How a Christmas light lease works, November to January
You rent the display, we own the lights. Every step of a season lease in the order it happens at your house, and what it costs from a small ranch to a big colonial.
The short answer
A Christmas light lease is a season of holiday lighting you rent instead of own. On a LightCast lease, the commercial-grade C9 LED display belongs to us. We design it around your roofline, cut every run to the edge it sits on, hang it in November, fix whatever goes out, and in January we take it down and haul it back to our storage. You pay $18–32 per foot for the season, and the smallest display we lease is $595.
- Measure and design. In autumn, from a photo of your house and then a look on site before anything is ordered.
- Hang in November. The display goes up on clips and stays dark until you want it lit.
- Switch on. You pick the night. Timers run it on your schedule after that.
- Keep it running. Outages during the season are ours to repair.
- Take it down in January. Every run and every clip comes off the house.
- Store it. The lights leave with us, and nothing ends up in your garage.
Who owns the lights and why it matters
On a lease, the lights are ours. That single fact explains almost everything else about how the arrangement works, and it is the real difference between leasing a display and buying boxes of lights at a store.
When you own the lights, you also own every problem that comes with them. You find the dead section on the first cold Saturday in December. You untangle last year's strands on the driveway, hunt for a replacement bulb that matches, and find a shelf in the basement for the bins in January. When we own them, all of that is our job:
- Buying and replacing. The C9 lights, the wire and the clips are our inventory. A failed bulb or a damaged run is replaced from our stock, not bought by you.
- Storage. Between the January takedown and the next November, the display stays with us. Your garage keeps its shelf space.
- Ladders. You never climb to a second-story eave in the cold. Our crews spend the rest of the year on these same fascias and gutters washing siding and cleaning roofs, so roof edges are familiar ground.
Ownership also cuts the other way, and it is worth being clear about. You cannot keep the lights after the season, and you cannot change the bulb colors from your phone halfway through December, because the display is built to a design and it comes back to us in January. If you are selling this winter, a display that comes down in January is one reason a lease can suit you. See Christmas lights when you are selling your house.
Design and custom-cut runs
A leased display starts with your roofline, not a box size. We decide with you which lines to light, usually the main eaves, the front gables and the garage, and which to leave dark. The bulb colors are chosen with you at design time and stay fixed for the season.
The fastest way to start is the LightCast measuring tool. One straight-on photo from the street, a tap on your garage door as the size reference, and it finds the roofline on its own, tallies every peak and valley, and shows a seasonal lease price next to the permanent one. Processing happens in your browser, so the photo is never uploaded. We check the footage in person before we order a single bulb.
Once the lines are set, each run is cut to the length of the edge it covers. A store strand comes in fixed lengths, so it either stops short of a corner or leaves a loop of extra wire stuffed behind a gutter. A custom-cut run ends where the roofline ends and turns cleanly at the peak. Our piece on custom-cut C9 runs versus store strands goes into how that looks after dark.
Two more choices are made at design time:
- How the runs attach. Every run goes up on clips made to protect shingles and gutters. No staples and no nails, ever. The guide to clips versus nails and staples explains why that matters for a Michigan roof.
- Wreaths and garland. These are the only add-ons we offer, quoted together with the display.
November install and dark until you say
Leased displays go up in November. The reason is practical: hanging lights is ladder work along the eaves and gables, and it goes better on dry fascia and unfrozen ground than on the icy edges a Michigan December brings. A display that is already on the house when the first real snow arrives is one less thing to worry about.
Hanging in November does not mean lighting in November. The display can hang dark until you decide to switch it on. Some households light the night after Thanksgiving, some wait for the first of December, and some want it on the day it goes up. On a lease that is your call, not the install date's.
Once you switch it on, timers run it. We configure the timers to the on and off times you choose, so nobody has to plug it in each evening or unplug it before bed.
Because the install window is short and every leased house needs its own date, the calendar fills in order. Earlier callers pick their day, and later callers choose from what is left. The Macomb Power Washing Solutions blog covers when to schedule a holiday light install in more detail.
Outages during the season
C9 LEDs are sturdy, but a roofline in a Michigan winter is a hard place for anything. Across a season, the usual problems look like this:
- A single bulb that stops lighting or cracks.
- A section of run that wind or ice has pulled loose from its clips.
- A timer that stops switching on schedule.
- A connection at the power end that trips or works loose.
On a lease, all of these are ours to repair. You call, we come back out and fix it, and there is no separate bill, because the lights, the clips and the timers are still our property. That is a large part of what the per-foot price pays for.
The one thing we ask is that you leave the ladder in the garage. A loose run on a second-story eave in January is not worth a fall, and it is exactly the kind of work the lease is meant to take off your hands.
January takedown and storage
In January we take the display down. Every run comes off, every clip comes off, and the timers go with us. Because nothing was stapled or nailed, the shingles, gutters and fascia are left the way they were before the lights went up.
From there the lights go into our storage for the off-season. You do not coil anything, box anything or find room for it. You skip the cold January afternoon of taking strands down yourself.
If you are wondering how late is too late to have lights up in general, the Macomb Power Washing Solutions blog has a guide on when to take Christmas lights down. On a lease you do not have to watch the date yourself, because the takedown is part of the season.
What a lease costs
A LightCast lease costs $18–32 per foot per season, and the smallest season we lease is $595. The price covers the design, the custom-cut runs and clips, the November install, repairs during the season, the January takedown and storage. Roofline shape moves a house inside the band. Long straight eaves on one story sit near the bottom, while several peaks, a second-story eave and a roofline that breaks every few feet push toward the top.
| Lit roofline | Lease, per season | Lease, 5 seasons |
|---|---|---|
| 60 ft | $1,100–$1,900 | $5,500–$9,500 |
| 80 ft | $1,400–$2,600 | $7,000–$13,000 |
| 100 ft | $1,800–$3,200 | $9,000–$16,000 |
| 120 ft | $2,200–$3,800 | $11,000–$19,000 |
| 150 ft | $2,700–$4,800 | $13,500–$24,000 |
| 200 ft | $3,600–$6,400 | $18,000–$32,000 |
What the minimum means for a small roofline
If your display prices below it at the per-foot rate, the season is billed at $595. Every row in the table already sits above that figure, so the minimum only matters for displays well short of 60 feet: a single garage eave, a porch roof, or one front gable on its own. A ranch front in Macomb Township, which usually runs 60 to 80 feet, clears it without trying.
If your plan does land under the minimum, look at it as room to add a line. You pay the minimum either way, so lighting the garage gable or a second eave may cost little or nothing more. Trace both versions in manual mode on the tool and compare the two seasonal numbers.
If you expect to stay in the house for several Decembers, read the honest downsides of permanent lights and the five-year lease and permanent comparison before you choose, because the lease column repeats every year and the permanent one does not.
To see your own seasonal number, run your house through the measuring tool and switch the tool to the seasonal C9 plan. When it looks right, request a lease estimate, and you will hear back to confirm it within 24 hours. November dates go to the earliest callers.
Questions about this
Can I keep the lights at the end of the season?
No. On a lease the C9 lights, clips and timers belong to us, and they come down in January and go back into our storage. If you want lights that stay on the house and change color from your phone, that is our permanent roofline lighting, which is a separate product priced per lit foot, installed once.
Does the lease renew automatically each year?
No. Each season is its own lease. Call in autumn, since November dates go to the earliest callers.
Can I change when the lights turn on and off each night?
Yes. The timers are configured when the display goes up, so it turns on and off on the schedule you choose without anyone plugging it in each night.