The short version: Freedom Forever, the second biggest home solar installer in the country, is being sold off for parts. Not fixed. Not bought. Liquidated. If they put panels on your roof, your warranty is now a line in a court file, and your bill still shows up every month like nothing happened. There is a deadline. It is October 16. Here is the whole story, and what to do before then.
Back in April, everybody said "sit tight"
Picture April. Freedom Forever files for bankruptcy. The Chapter 11 kind. That is the kind where a company says, "We just need a minute to catch our breath."
Customers got told to sit tight. Keep paying. Somebody will be in touch.
Nobody was in touch.
Then they went shopping for a buyer
Over the summer, the company went looking for someone to buy it.
They called about 90 possible buyers. Nineteen of them signed papers so they could open the books and take a look.
Nineteen people opened the books. Nineteen people closed them again.
Not one real offer came in. The only bid on the table came from insiders tied to the company's own boss. The folks the company owes money to looked at that offer and said, politely, no thanks.
Sal says: When 19 buyers look at the books and every one of them walks, the books are the news. Whatever they saw, they did not want to own it.
August 7: the judge pulled the plug
With no buyer, the judge in Delaware switched the case over to Chapter 7.
Chapter 11 is "we need a minute." Chapter 7 is "sell the office chairs."
A court officer called a trustee now runs what is left. His name is Alfred T. Giuliano. His job is not to help you. His job is to turn every last thing into cash and hand it out to the people who are owed. You are on that list. You are also near the back of it, behind the folks in suits.
So who is coming to fix your panels?
Nobody. Not the crew. Not the rep who sat at your kitchen table. Not even the guy who set up the app on your phone.
Meanwhile, on your roof
Here is the funny thing about your solar system. It has no idea the company is gone.
Your inverter does not read the news. It just knows it is Tuesday, and the bill knows it too.
That bill is the part people get wrong, so let us slow down.
Your warranty is now a claim, not a promise. The workmanship warranty covers the install itself. The holes in your roof. The wiring. The racking. That was a promise from Freedom Forever, and Freedom Forever is gone. So the promise is now a claim in a pile of claims, and the pile is a lot bigger than the money.
The equipment is a different story, and a better one. Your panels and your inverter are covered by the company that made them, not the company that bolted them on. That company is still in business. You call the maker now. Have your serial numbers ready.
Your bill still comes. Freedom Forever never held your loan or your lease. A finance company does. That finance company did not go bankrupt. It is doing just fine, thank you. Your payment is due on the same day it has always been due. Stop paying and you are the one in trouble. Not them.
If your system was never finished, you are in the worst spot of all. You are paying every month for panels that make nothing. Write to your finance company. Tell them the system they paid for was never turned on, and the installer is in Chapter 7. Ask them what they plan to do about it. Keep a copy.
Sal says: Go to the Freedom Forever customer portal today and download everything. Your agreement, your permit, your warranty, every email. When that website goes dark, it takes your paperwork with it.
The deadline: October 16
Now the part with a clock on it.
October 16, 2026 is the last day to file what the court calls a "proof of claim." Fancy name. Simple form. It tells the trustee, "Hey. This company owes me too."
Paid a deposit and never got your system? File one. System never finished? File one. Was your workmanship warranty worth something to you? File one.
Will you get paid? Nobody can promise that. Like we said, you are near the back of the line. But here is the thing about lines. If you do not file, you are not in the line at all. You are in the parking lot.
The form is free. The case website is restructuring.ra.kroll.com/FreedomForever. The case number is 26-10522.
One more date for the fridge. On Tuesday, September 22, at 11 in the morning Eastern, the trustee holds the meeting of creditors. You can listen in by phone or video. You do not have to. But you are allowed to, because you are one of the people this company owes. Bring coffee.
The plot twist: the bank never left
Here is the part a bankruptcy does not erase, and it is the best news in this whole story.
In July, Michigan's Attorney General sued a solar company called Climax Solar. Climax had closed in 2024. Bankrupt. Gone. Lights off.
She sued them anyway. Then she turned around and sued the banks that financed the deals, right along with them.
About 1,700 Michigan families. $81 million in loans. More than $22 million of that was hidden financing cost, baked into the price and never shown as a fee. Those fees averaged 27% of what people borrowed.
Twenty seven cents of every dollar. A fee nobody mentioned.
The state's own words for how the whole thing worked: pitch, sign, fund, fail, and collect. Five words. It almost rhymes.
Notice what did not happen. The installer going broke did not let the bank off the hook. If your loan has a hidden fee tucked inside it, that is a problem for whoever holds your loan today. And that company is very much still around.
Sal says: When the installer vanishes, most people stop looking at the paperwork. Look harder. The lender did not vanish. The lender is the one still cashing your checks.
"Okay. So what do I actually do?"
Three things before October 16.
Save your documents. Today, not this weekend.
File your proof of claim. It costs nothing, and it is the only way into the line.
Then have someone read what you actually signed. Not the sales pitch. The agreement, and the loan sitting behind it. The company that sold it is gone. The company collecting on it is not.
Get your free Solar Relief Call →
Because your installer is gone, but your agreement is not. Somebody should read it before the deadline, not after.
Where this comes from: In re Freedom Forever LLC, Case No. 26-10522, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (Chapter 7 conversion effective August 7, 2026); creditor meeting and claim deadline as reported by pv magazine USA, September 9, 2026; the failed insider sale as reported by Law360 and Bloomberg Law, August 2026; Michigan Attorney General press release, July 15, 2026.