Is solar worth it in Texas?

Solar can be worth pricing in Texas and still be a bad contract. The 2025 EIA residential average was 15.40 cents per kWh. That average hides retail plans in Houston and Dallas and municipal tariffs in Austin and San Antonio.

Retail choice is the trap

In Oncor and CenterPoint areas you buy energy from a retail provider. Any export payment is usually a term in that plan, not a 25-year utility promise. A one-year buyback under a 20-year loan is not a matched pair. Ask what the model does when the plan ends.

Austin Energy and CPS Energy are not retail-choice markets. El Paso Electric is outside ERCOT. A statewide "Texas buyback" slide is already wrong for those cities. Read Houston, Dallas, Austin, and El Paso before you compare bids from different metros.

Hail and the roof

North Texas hail can end a roof. Covering a tired roof with modules creates a later removal bill. If the shingles are near replacement, do the roof first or put removal and reinstall in the price. Gulf Coast wind is the parallel question in Houston and Corpus Christi.

How to judge "worth it"

You need a cash price, a realistic bill offset, and a plan for exports. Our estimate only supplies the bill-offset illustration, using the state average. It does not know your retail plan. If the proposal's savings are far above that range, ask which export price produced them.

The federal residential credit under section 25D ended for systems placed in service after December 31, 2025. Do not let "worth it" depend on a 30 percent discount the statute no longer allows for a new install.