What your solar warranty still covers after the installer closes
Three separate promises were made when you bought your system, by three different parties. A bankruptcy kills one of them and leaves the other two standing. Knowing which is which is worth thousands of dollars.
The three warranties
Hardware promises survive. Labor promises do not. The manufacturer ships you a replacement part; nobody is contractually obliged to fit it. That gap is what an orphaned system actually costs you.
1. Equipment warranties — from the manufacturer
The company that built your panels warrants them, typically for around 25 years on performance and a shorter term on the product itself. The company that built your inverter warrants it separately, commonly ten to twelve years for a string unit and up to 25 for microinverters. These obligations belong to the manufacturers and have nothing to do with who installed the equipment or whether that installer still exists.
The catch, and it is a big one: manufacturer warranties cover the part, not the person fitting it. A warranty claim gets a replacement inverter delivered. It does not get anyone onto your roof.
2. Workmanship warranty — from the installer
This covered the labor: racking, wiring, conduit, and above all the roof penetrations and flashing. It typically ran ten to twenty-five years, and it is the one that dies with the company. If a mounting bolt was flashed badly and your roof leaks in the next winter storm, there is no longer a party contractually obliged to fix it.
3. Production guarantee — from the installer or the sales company
A promise that the system would generate a stated amount of energy, with a cash remedy if it fell short. These rarely survive a bankruptcy filing, and in practice homeowners recover little on them.
The pattern to take away. Anything involving physical hardware is probably still covered. Anything involving labor or a performance promise probably is not. Your out-of-pocket cost after an installer collapse is mostly the cost of skilled hands.
How to establish what you still have
- Find the paperwork. The original contract, the system design document, and the permit package. If you have lost them, the local building department may still hold the permit record with the equipment specified on it.
- Read the labels. The inverter carries a manufacturer name, model, and serial number on its housing. Panel model numbers appear on the back of the modules and in your system documentation. Photograph everything.
- Register with the manufacturer. Contact them directly, provide the serials and your install date, and confirm the warranty is recorded in your name. Some manufacturers require registration transfer if the original installer registered the equipment.
- Ask what they need for a claim. Usually a diagnostic report from a licensed contractor. Knowing the required format in advance saves a second service visit.
If you bought a third-party warranty
Some homeowners were sold an extended service plan or a third-party monitoring and warranty product. These are worth checking; several were designed specifically to survive an installer failure and to fund service on orphaned systems. Look for a separate agreement with a company name you do not recognise from the installation.
Leases and power purchase agreements are different
If you did not buy your system, none of the above is really your problem — and paying for a repair could be a costly error. Under a lease or PPA, a third party owns the equipment on your roof and carries the maintenance obligation. When the original provider fails, those agreements are typically sold to another servicer.
Your task in that case is to identify who currently holds the agreement and put the repair request to them in writing. Find your monthly payment on a bank statement and trace where it is going — the recipient is usually the servicer, and that is the party you need.
What about the loan?
Separate from all of it. Loan obligations survive the seller's bankruptcy and the paper is usually sold on to a new servicer. Some solar loans also involve a UCC filing recorded against the property, which can surface unexpectedly when you refinance or sell — worth checking with the county recorder if you are planning either.
If you were sold a system on promises the seller never delivered, a consumer attorney can advise on whether the FTC Holder Rule gives you a route to raise that with the current loan holder. We are not lawyers and this page is not legal advice; it is a pointer toward the right kind of professional.