Original research
Who actually owns the solar panels on American roofs
Third-party ownership (leases and power purchase agreements) as a share of the residential fleet, by state.
The finding
Key findings
- 1 29.0% of US residential solar is third-party owned
1,474,863 of 5,077,543 net-metered systems belong to a company rather than the household beneath them.
- 2 In 4 states it is the majority
Massachusetts 57.2%, Maryland 54.6%, Connecticut 53.8%, New Jersey 51.4%. More than half of the rooftop solar in these states is leased or on a PPA.
- 3 The range is 0.0% to 57.2%
A ∞-fold spread between Missouri and Massachusetts. No other feature of the residential solar market varies this much.
- 4 Ownership does not track adoption
Some of the highest-adoption states are near-total ownership markets and some are majority-lease. What a household is offered is decided by state policy design, not by how much solar the state has.
- 5 The pattern follows incentive structure
The lease-dominated states built incentives (SRECs, state rebates, utility programmes) that a corporate tax-equity owner can monetise more efficiently than a household can.
- 6 13 jurisdictions report no third-party figure at all
Blank is not zero. The third-party sheet is filed by system owners rather than utilities, so its coverage is materially less complete than the main schedule.
Why ownership is the question that matters
Yet almost every published statistic about rooftop solar (capacity, installations, growth rates, cost per watt) is silent on ownership. EIA is not. It collects third-party-owned systems on a separate sheet of the same form, which makes the share computable for every state that files one.
Yet almost every published statistic about rooftop solar, capacity, installations, growth rates, cost per watt, is silent on ownership. EIA is not. It collects third-party-owned systems on a separate sheet of the same form, which makes the share computable for every state that files one.
The national split
Roughly seven systems in ten are owned by the household. That is a meaningful correction to a common impression: the lease and PPA model is large but it is not the default nationally.
It is the default in specific places, and that is what the state table shows.
Where the leases are
The lease belt is unmistakable: a cluster of Northeastern and mid-Atlantic states where more than half the fleet is third-party owned, plus Nevada and Arizona in the West. The Mountain West and the Midwest are close to pure ownership markets.
Third-party ownership share by state, 2024
| # | State | Residential systems | Third-party owned | TPO share 2024 | Share 2023 | Change | Avg. system size |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Massachusetts | 189,611 | 108,420 | 57.2% | 59.9% | -2.7%pp | 6.88 kW |
| 2 | Maryland | 108,428 | 59,158 | 54.6% | 58.4% | -3.8%pp | 8.29 kW |
| 3 | Connecticut | 103,824 | 55,857 | 53.8% | 56.1% | -2.3%pp | 7.71 kW |
| 4 | New Jersey | 199,822 | 102,728 | 51.4% | 55.4% | -4.0%pp | 6.91 kW |
| 5 | Illinois | 103,145 | 48,478 | 47.0% | 41.0% | +6.0%pp | 7.74 kW |
| 6 | New York | 226,979 | 82,371 | 36.3% | 39.9% | -3.6%pp | 6.93 kW |
| 7 | Nevada | 134,257 | 48,561 | 36.2% | 34.8% | +1.4%pp | 7.60 kW |
| 8 | Rhode Island | 17,321 | 6,145 | 35.5% | 46.0% | -10.5%pp | 6.12 kW |
| 9 | Arizona | 317,033 | 108,108 | 34.1% | 34.4% | -0.3%pp | 7.18 kW |
| 10 | California | 2,090,983 | 669,115 | 32.0% | 32.1% | -0.1%pp | 6.07 kW |
| 11 | Pennsylvania | 81,375 | 25,837 | 31.8% | 35.5% | -3.7%pp | 8.00 kW |
| 12 | Delaware | 14,087 | 3,757 | 26.7% | 31.0% | -4.4%pp | 7.67 kW |
| 13 | New Hampshire | 22,503 | 5,772 | 25.7% | 24.6% | +1.0%pp | 8.06 kW |
| 14 | Texas | 133,501 | 32,214 | 24.1% | 20.4% | +3.8%pp | 7.37 kW |
| 15 | Hawaii | 98,418 | 21,485 | 21.8% | 21.8% | +0.1%pp | 5.40 kW |
| 16 | South Carolina | 40,055 | 8,071 | 20.2% | 21.5% | -1.3%pp | 7.54 kW |
| 17 | Colorado | 179,751 | 31,726 | 17.7% | 17.3% | +0.3%pp | 5.16 kW |
| 18 | Florida | 289,774 | 39,177 | 13.5% | 10.5% | +3.0%pp | 8.88 kW |
| 19 | Maine | 14,867 | 1,316 | 8.9% | 0.2% | +8.7%pp | 8.16 kW |
| 20 | New Mexico | 61,209 | 4,695 | 7.7% | 7.9% | -0.3%pp | 5.35 kW |
| 21 | Oregon | 52,600 | 3,771 | 7.2% | 8.3% | -1.2%pp | 6.34 kW |
| 22 | Ohio | 27,520 | 1,043 | 3.8% | 0.0% | +3.8%pp | 7.44 kW |
| 23 | District of Columbia | 17,780 | 564 | 3.2% | 4.2% | -1.0%pp | 6.35 kW |
| 24 | Georgia | 18,612 | 417 | 2.2% | 0.1% | +2.2%pp | 6.92 kW |
| 25 | Oklahoma | 16,755 | 231 | 1.4% | — | — | 7.38 kW |
| 26 | Utah | 81,115 | 754 | 0.9% | 1.1% | -0.2%pp | 5.93 kW |
| 27 | Louisiana | 34,417 | 110 | 0.3% | 0.4% | -0.0%pp | 5.46 kW |
| 28 | Arkansas | 19,146 | 40 | 0.2% | 0.2% | -0.0%pp | 8.87 kW |
| 29 | North Carolina | 57,393 | 121 | 0.2% | 0.1% | +0.1%pp | 7.39 kW |
| 30 | Michigan | 23,456 | 45 | 0.2% | 0.1% | +0.1%pp | 6.63 kW |
| 31 | Washington | 59,235 | 101 | 0.2% | 0.2% | -0.0%pp | 7.23 kW |
| 32 | Virginia | 69,553 | 70 | 0.1% | 0.4% | -0.2%pp | 7.39 kW |
| 33 | Idaho | 22,899 | 9 | 0.0% | 0.1% | -0.0%pp | 6.50 kW |
| 34 | Indiana | 11,045 | 2 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0%pp | 8.69 kW |
| 35 | Missouri | 30,022 | 0 | 0.0% | 0.1% | -0.1%pp | 9.15 kW |
States with at least 10,000 residential net-metered systems and a reported third-party figure. HyreSolar calculation from EIA-861 2024.
Figures labelled HyreSolar calculation are computed by us from the EIA source files named below. EIA publishes the inputs; it does not publish these ratios.
Two different markets, sold two different ways
Lease-dominated: Massachusetts, Maryland, Connecticut, New Jersey
These are, without exception, states that built strong solar incentive programmes around a corporate tax-equity structure, SRECs, state rebates and utility programmes that a third-party owner can monetise more efficiently than a household can. A company with tax appetite and portfolio scale extracts more value from a tradable credit than a homeowner filing one return.
The consequence for a homeowner is that the default offer they receive is a lease or a PPA, not a purchase quote, and the comparison they are shown is against their utility bill rather than against buying the same system with a loan.
It is not inherently a worse outcome. It is a different product with different risks, and one that most buyers in these states are never shown an alternative to.
Ownership-dominated: Missouri, Indiana, Idaho, Virginia
At the other end, third-party ownership is effectively absent. Some of these states restrict or do not clearly authorise third-party power sales to retail customers, which removes the PPA from the menu entirely; others simply never built an incentive a corporate owner could capture.
Where the model is unavailable, the market reverts to cash and loans. Households in these states face a different conversation (a capital decision rather than a bill-swap decision) and a different set of risks, principally loan terms and dealer fees rather than escalators and assignment clauses.
Ownership and adoption are unrelated
A plausible theory is that third-party ownership is how immature markets get started: that leases lower the barrier, adoption follows, and ownership takes over as the market matures. The cross-section does not support it.
Massachusetts has 57.2% third-party ownership at 6.5% household adoption. Missouri has 0.0% at 1.0%, comparable adoption, opposite ownership structure. California, the largest market by far, sits mid-table at 32.0%.
Whatever determines the ownership mix, it is not how far along a state’s solar market is.
What moved in a year
Ownership mix is a stock measure and moves slowly: it describes two decades of accumulated installations, so a single year of new sales barely shifts it. Movements of more than a couple of percentage points therefore deserve suspicion rather than interpretation.
The largest single-year moves are shown below. On a schedule where filing is by system owner rather than utility, a large jump is at least as likely to be a company beginning or ceasing to file as a genuine change in the market.
What we can and cannot conclude
The association between third-party ownership and state incentive design is strong and visible in the table. What this data cannot do is tell you whether households in high-TPO states got a worse deal. A well-priced PPA can beat a badly financed purchase, and a lease is not automatically a bad outcome: it transfers performance risk and maintenance obligation to the owner, which has value.
What it does establish is that the ownership mix a household faces is set before they ever request a quote, by the state they live in. That is worth knowing before assuming the offer in front of you is the only shape the market takes. In a majority-TPO state, asking for a purchase quote alongside the lease is asking for the minority product, and you may have to ask more than once.
If you are offered a lease or PPA
- The escalator
Most agreements raise the payment annually, commonly 1–3%. Over 20–25 years an escalator compounds substantially. Ask for the total contracted payments across the full term, not the first-year figure.
- The assignment clause on sale
When you sell the house, the buyer must assume the agreement or you must buy it out. Both routes have failed sales. Read what the contract requires of a buyer before you sign, not when you list.
- The buyout terms and timing
Check when a buyout is first permitted, how the price is calculated, and whether it is fixed or fair-market-value assessed at the time.
- Who owns the incentives
Under a lease or PPA the tax credit and any tradable certificates go to the system owner, not to you. That is the trade being made and it should be visible in the pricing.
- Do not compare against your bill alone
The comparison a lease is usually shown against is your current utility bill. The comparison that matters is against buying the same system with a loan over the same term.
Methodology
Definition
TPO share = residential photovoltaic installations reported on the EIA-861 third-party-owned sheet ÷ residential photovoltaic net-metering installations on the main sheet, both summed to state level. Third-party owned covers leases and power purchase agreements: any arrangement where the system on the roof belongs to someone other than the occupant.
The residual (what we describe as household-owned) includes both outright cash purchases and loan-financed systems. This data cannot separate them, and a loan-financed system where the household holds the asset is economically very different from a lease. We do not present the residual as "cash buyers".
A reporting caveat that matters
The two sheets are filed by different entities. The main net metering sheet is filed by the utility whose meter the system sits behind; the third-party sheet is filed by the owner of the system, which is a solar company rather than a utility. Coverage on the third-party sheet is therefore materially less complete, and a state where third-party owners under-file will show a TPO share that is too low.
38 of 51 jurisdictions have a reported figure at all. Where the sheet reports nothing, we show nothing rather than assuming zero: an absent filing and a genuine zero look identical in the file and are not the same fact.
This is the weakest dataset in our research section on coverage grounds, and we would rather say so on the page than have a reader discover it. The direction of the bias is known: under-reporting understates TPO, so the true national share is probably somewhat above 29.0%.
Inclusion floor
States with fewer than 10,000 residential net-metered systems are excluded from the ranking, for the same reason as elsewhere in this section: a share computed on a base of a few hundred systems is not a market statistic.
Stock, not sales
This is the ownership mix of the installed fleet, accumulated over two decades. The mix of systems sold in 2024 alone is not derivable from these files and is not what this page reports. Industry sources that track current sales report a higher third-party share than this page, and both can be true simultaneously.
Terms used on this page
- Third-party ownership (TPO)
- Any arrangement where the system on the roof is owned by a company rather than the occupant. Covers both leases and power purchase agreements.
- Solar lease
- A fixed monthly payment for the use of the system, regardless of how much it generates. Usually 20–25 years with an annual escalator.
- Power purchase agreement (PPA)
- A payment per kilowatt-hour generated, rather than a fixed monthly fee. The household buys the output, not the equipment.
- Escalator
- The annual percentage increase written into a lease or PPA payment, commonly 1–3%. Compounds over the contract term.
- SREC
- Solar renewable energy certificate: a tradable credit for each megawatt-hour generated, used in several state programmes. Easier for a corporate owner to monetise than a household.
- Tax equity
- The financing structure through which a company with tax liability monetises credits a household could not fully use. The mechanism behind the lease-dominated states.
Citation, reuse and corrections
How to cite this study
Full citation. HyreSolar Research, “Who actually owns the solar panels on American roofs”, September 2026. Analysis of US Energy Information Administration Form EIA-861, 2014–2024. Available at https://hyresolar.com/research/solar-ownership-by-state/
In text. “according to a HyreSolar analysis of federal utility filings” — with a link to this page.
In a chart or table. “Source: HyreSolar analysis of EIA-861 (2024)”.
What you may reuse
The underlying data is a public US government dataset and carries no restriction. The analysis, rankings, derived ratios and charts on this page are ours, and you are welcome to reproduce them — including the charts — for editorial, academic and non-commercial purposes with attribution and a link to this page.
We ask for the link rather than a bare mention because the methodology and the limitations live here. A figure quoted without them is easy to misread, and several of the numbers on this page carry conditions that change what they mean.
Who produced this
The HyreSolar research desk. We do not attach an individual byline to these studies, because the work is a scripted analysis of a public federal dataset rather than an authored opinion, and a personal byline would imply a kind of authorship that is not what happened here. What is accountable instead is the method: the source files are named, the arithmetic is stated, the extraction is scripted, and the validation is published.
HyreSolar is an independent analysis and matching service. We are not an installer, a lender or a utility, and no installer pays for placement, ranking or mention in this research. See the editorial policy.
How this study is built
Annual Form EIA-861 workbooks for 2014–2024 are downloaded from EIA and parsed by script into a single dataset. Every figure on this page — in the prose, in the tables and in every mark on every chart — is read from that dataset at build time. Nothing is typed by hand.
That is not a stylistic preference. It means a number in a sentence and the same number in the table beneath it cannot drift apart, a chart cannot disagree with its own caption, and next year's EIA release updates the entire study by regenerating one file rather than by someone editing 4,000 words and hoping they caught every instance.
The workbooks are not consistent between years — sheet names change, header rows move, a measure is renamed, a column appears in one year only, and one large utility is filed under two different spellings. The extraction addresses columns by their header meaning rather than their position, and keys utilities on their EIA number rather than their name, because every one of those inconsistencies silently produces wrong output if ignored.
Corrections
If you find an error, tell us and we will fix it on the page with a dated note rather than silently. That includes disagreements about method: the inputs are public and the arithmetic is stated, so the argument can be had on the evidence.
Update schedule
EIA publishes final Form EIA-861 data for a year in approximately October of the following year. This study is rebuilt against the new release and republished at the same URL, so links do not break and the accumulated citations stay attached to the current numbers.
Questions
What percentage of solar panels are leased?
Which states have the most leased solar?
Is a solar lease worse than buying?
Why is third-party ownership so much more common in some states?
Does leasing mean the state has a less mature solar market?
Can I buy out my lease?
How reliable is this data?
Written and audited by
HyreSolar Research
Primary-source research, data analysis and fact checking
We are a research desk, not a sales floor. We read the statute, the tariff, the code section, the federal filing or the manufacturer data sheet ourselves, and we publish the figure with the document it came from and the date we retrieved it. Where a number cannot be traced to a primary source, we publish the shorter page and say what we could not verify. That rule has cost us whole sections, and it is the reason the rest can be trusted.
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How this desk works
- Primary sources only. Statutes from the legislature’s own publishing system, federal data from the agency that collects it, code text from the adopted edition, manufacturer claims from the data sheet. We do not cite an article that cites a source; we go and read the source.
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Data as of EIA-861 2024 final release. Authorship on this site is organisational: the analysis belongs to the desk rather than to a named individual, and we do not publish credentials we do not hold. Our editorial policy sets out how we source, date and correct what we publish.
Sources & retrieval dates
- US EIA, Form EIA-861 — Net Metering (annual files, 2014–2024) — Utility-level net-metered capacity, installations and energy sold back by state and customer sector, plus PV-paired battery capacity and installations from 2023. Downloaded as the published annual ZIP archives. Retrieved 2 September 2026.
- US EIA, Form EIA-861 — Sales to Ultimate Customers (annual files, 2014–2024) — Utility-level residential revenue, sales and customer counts by state, used to derive the average residential price and to count the households a state actually meters. Retrieved 2 September 2026.
- US EIA, Form EIA-861 — Distributed Generation that is not Net Metered (2024) — Residential photovoltaic capacity served under buyback, feed-in and utility-owned arrangements rather than net metering. Capacity only; this schedule collects no installation count. Retrieved 2 September 2026.
- US EIA, Average Price of Electricity to Ultimate Customers by End-Use Sector — EIA’s own published state price series, used only to validate our derivation. Agreement across all 357 overlapping state-years is within 0.005¢/kWh, i.e. EIA’s own rounding. Retrieved 2 September 2026.
Reading a lease or PPA before you sign it
Escalator, term, buyout, assignment on sale: the four clauses that decide whether the deal is good.
HyreSolar is an independent analysis and matching service. We are not an installer, lender or utility. When a reader asks to be introduced, installers may pay us a referral fee. That fee never buys ranking, scores or placement in research. Our editorial policy sets out the rules.