Audit
System Handover Audit, Gold Coast
For new homeowners inheriting a solar, battery, off-grid, or smart-home system. We document what you actually have, identify what's missing or unsafe, and explain how to live with it. Most useful before settlement, when issues can still be raised with the seller. Useful after settlement when the previous owner is gone and the documentation is patchy. Either way, you walk away with a written report you can take to any other contractor, manufacturer, or insurer.
Who the Handover Audit is for
The Handover Audit is a focused product for one specific situation. You've bought, are buying, or have just moved into a property with existing electrical or energy infrastructure that nobody fully documented. Common scenarios:
- You're in the conveyancing window for a property with solar, a battery, or off-grid setup, and you want to know what you're actually buying before settlement
- You've just moved into a property with existing smart-home gear, and the seller's documentation amounts to "the app is on his phone, you'll figure it out"
- The previous owner has gone overseas, sold the house from interstate, or is otherwise unreachable, and you can't get answers about how the system works
- You're inheriting a property and want to understand the electrical and energy systems before deciding what to keep, replace, or remove
- A building inspector flagged "electrical system not fully assessed" and you need a specialist follow-up
- You suspect the system isn't working properly but you don't know enough about it to articulate what's wrong
If you're a long-time owner with a system you understand, the Handover Audit isn't the right product. You'd want a Solar Health Check for solar issues or a Home System Audit for integration scoping. The Handover Audit is specifically for inherited systems where you don't know what you've got.
What the audit actually covers
The Handover Audit is a structured assessment, $350, two hours on site plus two to three hours of off-site documentation work. We work to a written checklist so nothing gets missed. The on-site portion covers six areas:
1. Physical inventory and identification
What's actually installed. Make and model of every inverter, battery, controller, monitoring device, switchboard component, and smart-home device on the property. Photographs of every nameplate. Serial numbers where they're accessible. Most inherited systems are a mix of components from different installers across different years, and getting them all on a single inventory is the foundation of everything else.
2. Battery and inverter communication
We confirm the inverter, battery management system, and any monitoring controller (Cerbo GX, Fronius Datamanager, SolarEdge gateway, Tesla Gateway, BYD BMS) are talking to each other properly. Comms drops are the most common reason an inherited system "looks broken" when actually the components are fine. They just stopped speaking to each other after a router change two years ago.
3. Charge profile and configuration check
We read the configured voltages, current limits, and charge profiles on every component and check them against the actual battery datasheet. Wrong settings shorten battery life dramatically and are a common find on inherited systems where the original installer set up for one battery type and a later replacement was a different chemistry. Lithium banks running on lead-acid charge profiles are unfortunately common.
4. Isolation and earthing inspection
DC and AC isolators in the right places, in working order, properly labelled. Earth continuity tested. Isolator condition checked, particularly DC isolators, which are a known failure mode in Australia and the most common cause of "the system has been off for six months and nobody knew." The basics that get skipped on rushed installs.
5. Monitoring access and account ownership
Who owns the cloud monitoring account. Whether the previous owner's email is still attached to the inverter portal. Whether VRM, SolarEdge Monitoring, Tesla Gateway, or whatever cloud system is in place can be transferred to your name. We document the path to take ownership of every monitoring layer, which is often more painful than expected. Some manufacturers require the original installer's intervention.
6. Daily operation walkthrough
How to read the monitoring app, what normal looks like for this specific system, what to do when something looks wrong, who to call. So you know how to live with the system, not just that it's there. This is where we transfer the knowledge a continuing owner would have but a new owner doesn't.
Findings go into a written report within five business days. The report includes the inventory, photographs, configuration documentation, identified issues, recommendations, and (where applicable) suggested questions to raise with the seller. The report is yours regardless of whether you proceed with any further work.
What audits typically uncover on inherited systems
Inherited systems share predictable patterns. Five most common findings.
1. The monitoring is locked to the previous owner's email
Found on roughly two-thirds of audits. The original installer set up the cloud monitoring account using the previous owner's email, the previous owner has moved on (or worse, has died), and the new owner has no way to access the dashboard. Resolution paths vary by manufacturer: some allow new-owner takeover with proof of address, some require the original installer's intervention. We document the path for your specific brands.
2. The DC isolator has failed or is failing
Single most common physical fault on inherited solar systems. Cracked enclosures from UV exposure, water ingress, terminal corrosion, or products from the recall list that were never replaced. Sometimes the system has been quietly off for months because the isolator failed and nobody noticed because the monitoring also stopped reporting at the same time.
3. The battery configuration doesn't match the battery
Common on systems where the original install was lead-acid and a later replacement was lithium, but the inverter and BMS settings were never updated. Result: lithium bank running on lead-acid charge profile, with absorption voltage either too low (bank never reaches full) or too high (cell damage over time). Easy to fix, hard to spot without knowing what to look for.
4. The smart-home gear is partially functional
Inherited smart homes are usually 60–80% working: some lights respond to the app, some don't; the climate control works through one app but the lighting needs a different one; voice control was set up by the previous owner with their account and has been broken since they left. The audit documents what works, what doesn't, and what it would take to consolidate everything onto one platform under your ownership.
5. The system passes safety basics but the warranty is unrecoverable
Many inherited solar systems are technically safe and operational but the manufacturer warranty is unrecoverable because the original installer is out of business and the documentation needed to claim against the manufacturer directly is missing. We document what warranty status appears to be (often "limited" rather than "expired") and what paperwork would be needed to claim if components fail.
What happens after the audit
Every Handover Audit ends with a written report and clear next steps. The path forward typically falls into one of four shapes:
Take the report and walk away
Many Handover Audit clients only want the assessment. The system works fine, the report gives you ownership clarity, and you don't need anything else. About a third of audits end here. The fee is the deliverable, not a deposit on follow-on work.
Pre-settlement negotiation
If the audit happens before settlement and identifies issues (failed isolators, missing documentation, unrecovered warranties, non-compliant work), the report is written to support raising those issues with the seller. We don't act as a building inspector or solicitor, but the report is the technical evidence your lawyer needs to negotiate.
Specific repair or replacement
Audit identifies a specific issue (failed inverter, dead BMS, unsafe wiring) that needs fixing. We provide a fixed-price quote for the repair work alongside the report. Repair work that requires SAA accreditation (grid-tied solar repairs touching the grid-connection point) is coordinated through an accredited partner installer. Other work is delivered directly.
Full integration project
Some clients use the Handover Audit as the entry point to a larger integration project: bringing the inherited gear under one Home Assistant dashboard, replacing the failing components, adding monitoring layers, modernising the switchboard. The Handover Audit fee credits 50 percent against installation when you proceed with project work within 90 days, the same as our other audits.
Available packages
System Handover Audit, $350 (Zone 1)
Two hours on site plus written PDF report within five business days. Inventory, photographs, configuration documentation, identified issues, and recommended next steps. Audit fee credits 50 percent against installation when you proceed with project work within 90 days.
Price shown is Zone 1. Zone 2 is $410, Zone 3 is $500. See /pricing/ for the full pricing structure.
The technical context behind why inherited systems fail
Most homeowners assume an inherited solar or smart-home system is roughly self-explanatory. The hardware is on the wall, the manuals are presumably somewhere, and the system has been working until now. The reality is messier. Here's the context that explains why.
Documentation evaporates faster than equipment fails
Solar and battery hardware typically lasts 10–25 years. The paperwork (installation diagrams, configuration records, warranty registrations, monitoring credentials) typically goes missing within 5–7 years of installation. Owners move, files get lost in moves, original installers go out of business, manufacturers update their portals and old logins break. By the time a system changes hands, the working hardware often comes with no working documentation.
Cloud account ownership is harder than it should be
Every cloud-monitored system (Fronius Solar.web, SolarEdge Monitoring, SMA Sunny Portal, Tesla Gateway, VRM) is registered to an email address. That email is usually the previous owner's. Manufacturers vary widely in how they handle ownership transfer: Fronius and SMA are reasonable, SolarEdge has been improving, Tesla can be difficult. Some require the original installer's intervention, which is impossible if the installer is out of business. Documenting this path is one of the most useful things the audit produces.
Configuration drift is invisible until something breaks
Solar inverters, batteries, and BMSes have hundreds of configuration parameters. Most don't matter day-to-day. Some matter enormously. Charge voltage, absorption time, equalisation settings, low-voltage cutoff, temperature compensation. The original installer set them correctly for the original battery. A later replacement battery from a different chemistry or different manufacturer should have triggered a configuration update. But on inherited systems, often didn't. The hardware keeps running, the bank life shortens silently, and the next owner doesn't know.
Smart-home systems decay differently to electrical systems
Electrical systems mostly fail visibly: a tripped breaker, a dead inverter, a smoke alarm that went silent. Smart-home systems decay in subtle ways: automations that fired in one direction but not the other, integrations that lost connection after a router change, voice assistants that stopped responding when the previous owner cancelled their account. The inherited smart home is usually working partially in ways the new owner can't easily diagnose, because they don't know what was supposed to happen versus what is happening.
The pre-settlement window is the highest-leverage moment
The single most valuable time to do a Handover Audit is before settlement. Issues identified can be raised with the seller while there's still leverage: repair, credit, or warranty assignment can be negotiated. After settlement, the same issues are yours to deal with regardless. We can do post-settlement audits and many do, but the pre-settlement audit gets more practical use out of the same fee.
For deeper reading on the technical aspects, see our guides on Why Your Solar Stopped and Solar Battery Storage Diagnostics, and the related Solar Health Check service page.
Frequently asked
▸ Should I book this before or after settlement?
▸ How quickly can you turn this around for a settlement deadline?
▸ Will the report be useful for my conveyancing solicitor?
▸ Can you fix issues you find on the day?
▸ Will you take over support of the system after the audit?
▸ Will the audit identify everything that's wrong?
▸ What if the system is completely off and I don't know how to turn it on?
▸ How does this compare to a building inspector's electrical assessment?
Book the audit
Tell us the property address, what's installed (as much as you know), and your settlement date if applicable. Most enquiries get a response within four business hours. Photos of the inverter, battery, switchboard, and any monitoring screens help us prepare for the visit, but they're not required if you're not on site yet.