Seven questions, in the order they actually come up. Each one has a page behind it if you want the detail; this is the walk-through.
The array is smaller than people expect — four hundred to six hundred square feet for a house-sized system, which is a corner of a one-acre lot. Space is rarely what stops a job.
What stops one is everything around the array: the setbacks off your boundaries, whatever shades the southern edge in December, and the distance back to your meter. Under about an acre those four things usually leave nowhere sensible, and we will say so on the phone rather than after a survey.
Above an acre, usually yes — the address decides. How much land a ground mount needs
This is the first question we ask, and it decides more than any equipment choice on the quote.
In deregulated territory — most of Oncor's area — you picked the company that bills you, and the buyback is a term in that contract you can renegotiate when it ends. Oncor itself buys nothing; it delivers.
On a cooperative you cannot shop, and the co-op's policy is the policy. Some still net at the full retail rate. Others buy your exported power at avoided cost, which can be a third of what you pay to import it.
Across the utilities we researched in September 2026 the best export rate was 11.3 cents and the worst 5 cents. Which one you are on changes what size array is worth building. Same house, same panels, two different right answers. What each city and co-op does
If you are in an HOA, Texas law is on your side but only so far. The state stops an HOA banning solar outright. It also lets an HOA prohibit a ground mount that sits anywhere other than a roof or a fenced yard.
Inside a fenced yard there is a second rule: the array cannot stand taller than the fence.
Some cities apply the same test themselves. Celina requires screening by a fence or a six-foot hedge with nothing above the line; Southlake asks you to verify the height at the permit counter.
Where a fence line governs, we build lower tilt or two panels high instead of four so it fits under. It costs a little production and it is not a dead end — but it is worth settling before anyone pours a foundation. Ground mount solar, answered
Inside a city, nearly always a building permit and an electrical permit, and sometimes a plan review. There is no statewide solar permit and no standard fee: Fairview publishes $175, Flower Mound $200, Celina $225 in three parts, and several cities publish nothing at all.
Outside the city limits, most Texas counties have no authority to require a building permit for ordinary single-family construction — Parker County says outright that it issues none.
That is not the same as no rules. Rockwall County runs its own permitting programme; Tarrant requires a fire-code construction permit and reviews floodplain on sites over an acre.
We pull whichever applies and tell you what each office said. You do not chase any of them.
Three answers in this part of Texas, and which one you have is a question about your parcel rather than your county.
Blackland clay swells when it is wet and shrinks when it is not, so the foundation has to reach below the zone that moves. Rock near the surface stops a driven pile early, which changes the foundation and slows the trench — both real numbers on the quote. Loose sand gives a pile less grip than stiff clay does.
We pull the soil survey for your address before quoting a foundation, and it decides between a driven pile, a helical and a concrete pier. Ground mount racking and foundations
$3.50 a watt installed — panels, rack, foundation, electrical and labour. An 8 kW system is about $28,000; a 15 kW system about $52,500.
Then two lines that are yours alone. The trench from the array to your meter is $45 a foot, which on acreage is routinely the largest single swing on the quote: 150 feet is $6,750, 300 feet is $13,500.
And site work — rock adds ten percent, slope five or ten, clearing starts at $1,500.
Cash or a loan. No leases, no power purchase agreements. The federal credit expired on 31 December 2025, so nothing here assumes one. What ground mount solar costs in Texas
The install is two days, three if we hit rock. Everything either side of it is queueing.
A site visit, then the city and the utility — which run separately, and the utility is the one that decides when the system may legally be switched on. Celina targets ten business days on its permit, Midlothian thirty, and several cities publish no target at all.
Nothing gets energised before the local inspection clears and the utility gives permission to operate. How a ground mount gets built
No, but under about an acre it usually does not work.
The array needs four hundred to six hundred square feet; the setbacks, the shade from next door and the run to your meter need considerably more than that between them.
Above an acre it is usually a yes, and the design tool will tell you from your own address rather than from an acreage band.
On acreage, the trench — the array has to reach your meter and that run is priced by the foot, so the pretty spot and the sensible spot can be five figures apart.
On the payback rather than the price, it is which utility bills you, because the spread between the best and worst export rate around here is more than two to one.
Two things.
If you are on Oncor's lines, look at what your retail plan pays for exported power before we finalise the size.
And be home for the meter tie-in.
The permits, the interconnection application and the inspections are ours.
No salesman. No home visit to get a number.
