Incentives

Updated 10.24.2026

This is the kitchen-table version. The notes on this site go deeper on one slice. If you only read one incentives page, read this one, then open last month’s electric bill and see whose name is on it.

What is still on the table in 2026

Incentive	What it actually does	Who does the paperwork
Federal 25D credit	Gone for a system you own, installed after December 31, 2025.	Nobody. Do not file Form 5695 for a 2026 purchased install.
Florida sales tax exemption	No 6% state sales tax on a qualifying solar energy system and its components (Fla. Stat. 212.08(7)(hh)). On a $25,000 equipment-heavy invoice that is about $1,500 you never pay.	The installer, on the invoice. Confirm the line is $0 tax before you sign.
Florida property tax exclusion	The just value attributable to the renewable-energy device is not added to your assessed value (Fla. Stat. 193.624). Market value can still rise. The tax roll should not.	Usually automatic. Check the next TRIM / assessment. Call the county property appraiser if the array showed up as taxable new construction.
Net metering (Duke, FPL)	Exported kWh bank at retail inside the calendar year. Leftover at year-end pays at cheap COG-1 avoided cost.	Utility interconnection, then the meter.
OUC TruNet	Self-used solar still avoids retail. New export after October 31, 2026 is a cheaper dollar credit (community-solar rate, then fuel rate). Legacy applications in by June 30, 2025 keep retail export through 2045.	OUC interconnection. Application date is the whole game.
OUC battery rebate	Up to $2,000 ($150 per kWh of nameplate, capped at 50% of battery cost). Taking it means you forfeit TruNet full-retail export.	OUC rebate portal. Read the trade before you grab the check.

The federal credit is not “reduced.” It is off.

For more than a decade, a homeowner who bought an array with cash or a loan could claim 30% of the cost on Form 5695 as the Residential Clean Energy Credit (Internal Revenue Code section 25D). The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (Public Law 119-21, signed July 4, 2025) ended that credit for expenditures made after December 31, 2025. The IRS treats the expenditure as made when original installation is completed, not when you signed or when you paid a deposit. A contract from 2025 with PTO in 2026 does not revive 25D.

If a salesperson still leads with “the 30% federal credit,” stop the meeting. For a purchased system in 2026 that sentence is false.

Unused 25D from a 2025 completion can still carry forward on your federal return. That is last year’s job, not this year’s quote.

Leases and PPAs are a different code section, not a loophole you claim. A third-party owner is a business. That business may still be able to use the commercial Clean Electricity Investment Credit (section 48E) on systems that met the construction-timing rules (including a begin-construction safe harbor that closed July 4, 2026, with a later placed-in-service window for projects that already qualified). You do not file that credit. You might see some of the value as a cheaper monthly payment, or you might not. Ask for the pass-through in writing. Also ask who owns the gear, what happens when you sell the house, and whether Florida’s property-tax exclusion still works the same when you do not own the array. A cheaper lease is not the same product as a system you own. Our financing note covers the lien and the transfer. This page will not pretend 48E is “your 30% back.”

Florida never had a state solar tax credit

Florida has no state personal income tax. There is nothing to credit against. National roundups that list “state tax credit: none” are correct, and they are not a scandal. The state incentives here are exemptions at the cash register and on the tax roll, plus whatever your utility pays for an exported kilowatt-hour.

Central Florida counties (Orange, Seminole, Osceola, Lake) are not running a general rooftop-PV rebate in 2026. A few Florida cities elsewhere have small local pots. Do not assume Orlando copied them. If a quote includes a “county rebate,” ask for the program page.

Sales tax: the one you should see as a blank line

Florida Statute 212.08(7)(hh) exempts solar energy systems and their components from the tax in Chapter 212. That is the 6% state sales tax. The Florida Solar Energy Center certifies equipment lists to the Department of Revenue. Panels, inverters, racking, and storage used as part of the solar energy system are the core of it. Conventional backup gear that you would have bought anyway is not.

You do not file a form with Tallahassee. The dealer does not charge the tax. Look at the invoice. If you see 6% on the panels, say so before you sign. On a $22,000 to $28,000 system the 6% is roughly $1,300 to $1,700 you should not be paying.

County discretionary surtax (Orange is in the half-percent neighborhood; others differ) sits on top of the 6% for ordinary retail. The solar exemption is written against the tax in the chapter. Confirm with the installer that the whole tax line on qualifying equipment is zero, not “we took off the 6% and left the surtax.” If they will not say that, ask them to put it in an email.

Property tax: the millage does not follow the panels

Florida Statute 193.624 tells the property appraiser not to consider the just value attributable to a renewable energy source device when assessing residential real property. Panels, inverters, and storage that are part of that device are in the definition. The roof under them is not. A new roof is still a new roof.

Two numbers people mash together:

• Market value is what a buyer might pay. An owned array can help here. That is resale, not this statute.
• Assessed value is what the county uses for the tax bill. 193.624 says the device’s value stays off that number.

You do not file a homestead-style application in most counties. The appraiser is prohibited from adding it. Still open the next TRIM notice. If a “solar” line showed up as taxable new construction, call the Orange, Seminole, Osceola, or Lake property appraiser and point at 193.624. Automatic in statute is not the same as never mis-coded in the GIS.

Worked scale, not a promise: if an owned system is worth $20,000 on the open market and local millage is in the mid-teens of mills, keeping that $20,000 off the roll is on the order of a few hundred dollars a year. Over 25 years that is real money. It is not the old 30% federal check.

The 2017 amendments to subsections (2) and (3) expire December 31, 2037, and the text reverts to the older residential language (the appraiser ignores an increase in just value from the device, and the section is residential-only). That is not “solar becomes taxable in 2038.” It is a narrower statute unless the Legislature acts. Put it on a calendar. Do not lose sleep in 2026.

Leased systems: the exclusion is about the device on the real property. Third-party ownership can get weird at closing. If you do not own the array, do not assume 193.624 is your resale story. Get the lease assignment rules in writing.

Net metering is the incentive that lasts all year

Exemptions cut the day you buy. The bill credit is every month after that. This is also where Central Florida splits.

Duke Energy Florida and FPL are investor-owned. Florida Administrative Code 25-6.065 still requires monthly 1-for-1 retail netting, a kWh bank for up to 12 months, and a calendar-year true-up at the COG-1 as-available rate. A 2022 bill that would have walked that down was vetoed. As of September 2026 the PSC has not replaced the rule. Oversizing so you cash a pile of December kWh at wholesale is a gift to the avoided-cost tariff. Size to annual use. FPL also says estimated production must be under 115% of annual kWh.

OUC is municipal. The PSC rule does not bind it. TruNet:

• Application in by June 30, 2025: full retail export through June 30, 2045. Sell the house after that date and the buyer is not grandfathered.
• New applications: full retail grace through October 31, 2026, then community-solar energy rate (OUC has quoted about 4.6 cents) through June 30, 2030, then retail levelized fuel (about 3.8 cents). Solar you use in the house is still full retail avoided. Export is the cheap column.

The long version, with the side-by-side table and the fixed charges solar does not erase (FPL’s $30 minimum base bill, Duke’s $14.35 customer charge), is the Duke vs FPL vs OUC note. Do not paste an FPL payback onto an OUC address.

The only local rebate that shows up here: OUC’s battery check

OUC will pay $150 per kWh of battery nameplate, up to 50% of battery-plus-install cost, capped at $2,000 per premise, for a battery paired with an interconnected array. To take it, you forfeit TruNet full-retail export and sit on the cheaper export schedule.

For a new OUC array after the October 2026 grace, that trade is often aligned: export is already cheap, self-use is the point, a battery that holds afternoon sun for evening AC is doing the tariff’s job. For a grandfathered full-retail account, $2,000 can be a bad sale of twenty years of retail export. Run the exports before you click apply. Duke and FPL are not copying this rebate.

What is not an incentive

PACE and SELF are loans. They can make the project possible. They are not a tax credit. PACE sits on the property tax bill as an assessment and can complicate a sale or a GSE mortgage. SELF is a Florida nonprofit lender for people conventional solar loans turn down. Interest is a cost. See the financing note.

“Free solar” and “government program.” Florida’s Attorney General has already sued over that pitch. There is no state program that puts panels on your roof for $0 because you live in Orlando.

HOA permission as a subsidy. Florida’s Solar Rights Act (Fla. Stat. 163.04) limits how far an HOA can ban an owned array. That is a right, not a rebate. Townhouses and condos are a different article on this site.

How to actually claim what exists

1. On the quote: sales tax line is $0 on qualifying equipment. If it is not, fix it before the contract.
2. After install: keep the invoice. You should not need it for a 25D filing. You may need it if the appraiser mis-codes the array.
3. Next TRIM notice: confirm the device is not sitting on the assessed value as taxable new construction. County property appraiser, not the installer, owns that file.
4. Utility: interconnection application, inspection, bidirectional meter, written permission to operate. Credits do not start because the crew left.
5. OUC only: write down the interconnection-application date. That date is your rate class. Battery rebate is a separate portal and a separate trade.
6. Anyone still saying 30%: ask which Internal Revenue Code section, for which owner, for which placed-in-service date. Then stop listening if the answer is “the federal credit” on a 2026 cash or loan job.

The federal check is gone. Florida’s remaining stack is a cheaper invoice, a tax roll that does not punish the roof, and a bill credit that depends on whose wires you are on. That is enough to make a well-sized, owned array a serious number on Duke or FPL. On new OUC it is enough only if you treat self-use as the product. The Cost guide and the payback calculator are the next two pages, not a national blog that still has 30% in the headline.