to sign off that then had to be signed off on their end until I could have the system installed.
On 11/3/20, I finally received approval from my HOA for the installation. On 11/05/20, I contacted Tesla and was able to schedule installation for 11/12/20. On installation day a crew of 2 showed up around 7:20AM and spoke with me about things. The 2 waited about another 30 minutes until 2 others showed up before they all started working. I was able to go over some specifics about small changes to the panel layout, the location for a conduit run, and where in my garage I wanted the inverter and shutoff installed. At about 1PM the work was done.
The next day (Friday), I received a call and was told the inspection with the city had been scheduled for that coming Monday the 16th. On inspection day, Tesla had someone come out and speak with the inspector who only spent about 5-10 minutes talking to the Tesla rep and looking at my inverter and breaker panel. The work passed inspection and the rep was just told by the inspector to add a couple additional specific red warning signs to the exterior of the building.
Later that day after the inspection I received my invoice from Tesla, which I immediately paid and notification from SDG&E that they had processed a NEM application for me and had received payment for the NEM application fee.
On 11/19/20, I received my PTO from SDG&E and 11/20 was my first day generating electricity from my system
Thanks again for all the info on this forum. I attached some pix of the final install and of my first day of production.
I'm willing to answer any questions to those that have any!
