12.5 Beware of third-party sales reps

A lot of solar salespeople in the U.S. work for independent third-party sales companies — not the installer itself. Which means once the contract is signed, that salesperson is no longer responsible for anything that happens afterward.

Why is this so common?

Because solar is a high-ticket product — tens of thousands of dollars per deal — customer acquisition is expensive. For installers, building an in-house sales operation is costly, slow, and hard to scale. So the industry split into a division of labor: installers focus on construction and engineering; sales companies focus on lead generation and contract signing, paid on commission. A single commission can run a few thousand to over ten thousand dollars.

This creates a structural problem: some salespeople over-promise, sometimes outright mislead, to close the deal.

So when buying solar in the U.S., always identify clearly: is the entity you're signing a contract with the installer itself, or a third-party sales operation? And does the contract back up every promise the salesperson made?

Getting this clear at the start prevents a lot of disputes later.

At Green Future, we don't use third-party sales reps. That's part of why our pricing is meaningfully lower than other companies.