HyreSolar tools
Two questions hide inside that one. This tool answers the half that depends on you.
Whether community solar exists where you live is set by your state's programme rules. Whether it is the right choice for you is set by your roof, your shade, how long you are staying and whether you have capital — and that half is decidable right now, before you spend an afternoon finding out what your state offers. This screens it, and names every factor that moved the answer.
What this returns at the defaults
A homeowner with a 15-year roof, 10% shading, staying 15 years screens as rooftop, 7 to 0. Change one thing — they are moving in three years — and it inverts to community solar, 3 to 1, because a move inside five years is shorter than any rooftop payback. The factor that decides this most often is not the roof. It is how long you are staying.
Last updated . Data as of 5 September 2026.
Five facts about your situation. Every factor that moves the answer is named.
Screens your circumstances, not what your state offers. Availability is a separate question.
HyreSolar does not sell systems and does not broker community solar subscriptions.
The verdict is a reading of your circumstances, not of your state. If it says community solar and your state has no programme, the honest conclusion is that neither option fits well right now — not that you should force a rooftop system onto a roof or a timeline that does not suit it. Availability is the first thing to check after reading this, and it is the one thing this tool cannot tell you.
Every factor is listed, so disagree with a step rather than a score. If you think a three-year move horizon should not weigh as heavily as it does here, you can see exactly where it entered and adjust your own conclusion. A tool that hands you a number with no working is asking for trust it has not earned.
"Both are live options" is a real answer. It usually means something is fixable — most often a roof near the end of its life, where the honest sequence is re-roof first, then decide. It is not the tool failing to reach a conclusion.
Every input below is a number you can find, not one you have to guess. This is where each one comes from.
The single hardest blocker. Rooftop solar needs the roof owner’s agreement, and in most rental situations that ends the conversation regardless of everything else.
Where to find it You know this one. If you own a condo or are in an HOA, answer own — but read our note in the FAQ, because shared roofs are their own problem.
Panels last far longer than a worn roof, and taking an array off and putting it back to re-roof underneath costs real money. This is the factor that most often means "not yet" rather than "no".
Where to find it A roofer can tell you in one visit. Failing that, the install date and the shingle warranty bracket it. See re-roofing before solar.
The share of potential output lost to shade across a year, not the share of the roof that looks shaded at noon. These are very different numbers.
Where to find it A site survey measures it properly. As a rough guide, our shade analysis covers the threshold where two independent sources both land.
The most decisive input in the tool, and the one people most often skip. A rooftop system is a long-horizon asset attached to a building you may not keep.
Where to find it Your own plans. If genuinely uncertain, run it twice at the optimistic and pessimistic ends and see whether the verdict changes.
Community subscriptions typically need no money up front and no loan. An owned rooftop system needs one or the other.
Where to find it Your own position. Note that "no capital" does not mean rooftop is impossible — it means the comparison is against a financed system, which our dealer fee calculator covers.
This tool deliberately does not know whether your state has a programme. That is a question for your state regulator or NREL, and the sources below link to both.
Where to find it Your state public utility commission, or NREL’s state policy dataset. Both are linked in the sources.
Renting, or shading heavy enough that a rooftop design cannot work around it. A blocker settles the verdict on its own.
Each circumstance adds a stated weight to rooftop or to community, and short horizons subtract from rooftop rather than only adding to community.
A lead of two or more decides it. Anything closer is reported as both being live, because a one-point lead is not a real distinction.
The output lists what pushed each way, so the reasoning is auditable rather than asserted.
The formula, in full
Blockers (renting, shading ≥30%) decide alone. Otherwise: community gains 3 for a move inside 5 years, 3 for a roof under 5 years, 2 for no capital, 2 for 15–29% shading. Rooftop gains 2 for staying 10+ years, 2 for a roof over 10 years, 1 each for ownership, low shade and available capital — and loses 4 for a move inside 5 years, 2 for a roof under 5 years. A lead of 2 or more decides.
A homeowner with a good roof and a long horizon, then the same homeowner with one thing changed.
Inputs
Result
Rooftop looks the better fit, 7 to 0
Nothing pushes toward community: they own a roof with life in it, the shade is low, and the timeline covers a payback. Now change one input — they are moving in three years — and the verdict inverts to community solar, 3 to 1. The roof did not change, the shade did not change, the capital did not change. A move inside five years subtracts four points from the rooftop case, because a rooftop array is a long-horizon asset bolted to a building you are about to sell, and what it does to a sale price is a separate and much less certain question.
One owner-occupier profile, one input changed at a time. Every verdict is computed by the tool on this page.
| Change | Verdict | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Base caseowns, 15-yr roof, 10% shade, staying 15 yr, capital available | Rooftop looks the better fit | rooftop 7 / community 0 |
| Renting instead of owning | Community solar, if your state offers it | rooftop 6 / community 4 |
| Moving in 3 years | Community solar looks the better fit | rooftop 1 / community 3 |
| Roof has 3 years left | Both are live options | rooftop 3 / community 3 |
| 35% shading | Community solar, if your state offers it | rooftop 6 / community 4 |
| 20% shading | Rooftop looks the better fit | rooftop 6 / community 2 |
| No capital available | Rooftop looks the better fit | rooftop 6 / community 2 |
| Moving in 3 years and no capital | Community solar looks the better fit | rooftop 0 / community 5 |
| Renter, 20% shade, moving in 2 years | Community solar, if your state offers it | rooftop −2 / community 11 |
Two rows are worth reading against each other. 20% shading still favours rooftop; 35% is a blocker. Shade is not a slider that gradually rules solar out — there is a point at which a design stops working around it. And note that "no capital" alone does not flip the verdict: financing exists, so a lack of cash is a reason to scrutinise a loan, not a reason to abandon an owned system.
Ranked. A proposal can change any of these without saying anything untrue, so these are the inputs to check first.
The most decisive input, and the one most often left out of a sales conversation. A move inside five years subtracts four points from rooftop — more than any single factor adds to it. A rooftop array is a 25-year asset; a three-year horizon is a mismatch no proposal can fix.
A hard blocker when you do not. Community solar exists in large part because roughly a third of American households rent, and rooftop was never available to them.
Not a gradient. Below 15% a normal design copes; between 15 and 30 it costs you real output; above 30 it is a blocker. Panel-level electronics change the shape of this but do not repeal it.
Rarely a no, frequently a not yet. A roof with under five years left means re-roof first, which is a sequencing problem rather than a disqualification.
The weakest factor in the model, deliberately. Financing exists, so the absence of cash changes which rooftop product you are comparing rather than whether rooftop is possible.
Availability in your state, subscription pricing, escalators in subscription contracts, bill credit rates, cancellation terms, waiting lists, low-income carve-outs, and whether your utility participates at all. Every one of those matters and none of them can be screened from five personal circumstances.
It is not one, and the name of the topic is the reason we say so twice. Community solar programmes are created by state policy and administered by utilities and third parties. This tool has no knowledge of your state and does not pretend to.
It is not. State statutes create materially different products sharing one name — different bill credit mechanisms, different cancellation rights, different consumer protections. Our statute-level comparison reads four of them in full.
A subscription that costs more than the bill credit it generates leaves you worse off, and some contracts carry escalators. Two of the statutes we read make it unlawful to charge more than the credit is worth; most do not. Read the pricing term, not the marketing.
When the tool says both are live because your roof has three years left, the sequence matters: re-roof, then decide. Installing an array over a roof that needs replacing means paying to remove and refit it.
Shading loss is an annual output figure, not a visual impression on a summer afternoon. Winter sun is low and the shadows are long. A site survey measures it; a glance does not.
It is the assumption people use to justify a rooftop system on a short horizon, and it is much less certain than it is made to sound — particularly with a loan or a lease attached. See what solar does to resale value.
This tool cannot tell you, deliberately, and any tool that claims to should be able to name the dataset behind it and its retrieval date. Community solar programmes are created by state policy, and the authoritative source is NREL’s state policy dataset together with your own state regulator. Both are linked in the sources below. We do not publish a state table we cannot retrieve and re-verify.
Because a rooftop array is a 25-year asset attached to a building. It subtracts four points from the rooftop case here — more than any single factor adds. The common counter is that solar raises the sale price, and it sometimes does, but that is a much less certain proposition than a payback you collect yourself, particularly with a loan or lease attached to the transfer.
Not impossible, but it needs the roof owner to agree and usually to pay, and the benefit flows to whoever holds the meter. Some landlords do install. In practice this is the circumstance community solar was designed for, which is why it is treated as a blocker here rather than a heavy negative.
Re-roof first, then decide. The tool returns "both are live options" for exactly this case because it is a sequencing problem, not a disqualification. Installing over a roof near end of life means paying to remove and refit the array later, which is a real and avoidable cost.
Because shade is not a smooth gradient. Below roughly 15% a normal design absorbs it; between 15 and 30 it costs you meaningful output and should change the sizing; above 30 the array stops being able to work around it, whatever the panel-level electronics do. Our shade analysis covers where two independent sources both land on that threshold.
It depends entirely on the subscription price against the bill credit it generates, and that varies by programme and provider. A subscription costing more than the credit is worth leaves you worse off — and some contracts carry escalators. Two of the four state statutes we read make overcharging unlawful; most states do not. Read the pricing term.
In some programmes yes, in others a rooftop system disqualifies you from subscribing, and in others the bill credits interact awkwardly. This is programme-specific and is one of the first things to ask a provider. The tool does not model it.
Because a suitability screen is an editorial judgement dressed as arithmetic, and hiding the arithmetic would be the dishonest version. With the weights published you can see that a three-year horizon costs rooftop four points and decide for yourself whether that is too harsh. A hidden score would ask you to trust a conclusion you cannot inspect.
Answer "own", but treat the result cautiously. A shared roof involves the association, the governing documents, and frequently a vote — obstacles this screen does not model at all. Our condo and shared roof piece covers what actually stands in the way.
Every assumption in this calculator is argued from primary sources somewhere in our research library. These are the pages that matter for this one.
Severe hail and wind exposure by state from 36,261 measured NOAA reports, normalised by land area.
Places you in the interconnection sequence, names who is actually holding it, and says whether the wait has become unusual.
Screens a system against your utility map and the 15% fast-track rule. Shows why the feeder, not your roof, decides.
Actual results depend on roof, usage, utility rules and a real proposal. Matching is still being built. The form is an enquiry, not a dispatch line.
Written and audited by
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.
How this desk works
Data as of 5 September 2026. 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.