In apartments and many townhouses, the hard part is not irradiance — it is governance. Roofs are often common property, so voting thresholds, by-laws, insurance notes and metering fairness decide whether a project lives. Panel brand is a late-stage detail. This 2026 guide is written for committees and lot owners who need a motion that survives scrutiny: who owns the array, who gets the bill credit, who signs the DNSP paperwork, and how CEC-accredited installers should price the complexity they usually under-quote on freestanding houses.
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Indicative 2026 pricing: a typical 6.6kW system often quotes around $5,000–$8,000 after the STC discount (metro installs often $5,000–$7,500; premium/regional can run higher). See our solar cost guide.
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Most multi-dwelling roofs, plant rooms and risers sit on common property under state strata / owners corporation law. That usually means a formal resolution, sometimes exclusive-use by-laws, and insurer notification before hardware is ordered. Lot-only experiments (a single balcony kit, a tiny patio array) face different electrical, insurer and network constraints and rarely replace a properly designed common-roof system. Map ownership on the strata plan before you invite three salespeople upstairs.
Ordinary vs special resolution requirements differ by state and by whether you are changing common property, granting exclusive use, or amending by-laws. Do not wing it with a vague “go green” agenda item. Bring: indicative annual yield, capital cost and funding split, who claims STCs, insurance implications, installer CEC credentials, and a draft metering/billing schedule. Committees kill projects when the paperwork feels like a blank cheque.
Three broad patterns dominate Australian strata solar: (1) offset common-area loads (lifts, lighting, HVAC plant) on the owners corporation meter; (2) feed an embedded network with transparent allocation rules; (3) allocate generation to lots via sub-metering or retailer products where available. Fairness fights sink more projects than winter irradiance. Approve the metering and credit rules in writing before any deposit — “we’ll figure billing out later” is how AGMs turn hostile.
Crane and scaffold access, roof membrane warranties, waterproofing penetrations, switchboard upgrades in shared cupboards, fire engineering overlays, and working-at-heights logistics all inflate cost and timeline. Installers who only quote detached homes often miss these line items. Require a site inspection, not a Google Earth guess, and insist the quote names who lodges DNSP / micro-EG paperwork for the building.
Eligible systems can still attract STCs when CEC-accredited practitioners and approved products are used. The body corporate agreement must say who benefits from the certificate discount and who owns the asset. Shared batteries for common loads or backup can stack with the federal Cheaper Home Batteries Program (~$372/kWh usable where eligible) and, in some states, local battery schemes — but fire standards, location and governance add process. Get eligibility and ownership clauses in the same pack as the hardware quote.
Notify the strata insurer early. Confirm whether panels affect the building policy excess, who maintains inverters, and how roof leaks are attributed after install. Build a sinking-fund line for inverter replacement (often year 10–15) and eventual decommissioning. Committees that only budget the install day discover the real cost at the first fault callout.
Ask for strata references, not only suburban photo galleries. Scope should include approvals support, access methodology, membrane protection method, as-built documentation for the strata records, and workmanship warranty that survives contractor change-of-control where possible. Compare at least three written proposals with identical inclusions before ranking price.
Request quotes through MrSolar so the conversation starts with CEC-accredited scopes instead of a single unsolicited flyer in the mailroom. Share the strata plan extract, recent common-power bills, and your preferred metering model with each installer so proposals are comparable.
Need committee-ready numbers? Compare free CEC-accredited strata-capable solar quotes on MrSolar.
Written and reviewed by Daniel (Marketplace lead, Epic Unicorn Pty Ltd). We build pages from Australian solar datasets and regulatory references, then map you to CEC-accredited installers only.
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