I took out a $15,000 personal loan to install solar panels on my home. Now I'm saving $6,000 a year.

Living in southeast Texas, I’ve learned to expect the weather to be a constant thing you have to survive. Whether it’s hurricane season or an ice storm, you have to stay prepared for whatever conditions are dropped on our metro.

Houston’s record-breaking temperatures keep climbing year over year, resulting in an increase in electricity use that taxes our power grid and our wallets.

So, after recent failures in the Texas power grid and an unfortunate air conditioner malfunction in the middle of summer 2024, my husband and I decided we needed to switch to solar.

We knew we needed a loan

However, we knew that this upgrade would come with a hefty price tag. Knowing we would likely need a personal loan, my husband first researched solar panel systems and put together a cost estimate for the project based on our home energy use.

He found that for our 3,000 square foot home, 30 panels rated for 450 watts each would work well. We calculated that we could source materials and tools for approximately $12,000 to $15,000.

Our search for a suitable personal loan led us to OneMain Financial. There, we were approved for a $16,000 loan for 48 months. This was our first time getting a personal loan, but the process was much easier than I expected. The professional we worked with walked us through all the details of our loan, and the loan amount hit our bank the very same day we finalized it. We were able to move quickly into executing our solar panel installation.

We’re saving $6,000 a year now

We wanted to get the panels installed before Houston’s temperature started racing toward the triple digits. My husband is an engineer and a hobbyist craftsman, so he insisted on doing the install himself. While this caused the installation to take longer than it would have had we hired a team to do it, it also saved us an additional $15,000 in labor.

After a few weeks, the project was complete, and we were able to start offsetting our electricity costs right away. In the first full month we ran with the solar panel system fully installed, we were able to offset 50% of our monthly electricity bill — about $500 a month, or $6,000 a year.

Besides being more reliable in case of extreme weather, the solar panels capitalize on our sunny weather, so they pay for themselves. That $500 we’re now saving a month goes straight back toward paying off our personal loan. Additionally, our loan has no penalties for early payoff. We plan to pay off the loan by early next year in order to fully enjoy our solar savings.