Under a new partnership between Meritage Homes, EchoFirst and installer Southern Energy Management (SEM), potential home buyers can now consider hybrid solar as a standard option in North Carolina. Under the partnership new homes being built by Meritage in four Triangle area neighborhoods in Raleigh, N.C., now offer EchoFirst’s Echo solar photovoltaic and thermal system as a standard feature. It’s the first time the system has been offered in the Eastern U.S.  Already some homeowners in the neighborhoods have opted for Echo and have are already moved in, according to Meritage.

The Echo system is unique in that it uses a computer-controlled blower to draw air under photovoltaics on a roof and using the heated air to provide heating, cooling and hot water for a home. By keeping the modules cooler they can produce more electricity. In all, Meritage said homes equipped with Echo can deliver twice the energy of a basic PV systemand use up to 80 percent less energy than equivalent homes without Echo.

The offering builds on a partnership between EchoFirst and Meritage, said Gordon Handelsman, EchoFirst co-founder and chief marketing officer. “It’s part of our joint plans, to offer it as an option in all of their [i.e., Maritage’s] communities,” he said.

In some Meritage communities Echo was a standard feature but since then, incentives have fallen and it is too much for Meritage to absorb in up-front costs. So now, in markets like North Carolina with lower incentives, the systems are offered as an elevation or standard option when home buyers come to the table to design their homes, according to Handelsman.

“As a general strategy Meritage is approaching the pricing of Echo in their homes in strategic way,” Handelsman said. The home builder is able to show how the additional cost of the Echo system, even in a low-incentive market like North Carolina, can help put additional money in the homeowners’ pockets right away, he said.

New homes with the system have proved popular, according to Handelsman. “There’s absolutely no doubt that their homes are selling two to three times faster than the competition,” he said. When compared to those communities with Meritage that included solar and compared to others that don’t.