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by rj45jackattack 1007 days ago
Can an American explain to me why there are so many solar scams in the USA?

I'm about to bring my 20,000W rooftop array online. In my country I simply got quotes from local professionals and it was painless. I picked the best system that met my needs and they installed within weeks.

2 comments

You know how haggling is accepted in some countries as part of doing business? In the US, small businesses scamming consumers if simply part of doing business. It's up to the consumer if they want to spend their time getting competing quotes or finding trusted referrals. But for a lot of people, a lot of the time, it's just easier to pay the premium even though you know you're getting ripped off. You'll find this in auto repair, landscaping, construction, plumbers and electricians, even web developers!
In the US, it is really hard to sell solar in a lot of places. This can be true even for houses where it would obviously be useful and even when incentives make it so obvious that anyone _should_ do it.

Companies minimize their sales cost by using the lowest cost, most effective salesmen that they can find and don't monitor them very much.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the ones that you hear from the most are the ones that you almost certainly shouldn't do business with.

I feel like there should be some term for this kind of market, where the worst of the worst natural rise to the top for periods of time.