A Texas HOA cannot ban solar outright. It can refuse a ground mount that sits anywhere other than your roof or a fenced yard you own and maintain, and it can refuse one inside that fenced yard if the array stands taller than the fence.
Both of those are Texas Property Code §202.010. Read together they mean the same thing for most lots inside an association: the array goes in the fenced yard, below the fence line, or it does not go.
The statute is short. It is worth reading in the order it is written, because the protection comes first and the exceptions come after, and almost every page on this subject quotes the first part and stops.
An association may not include or enforce a provision in a dedicatory instrument that prohibits or restricts a property owner from installing a solar energy device.
That is the protection, and it is broad.
A provision that violates (b) is void. Not unenforceable on request, not subject to a waiver. Void.
Eight exceptions. Five of them are unlikely to reach you and three decide whether you have a project.
The five: a device a court has adjudicated a threat to public health or safety or a violation of law; one on property the association owns; one on property owned in common by the members; one that voids a material warranty as installed; and one installed without the prior approval the association's documents require.
The three that decide a ground mount are (d)(4), (d)(5) and (d)(6).
An association may prohibit a device located in an area other than on the roof of the home or another structure allowed under the dedicatory instrument, or in a fenced yard or patio owned and maintained by the owner.
Read that twice, because it is the subsection that matters most and the one that gets left out.
A ground mount in the back corner of an unfenced lot, behind a screen of trees, out of sight of the street, is not on a roof and it is not in a fenced yard. Under (d)(4) an association may prohibit exactly that placement.
Extends beyond the roofline, sits outside a designated area unless an alternate location raises estimated annual production by more than ten percent as determined by a publicly available modelling tool, does not conform to the roof slope, or has frames, brackets or visible piping and wiring that are not silver, bronze or black.
Only the colour condition tends to reach a ground mount, and it reaches it through the permit counter rather than through the HOA — Southlake asks for it on its own checklist.
If the device is located in a fenced yard or patio, an association may prohibit it where the device is taller than the fence line.
Note what it is conditional on. This is not a general height cap on ground mounts. It applies inside a fenced yard, which is the one place (d)(4) leaves you.
That is why the fence line ends up deciding the shape of the array.
Where the (d) conditions are met, an association may not withhold approval unless it determines in writing that the placement substantially interferes with the use and enjoyment of land by causing unreasonable discomfort or annoyance to persons of ordinary sensibilities.
And written approval from every adjoining owner is prima facie evidence that no such condition exists. If your neighbours have signed, the association is arguing against its own statute.
During the development period, in a development with fewer than fifty-one planned units, the declarant may prohibit or restrict installation outright.
If your subdivision is still being built out by its developer, the protection above may not have switched on yet.
Put (d)(4) and (d)(6) together and the design follows from them. Inside an association, the array goes in a fenced yard, and inside a fenced yard it may not stand taller than the fence.
Here is the arithmetic on what we build. The front post stands two feet four inches above grade and the rear post sits seven feet six or nine feet behind it.
Four modules high at thirty degrees is a slope of just under fifteen feet, so the top edge lands near nine feet ten. A six-foot fence does not cover that, and nothing about the hardware changes it.
What gets an array under a fence is a shallower angle. Keep the same four modules and bring the tilt down to around fourteen degrees and the top edge comes in under six feet.
That is a decision made on your drawing, not a different product off a shelf, and it costs production: a panel laid flatter catches less through the winter, which is when you want it most.
Worth saying plainly, because most pages on this subject are written to frighten you. Across the jobs we have built, an HOA constraint has decided the design twice.
The statute matters because when it bites it decides everything. It is not common.
The HOA rule and the city rule are different rules, and a job has to clear both. Two things are worth saying plainly before the table.
None of the fourteen cities we build in publishes a numeric height cap for a ground mount. That is not the same as there being none — it means no document we have found sets one, and the array gets measured against the ordinary accessory-structure and zoning setbacks for your lot instead.
Other cities in this region do publish numbers, which is why nobody should assume. North Richland Hills caps a ground mount at eight feet. Fate caps it at twelve. Lakeside City caps it at ten and limits the run to thirty feet.
None of those bind a job in our fourteen. All of them show what a published rule looks like when a city writes one.
| City | Published height rule | Permit fee |
|---|---|---|
| Celina | Fence line, by screening rule | $50 application, $75 plan review, $100 permit |
| Southlake | Fence line, checked at the counter | Not published |
| Flower Mound | Height reviewed, no cap published | $200 |
| McKinney | None published | Not published |
| Fort Worth | Governed by accessory-structure zoning | Not published |
| Weatherford | None published | $250 on permits finaled in 2026 |
| Fairview | None published | $175 |
| Grand Prairie | None published | Fee estimator, no flat figure |
| Midlothian | None published | Not published |
| Heath | Confirm with the city | Confirm with the city |
| Lucas | Confirm with the city | Confirm with the city |
| Allen | Confirm with the city | Confirm with the city |
| Burleson | Confirm with the city | Confirm with the city |
| Waxahachie | Confirm with the city | Confirm with the city |
What each city actually asks for, in its own words, is on its own page. Five of the fourteen publish no solar-specific document at all, and those rows say to confirm with the city because there is nothing to cite.
Solar by right in every district. Not allowed in a front yard; takes the accessory-structure setbacks for your zoning district; must be screened by a wooden or masonry fence with no part of the array above the fence line, or a solid evergreen hedge kept at six feet or more where fences are not allowed.
Checklist has a Ground Mount option: engineered footing detail and an inspection of it, engineered structural plans, sealed line diagram. Where the array is in a fenced yard or patio the city asks you to show and verify the height, which cannot exceed the fence. Zoning adds a ten-foot setback from any side or rear line, keeps the array behind the principal building, and calls for a line-of-sight analysis.
Solar packet has a separate ground-mounted section: site plan showing setbacks to property lines and other structures, plans showing the height of the array, structural plans sealed by a Texas engineer.
Checklist has a Ground Mount mounting type: site plan showing the layout against easements, property lines, building setback lines and zoning setbacks; sealed structural plans and calculations for framing and foundations.
Treats the array as an accessory structure and says so. Accessory structures carry zoning requirements on location, maximum height and square footage that change with lot size — the supplemental use standards decide where it may stand, not the electrical code.
Issues a Solar PV System Permit through the city portal. No ground-mount height limit and no solar-specific setback published — measured against ordinary accessory-structure and zoning setbacks.
Residential solar PV permit on the Town fee schedule. Packet wants contractor registration, plot plan, electrical plan, attachment and elevation details, wiring calculations, specifications and a structural letter. Runs a remote virtual inspection programme whose photo list is written for roofs.
Permit required from Building Inspections for any residential solar. Architectural and structural plan with load calculations, plus the mechanical, electrical and plumbing drawings. Third-party review and inspection available.
Building Solar System Permit through the online portal; contractor must register first, registration free. Published review target 30 business days.
Permit required for any contractor work on a building or its utility systems; work started without one is subject to fines up to $500. 2021 codes with regional amendments. No solar-specific document found.
Permit required only where a third-party inspector is not used. As published the rule says solar roofing, and a ground mount is not a roof.
Ordinance O-3846-8-21 permits solar panels on the roof of a primary structure or a permitted accessory structure such as a patio cover or storage building — wording that may not have contemplated a free-standing array.
General building-permits page, nothing solar-specific found. The array goes through the ordinary building and electrical process.
No solar-specific permit document found. The array goes through the ordinary building and electrical process.
Southlake is the one worth reading twice. A city in our own service area asks an applicant to demonstrate that a ground mount does not exceed the height of the fence — the HOA rule in §202.010(d)(6), checked by a building department.
Two separate authorities, one number.
One. Read the dedicatory instrument before anything else. It is the document the statute keeps referring to, and it is the one that says whether approval is needed, who gives it and how long they have. Section (d)(8) lets an association refuse a device installed without the approval its own documents require, so this is the step that cannot be skipped.
Two. Send a site plan showing where the array stands, the fence, and the height of the array against the height of the fence. That is the (d)(6) question answered before it is asked.
Three. Send the elevation and the specification. Frames, brackets and visible wiring in silver, bronze or black, because that is (d)(5) and because Southlake asks for it at the permit counter anyway.
Four. If your array is close to a boundary, get the adjoining owners to sign. Under (e), their written approval is prima facie evidence that the placement does not cause the unreasonable discomfort or annoyance the association would have to find in writing.
Five. Keep it in writing and keep the dates. Subsection (e) requires a written determination from the association, not a phone call.
We do. Both of them, in most cities — a building permit and an electrical permit — plus the utility's own interconnection application, which is a separate queue and the one that decides when the system may legally be switched on.
Outside a city, it is usually shorter. Texas counties have no general authority to require a building permit for ordinary single-family construction, and two counties in our footprint say so in their own words: Parker County does not issue building permits at all, and Tarrant County does not issue them for residential homes.
Septic setbacks, floodplain rules and the utility still apply, so it removes one office rather than all of them.
What we do not do is argue with your association for you. We give you the site plan, the elevation and the specification in the form the statute asks for, and you send them.
It cannot ban solar outright — §202.010(b) voids any provision in a dedicatory instrument that does.
It may prohibit a device located anywhere other than a roof or a fenced yard or patio you own and maintain, under (d)(4), and it may prohibit one inside a fenced yard that stands taller than the fence, under (d)(6).
Not a statewide one. Inside a fenced yard, §202.010(d)(6) lets an association prohibit an array taller than the fence line, which is a limit set by your fence rather than by the state.
Four modules at the thirty degrees we normally build stands near nine feet ten, so a six-foot fence means a shallower tilt.
A city may publish its own cap; none of the fourteen we build in has published a figure we have found, and other cities in this region publish caps between eight and twelve feet.
Inside a city, nearly always: a building permit and an electrical permit, and some cities add a plan review.
There is no statewide solar permit and no standard fee — each city sets its own. Fairview publishes $175, Flower Mound $200, Celina $225 in three parts.
Outside the city limits it is usually a shorter list, but that is not the same as no rules.
An association may refuse it. §202.010(d)(4) permits a device on a roof or in a fenced yard or patio; an unfenced area of the lot is neither, so the exception applies whether or not the array is out of sight.
Outside an association this is a question for your city's setbacks instead.
No salesman. No home visit to get a number.
