Many companies have been trying to make it easier and cheaper for homeowners to generate electricity from the sun. The number of residential solar installations has climbed, aided by their declining cost and government incentives. Now home builders have jumped in. Such systems are less expensive to install during a home’s construction than afterward, while some builders offer the cheaper option to lease a system rather than buy one. Few companies have gone as far as Lennar, the nation’s second-largest home builder. Consumers shopping for a Lennar home in more than 100 of its developments in California, 11 in Colorado and a handful in Nevada find that almost all the houses have solar panels. The company plans to expand the program to more states, focusing on locations that have programs to encourage renewable energy. “We aren’t offering homes with solar as an option – it’s a standard feature” in certain communities, said David Kaiserman, president of Lennar Ventures, which oversees the builder’s solar project. [Read this article]
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