Whole House Generator

It depends on what you want running at the same time, not on the size of the house. A typical 2,000 to 3,000 square foot Riverside home with one air conditioning system, a kitchen and normal appliances is comfortable on 18kW to 22kW. Two air conditioning systems, a pool, a well or an EV charger usually pushes it to 24kW to 26kW. Above that, or for very large homes, we move to liquid-cooled units from 32kW up. If you only want essentials covered, 10kW to 14kW is often enough. We do a load calculation at the panel and size to the worst realistic case, which around here is a 105-degree afternoon with both compressors starting together.

Natural gas is the default for any home with a gas main, because the supply keeps coming during an outage and there is nothing to refill. Propane is the answer where there is no main, which covers a lot of Norco, Jurupa Valley and rural Perris; it stores indefinitely, delivers slightly more output from the same engine, and needs a tank of at least 250 to 500 gallons if you want multi-day runtime without a delivery. Diesel is the standard for commercial and industrial standby and for large rural properties, because it produces the most power per dollar of engine, but it needs on-site storage, periodic fuel polishing and, for stationary engines, an air district permit.

Most complete residential installations in the Riverside area run between $5,000 and $15,000, covering the generator, the transfer switch, the pad, the gas and electrical work, the permit and commissioning. Smaller essential-circuit systems sit at the low end. Large liquid-cooled units for big homes, or jobs that need a panel upgrade or a long gas run, sit at the top or above it. The equipment alone is usually about half; the rest is the install. We quote a fixed price after a site visit rather than a range, and financing is available.

The install itself is one to two days for a typical air-cooled home standby system, with the power off for a few hours while the transfer switch goes in. The calendar is longer than the labor: allow one to three weeks for the permit and equipment, more if the unit is a special order or the gas meter needs upgrading by the utility, since that runs on their schedule. Inspection follows the install, then commissioning. Most Riverside homeowners are from first call to working generator in three to six weeks.

Yes. A permanently installed standby generator needs electrical and mechanical permits, and the gas connection is inspected too. In the City of Riverside that goes through Building and Safety, and the surrounding cities each run their own process. We file the paperwork, meet the inspector and hand you the signed-off permit at the end. Commercial and industrial engines have a second layer: stationary diesel engines above a threshold size also need a South Coast AQMD permit, which we handle on those jobs.

On a level pad outside, clear of the house by the manufacturer distance, which is usually about 18 inches from the wall and five feet from any window, door or vent, with the exhaust side pointing away from the building and clear airflow all around. It should be close enough to the gas meter and the electrical panel to keep the runs reasonable, out of any low spot where water collects, and where a service truck can reach it. On tight side yards in Corona and older Riverside neighbourhoods, placement is the constraint we design the whole install around.

Industry surveys generally put the effect at around 3 to 5 percent of home value for a properly installed whole house system, and appraisers in areas with frequent outages tend to treat it as a genuine feature rather than a personal preference. In fire-season shutoff neighbourhoods such as the Corona canyons, the Rancho Cucamonga foothills and the Redlands hills, it also shows up as a shorter time on market, because buyers there have lived through the outages themselves.

Yes. We work with lending partners who cover home standby installations with terms from about 12 to 84 months, subject to credit approval, and there are promotional zero-interest periods on some equipment brands at certain times of year. Many homeowners also use a HELOC, since the work is a permanent improvement. We will lay out what the monthly number looks like alongside the fixed quote so you can compare them properly.

One professional service a year for most residential units, or every 100 to 200 running hours if it works harder than that. That visit covers oil and filter, air filter, spark plugs, valve clearance checks at the longer intervals, battery test, coolant on liquid-cooled units, a transfer test under load and a controller check. Between visits the machine runs its own weekly exercise cycle. The single most common reason a standby generator fails to start is a dead battery, which is also the cheapest thing on it to replace.