The Solar Tax Credit Is Gone: What Home Energy Credits Are Left in 2026 — and the June 30 Deadlines

The Short Version: What Ended, What Ends on June 30, and What Survives

For two decades, the federal government paid Americans to put solar panels on their roofs. That era is over. The One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), signed July 4, 2025, terminated the two big home energy tax credits at the end of 2025 — years ahead of schedule. The IRS lists the change plainly on its OBBBA provisions page under “Home energy credit expirations.”[6, 5]

Here is the scoreboard as of June 11, 2026. Already ended: the §25D Residential Clean Energy Credit (30% of solar, battery, and geothermal costs, with no dollar cap) died for expenditures after December 31, 2025. The §25C Energy Efficient Home Improvement Credit (up to $1,200 a year, or $2,000 for heat pumps) died for property placed in service after the same date. Ending in days: the §30C credit for home EV chargers — 30%, up to $1,000 — stops for property placed in service after June 30, 2026.[1, 2, 3]

What survives? More than you might think. State tax credits — New York still pays 25% up to $5,000. DOE Home Energy Rebates of up to $14,000 are “now available in select states.” Unused federal solar credit from earlier years still carries forward. And solar companies can still claim a separate business credit (§48E) on systems they lease to you, which can lower lease and PPA pricing. This guide walks through each one, with the exact dates and the traps.[23, 15, 1, 14]

One thing first: without the 30% federal credit, the math on a $30,000 solar loan changes a lot. Before you talk to any installer in 2026, run the monthly payment yourself so a salesperson cannot run it for you.

How One Law Cut Seven Years Off the Clock

These credits were not supposed to end now. Under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, the §25D solar credit was scheduled to run at 30% through 2032, then step down through 2034. The §25C home improvement credit and the §30C charger credit were both written to last through December 31, 2032. Homeowners, installers, and lenders all planned around that decade-long runway.[11, 12, 13]

OBBBA — Public Law 119-21 — rewrote those dates in a few lines of text. The IRS and Treasury then published a dedicated FAQ, Fact Sheet 2025-05, on August 21, 2025, to answer the timing questions that the sudden cutoff created. That fact sheet is now the single most important official document for anyone with a half-finished project.[4, 5]

Two details matter before we go further. First, the credits did not shrink — they vanished. There is no partial 2026 credit, no phase-down, no grandfathering for signed contracts. Second, each credit has its own cutoff test. §25D turns on when you ‘spent’ the money (more on that twist next), §25C and §30C turn on when the equipment was ‘placed in service.’ Mixing those tests up is exactly how people lose money this year.[4]

The §25D Solar Credit: Why Paying in 2025 Was Not Enough

The law sounds simple. Section 25D(h) now reads: the credit “shall not apply with respect to any expenditures made after December 31, 2025.” So if you spent the money in 2025, you are safe — right? Not necessarily. Buried in §25D(e)(8)(A) is the rule that decides everything: an expenditure is treated as made “when the original installation of the item is completed.”[11, 4]

The IRS spelled out the painful consequence in its OBBBA energy FAQ: if you paid for solar panels in 2025 but the installation was completed in 2026, you get no credit at all. Not a reduced credit — zero. The check you wrote does not matter. The contract date does not matter. Only the date the crew finished the original installation does.[4]

Who is caught by this? Mostly people who signed contracts in the late-2025 rush. Industry order books exploded in the second half of 2025 as buyers raced the deadline, and installers could not finish every job by New Year’s Eve. If your system was completed on or before December 31, 2025, you claim the credit normally (next section). If it was completed in 2026, the federal credit is gone for you — skip ahead to the sections on state incentives, rebates, and leases.[4, 1]

One narrow exception in the same FAQ helps off-grid and self-install projects: for §25D, an expenditure connected to the construction of a home is treated as made when your use of the constructed home begins. And note what did not change: battery storage, geothermal heat pumps, and solar water heaters all lived inside §25D, so they ended on the same date with the same installation-completion test.[4, 11]

The §25C Credit for Heat Pumps, Windows, and Insulation Ended Too — With a Different Test

The second casualty is the credit most people used for smaller projects. §25C paid 30% of costs up to $1,200 per year — with sub-limits of $600 for windows, $250 per exterior door ($500 total), and $150 for a home energy audit — plus a separate $2,000 per year for heat pumps, heat pump water heaters, and biomass stoves. Because the cap reset every year, savvy homeowners spread projects across years. That strategy is now history: §25C(i) ends the credit for “any property placed in service after December 31, 2025.”[2, 12]

Note the words: “placed in service,” not “expenditures made.” For §25C, the question is when the equipment was installed and ready for use in your home. The IRS FAQ confirms the same cliff-edge result as solar: a heat pump placed in service on January 2, 2026 earns nothing, even if you ordered and paid for it in November 2025.[4, 12]

If you did squeeze a project into 2025, one extra hoop applies to that final year: most §25C property placed in service in 2025 must come from a registered “qualified manufacturer,” and you must report the product identification number (PIN) on your return. Keep that paperwork — without the PIN, the IRS can deny the credit for an otherwise perfect 2025 installation.[2, 12]

Installed in 2025? You Can Still Claim It — Here Is How

The credits are dead for new projects, but 2025 installations are very much alive on 2025 tax returns. Both credits are claimed on Form 5695, filed with your Form 1040. If you got an extension, your 2025 return is due October 15, 2026 — so thousands of people will legitimately claim the “dead” solar credit this fall. If you already filed and forgot the credit, you can file an amended return (Form 1040-X); you generally have three years to do that.[7, 1]

Three rules trip people up. First, both credits are nonrefundable — they can cut your tax bill to zero, but the IRS will not send you a check for the rest. Second, there is no income limit in either direction; a credit is worth the same to any taxpayer who owes enough tax. Third, the credit belongs to the year the property was placed in service or the installation was completed — you cannot “save” a 2025 installation and claim it on a 2026 return.[1, 2]

Two housekeeping notes for solar claimants. The IRS posted a correction to the 2025 Form 5695 instructions in January 2026 for the joint-occupancy calculation — if you share a home and split costs, use the corrected worksheet. And remember that the §25D credit reduces your home’s cost basis by the credit amount, which matters when you eventually sell. Our guide to the home-sale capital gains exclusion explains how basis drives that tax bill.[7, 11]

Carryforward: The One Piece of the Solar Credit That Survives 2025

Because the solar credit is nonrefundable, a big system often produces more credit than one year of tax. A $30,000 system generated a $9,000 credit; a household owing $6,000 in federal income tax could only use $6,000 of it that year. The law’s answer is §25D(c): the excess “shall be carried to the succeeding taxable year.” The IRS page says it in plain English: “You can carry forward any excess unused credit … and apply it to reduce the tax you owe in future years.”[11, 1]

Here is the good news for the late-2025 crowd: OBBBA killed the credit for new expenditures, but it did not repeal §25D(c). A carryforward born from a 2025 (or earlier) installation keeps rolling into 2026 and beyond until it is used up. The IRS landing page still describes the carryforward today, and the 2025 Form 5695 computes it. One honest caveat: the IRS has not yet published the 2026 forms, so watch how the carryforward line is handled there — and keep your 2025 paperwork forever.[1, 11, 7]

The §25C home improvement credit gets no such mercy. The IRS page is blunt: “You can’t apply any excess credit to future tax years.” Use it or lose it was always the rule there — and after 2025, there is nothing left to use. If you have a solar carryforward, though, think of it as a guaranteed tax discount over the next few years. Money you are not sending to the IRS can work somewhere else — that is exactly the kind of multi-year math a compound interest calculator makes visible.[2]

Act Before June 30, 2026: The Home EV Charger Credit Is Still Alive — Barely

One federal home energy credit is still claimable as you read this. Section 30C covers “alternative fuel vehicle refueling property” — for homeowners, that means EV charging equipment. The IRS states the window precisely: for property you buy and place in service at your main home “from January 1, 2023, to June 30, 2026, the credit equals 30% of the cost of the property up to a maximum credit of $1,000 per item.” The statute backs it up: §30C(i) says the section “shall not apply to any property placed in service after June 30, 2026.”[3, 13]

There is a catch most articles skip: your address must qualify. Since 2023, §30C(c)(3) only allows the credit if the property is placed in service in an “eligible census tract” — either a low-income community or a tract that is not an urban area. The IRS page hosts downloadable GEOID tables; you find your 11-digit census tract number and check it against the list for your installation date. Roughly speaking, rural and lower-income areas qualify and many dense suburbs do not — but never guess. Check the table before you buy anything.[3, 13]

If you qualify, the play is simple: a Level 2 charger plus installation typically lands in the $1,000–$3,000 range, so the 30% credit covers a meaningful slice. It must be placed in service — installed and working — by June 30, 2026, not just ordered. You claim it with Form 8911 on your 2026 return next year. Electricians book up fast when a deadline looms, so call this week, not on June 28. For the bigger picture on whether an EV saves you money overall, see our EV total cost of ownership guide.[3, 8]

Also Ending June 30: The Builder Credit That Quietly Shaped New-Home Prices

Two more energy provisions die on the same June 30, 2026 date — and although homeowners never claim them directly, one of them touches anyone shopping for a new house. Section 45L pays an “eligible contractor” — the builder — up to $5,000 for each qualified energy-efficient new home. The IRS page frames the window as homes “acquired in 2023 through June 30, 2026,” and the OBBBA FAQ states the cutoff: no credit for any qualified home acquired after that date.[9, 4]

Why should a buyer care? Because $2,500–$5,000 per home was real money in a builder’s margin, especially for big production builders certifying whole subdivisions to ENERGY STAR or Zero Energy Ready standards. The credit nudged builders to include efficiency features by default. With it gone, expect some builders to make those features optional paid upgrades instead. If you are closing on a new home this summer, the date you “acquire” the home decides the builder’s credit — one more reason June closings are frantic this year.[9]

The second June 30 casualty is §179D, the deduction for energy-efficient commercial buildings — it ends for any property whose construction begins after June 30, 2026. That one mostly matters to building owners and architects, but it completes the picture: by July 1, 2026, every major federal energy efficiency incentive for buildings, old or new, residential or commercial, is either dead or on its final countdown.[4, 6]

Does Solar Still Pay Off Without the 30% Credit? The Honest Math

Let’s run the numbers with assumptions stated out loud, so you can swap in your own. Say a mid-size home system costs $30,000 installed and produces about 9,000 kWh a year that you would otherwise buy from the grid. (Berkeley Lab’s national database of 4.5 million systems is the place to check real installed prices in your state.) At the March 2026 average U.S. residential electricity price of 18.56 cents/kWh, that production is worth roughly $1,670 a year.[19, 18]

With the old 30% credit, your net cost was about $21,000, and $21,000 ÷ $1,670 gives a simple payback near 12.5 years. Without the credit you pay the full $30,000, and payback stretches to about 18 years — five and a half years longer, a 43% jump, before counting financing costs, inverter replacement, or what the cash could have earned elsewhere. That is the honest core of it: the credit’s death does not make solar worthless, it makes solar slower.[18]

Two forces still work in solar’s favor. First, electricity prices are climbing — the U.S. residential average rose from 17.09 to 18.56 cents/kWh in the twelve months through March 2026, an 8.6% jump, and every rate hike shortens your payback. Second, prices vary wildly by state: at 30 cents/kWh in parts of New England or California, the same system pays back in roughly 11 years with no federal help at all. Sunshine, your utility’s net metering rules, and your state’s incentives (next sections) decide whether 2026 solar is a sound investment or an expensive hobby.[18]

How you pay matters more than ever. Cash avoids interest but ties up money for a decade-plus. A home equity line often beats a dealer-arranged solar loan on rate and fees — our HELOC guide covers the trade-offs, and the consumer-protection section below explains why dealer-arranged loans deserve extra suspicion now.[22]

Leases and PPAs: The Business Credit That Survived — and What It Means for Your Roof

Here is the twist nobody expected to matter this much: OBBBA killed the homeowner credit, but the business investment credit — §48E, worth up to 30% — survives for solar systems a company owns and leases to you, or sells you power from under a power purchase agreement (PPA). The statute gives wind and solar a hard stop for systems placed in service after December 31, 2027, with an exception tied to construction starting within twelve months of the law’s enactment — that is, by July 4, 2026.[14, 10]

That is why the solar industry is racing another deadline right now. IRS Notice 2025-42, effective September 2, 2025, tightened how a project proves construction has begun: physical, significant work — not just spending 5% of the budget — is the test for most projects, though small solar facilities of 1.5 megawatts or less keep the old 5% safe harbor. Translation for homeowners: leasing companies that lock in construction starts by July 4, 2026 can keep claiming the credit on rooftop fleets they install through 2027.[10, 14]

A lease or PPA can therefore deliver part of a subsidy you can no longer claim yourself — competition decides how much of the company’s credit shows up in your monthly rate. But read these contracts like a lawyer. The FTC’s consumer guide (updated June 2026) warns that with a lease you do not own the system, you may face an annual payment “escalator,” and selling your home gets more complicated: the buyer must assume the lease or you must buy it out. Compare the lease’s 20-year total cost, escalators included, against a purchased system’s — not just month one against your current bill.[20, 14]

One more reason leases stay interesting: some state credits never cared who owns the hardware. New York’s 25% credit, for example, explicitly covers lease payments and power purchased under agreements of at least ten years — so a New York lessee can still stack a state credit on top of whatever §48E savings the lessor passes through.[23]

State Incentives Did Not Get the Memo: Credits, Exemptions, and Net Metering

Congress killed the federal credit; it cannot touch state ones. New York is the cleanest example: a 25% state income tax credit up to $5,000 for solar equipment at your principal residence — and, as noted, it covers leases and long PPAs too, with a five-year carryforward if your state tax bill is too small. Be careful with headlines, though: bills to raise New York’s cap to $10,000 have been introduced but had not become law as of June 2026. Claim what the statute says today, not what a press release hopes.[23]

Beyond income tax credits, states and utilities still offer three quieter subsidies. Property tax exemptions mean your assessment does not jump when panels raise your home’s value. Sales tax exemptions shave hundreds off the purchase. And net metering — the rate your utility pays for your excess power — is often worth more over 25 years than the federal credit ever was, though some states have trimmed it sharply. The same dollar of sunshine can be worth twice as much one state line away.[24]

The practical move: look up your own state before believing any installer’s pitch. The DSIRE database, run by the N.C. Clean Energy Technology Center at NC State University, tracks every federal, state, and utility incentive by ZIP code and is the standard reference the industry itself uses. Five minutes there tells you whether your state still makes solar attractive in 2026 — and arms you with numbers before a salesperson supplies their own.[24]

Whatever incentives you find, the final question is always the same: what does the monthly payment look like against the monthly savings? Run your real loan quote — amount, rate, term — through a neutral calculator before signing anything.

The $8.8 Billion Nobody Talks About: DOE Home Energy Rebates, State by State

Tax credits are not the only federal money for home energy work — and the other pot is still open. The Department of Energy’s Home Energy Rebates, funded by the Inflation Reduction Act, pay cash discounts rather than tax credits: the HOMES program offers up to $8,000 for whole-home upgrades that cut modeled energy use by at least 20%, and the HEEHR electrification program offers up to $14,000 per household at the point of sale for things like heat pumps, insulation, and electric panel upgrades. DOE’s status line as of June 2026: rebates “are now available in select states,” and your State Energy Office is the place to check yours.[15, 16]

Two warnings keep this from being free money for everyone. First, the rules just changed: after a long federal review, DOE restarted the rebate programs in late May 2026 with revised guidance — reporting by Inside Climate News found the new rules drop support for switching homes from gas or oil to electric heat, and require insulation and air-sealing work before appliance rebates. States were given a window to bring their programs in line, so what your state offered in 2025 may not be what it offers today. Second, HEEHR is income-targeted: the biggest rebates go to households under 80% of area median income, smaller ones up to 150%.[25, 15]

And the money runs out. California — the biggest state program — declared its single-family HEEHRA rebates “fully reserved statewide” on February 24, 2026, while its HOMES program had not even launched yet. Other states are still opening first-come, first-served windows this year. The lesson is the same one the tax credits just taught: federal energy money now has expiration dates and waiting lists. If a rebate exists in your state and you qualify, claim it while it is actually there.[17, 15]

Scams and Loan Traps Got More Dangerous the Day the Credit Died

Selling solar got harder in 2026 — which means selling solar dishonestly got more tempting. The FTC’s standing warning is blunt: “The federal government does not install solar systems in homes for free.” Anyone pitching “free panels,” a “government program” that covers everything, or a vanishing electric bill is reading from a script the FTC has been flagging since 2024. The new twist to listen for this year: pitches that still promise you a “30% federal tax credit.” For a system you buy and install in 2026, that credit does not exist.[21, 20]

The financing deserves equal suspicion. The CFPB’s investigation of solar lending found “dealer fees” quietly baked into loan principal — typically 10% to 30% of the cash price, and in some cases more than 50%. It also flagged a payment structure built around the old tax credit: loans assuming you would prepay about 30% around month 18, with monthly payments jumping if you did not. Think about what that means now: a loan structured around a tax credit that no longer exists, sold to a borrower who will never receive it. Ask every lender for the cash price versus the financed price, in writing, before you sign.[22]

Finally, vet the company as hard as the contract. The FTC advises getting multiple bids, checking references and state licensing, and never paying in full up front or in cash. A 25-year warranty is only as good as the firm behind it, and the industry is consolidating fast now that the demand subsidy is gone. Slow down, compare, and remember the one rule that beats every scam: nobody who pressures you to sign today is offering a deal that will survive until tomorrow.[20, 21]

The Bottom Line: A Decision Checklist for June 2026

Here is the whole article as a checklist. Installed solar or efficiency upgrades in 2025? Claim them on your 2025 return with Form 5695 — by October 15, 2026 if extended — and track any solar carryforward. Project finished in 2026? The federal credits are gone; pivot to your state credit, your utility, and any DOE rebate your state runs. Want a home EV charger? Check the census-tract list and get it placed in service by June 30. Considering solar now? Price it with zero federal help, compare buy versus lease with the §48E pass-through in mind, and treat every financing quote as guilty until proven innocent.[7, 3, 15]

Could Congress bring the credits back? Bills get introduced every session, but as of June 11, 2026, no law restores §25D or §25C — and planning a five-figure purchase around a hypothetical vote is speculation, not strategy. The smarter frame: the subsidy era trained everyone to chase 30% discounts. The post-subsidy era rewards people who do arithmetic. Energy prices, equipment costs, state programs, and your own tax situation now decide the answer — and those you can actually look up.[6]

One last piece of arithmetic worth doing: if you decide solar no longer pencils for you, you are about to not spend $30,000. Money that does not go on a roof can compound somewhere else for the same 25 years the panels would have lasted. Run both futures — the panels and the portfolio — before you choose. That comparison, not a vanished tax credit, is what a good 2026 decision looks like.