Net metering
What Happens to Net Metering When a California Home Is Sold?
The rules differ by program, and one of them is widely misreported.
It depends on which program the system is on, and the answer is not the same for all of them. For the Net Billing Tariff — the regime for most systems interconnected from April 2023 — the CPUC decision ties the legacy period to the customer, not to the system, so a buyer does not simply inherit the seller's remaining term. For older NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0 systems the industry widely states that the arrangement runs with the property for the balance of its 20-year term, but we have not been able to confirm that against a primary source, so we won't assert it.
Three regimes, not one
Californians say “net metering” for three quite different arrangements, and which one applies depends on when the system was interconnected:
- NEM 1.0 — the earliest systems, on the most generous terms.
- NEM 2.0 — the middle period, with non-bypassable charges and time-of-use requirements.
- Net Billing Tariff (NBT) — from April 2023, with exported energy compensated at substantially lower avoided-cost values.
In Riverside County the split across residential systems is roughly 27% on NEM 1.0, 63% on NEM 2.0 and 10% on Net Billing, based on CPUC interconnection data. So most systems changing hands in this market today are on NEM 2.0, and the oldest housing stock in Murrieta and Temecula holds the deepest NEM 1.0 base.
What is confirmed for Net Billing
For systems on the Net Billing Tariff, the CPUC’s decision structures the legacy period around the customer of record rather than the physical system. A buyer taking over a property with an NBT system does not inherit a remaining legacy period as though it were attached to the panels.
This matters most for newer construction. In submarkets like Winchester and French Valley, where a large share of the solar is recent, more of the stock sits on NBT than the county average would suggest.
What is not confirmed
For NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0, the common industry statement is that the grandfathered period attaches to the interconnection and continues for the balance of 20 years from the original permission to operate, regardless of who owns the home. That may well be right. We have not found the primary source that says so plainly, and it is the kind of claim that costs a buyer real money if it turns out to be wrong.
So the responsible position for a live transaction is: establish the interconnection date, establish which regime applies, and get the utility to confirm the treatment on that specific service account in writing.
What to actually do
- Find the Permission to Operate date. It determines the regime.
- Ask the utility, in writing, how the account will be treated on change of ownership.
- Don’t rely on the listing, the seller’s recollection, or a solar company’s blog.
- Remember that municipal utilities are outside CPUC jurisdiction entirely — Riverside, Banning, Moreno Valley and Anza run their own programs, and the CPUC timeline doesn’t describe them.
An inspection establishes the equipment, the interconnection evidence and the monitoring picture. Solar Transaction Support is the separate service for chasing the paperwork.
Sources
Need this settled on a live deal
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