Why me?

Friends and neighbors have asked me why I decided to get a solar panel on my house.  To be honest, I didn't really seek it out.  Some pre-sales person called me and asked if I would be interested in listening to a real salesman.  A few days later I got a call.  The guy who called me was on the road during the call and I actually never even met him.  We communicated by phone a couple of times and by email a few more.

There were a few things from the conversation that made me decide to proceed.  Firstly, Utah would be reducing the tax credit over the coming years so if I wanted to take advantage of those credits, I shouldn't wait.  Secondly, I had provided them with my electric usage for several months and he said my usage was really high in comparison to others with my size house.  I was intrigued by the idea of offsetting those high costs (assuming it was true) with "free" power from the Sun.

I sat down and did the math with the goal of determining if purchasing a solar assembly on credit would pay for itself.  There are actually a lot of unknowns in this equation (the weather being the biggest outlier).

The total cost of the installation was $15,000.00.  This is a 3 kilowatt system.
The tax credit is 25% up to a maximum of $2,000.00 per residence.  So figure $2,000 since 25% is $3,750.
See https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title59/Chapter10/59-10-S1014.html

The federal tax credit is 30% (until 2019) with no maximum.  So figure $4,500.
See https://energy.gov/savings/residential-renewable-energy-tax-credit

So total credits = $2,000+$4,500=$6,500 making the cost $8,500.  I've heard there may be other credits but so far I don't know what they are.

The system has a 25 year manufacture warranty.  The loan is 3% for 12 years with a payment of $124 a month.  If I apply the credit to the balance, the loan could be paid off in 6-7 years.

So to answer the question, "will the solar array pay for itself", I roughly use the $124 monthly loan amount as the target number.  If I save $124 in electricity each month, it is paying for itself...