Backup power for the Palm Beach County home — including the months you’re not in it

A whole-home generator in Palm Beach County costs $11,000–$17,000, installed and permitted. It starts itself when the grid drops, runs the air conditioning, the fridge, the well pump and the lights, and shuts down when the grid returns. The range is wide because the price isn’t the generator — it’s the site.

We publish the numbers other sites won’t: what the permit costs, what the fuel line costs, what the concrete pad costs, and what the install costs — city by city, in Palm Beach County.

And we tell you what we don’t know yet, instead of guessing.

Why the national averages will mislead you

Most generator sites quote a national average of $5,154, all-in. That number is 8 years out of date, it excludes the transfer switch, the fuel connection, the concrete pad and the permit, and it comes from a market where the housing stock is newer and the lots are bigger.

Palm Beach County has one of the oldest generator fleets in the country, some of the tightest setbacks in the state, and a permitting process that varies city to city. A national average tells you nothing about the price in Boynton Beach.

Figures last reviewed November 2026 · Sources: see ‘How we get our numbers’ on the About page.

What an outage does to an empty house

Palm Beach County has about 1.6 million people, and about 1 in 4 of them are 65 or older. A lot of those homes sit empty for months at a time — the owners are up north, or they’re seasonal residents who spend the summer somewhere else. When the power goes out in one of those houses, nobody notices. The fridge warms up. The air conditioning stops. The humidity climbs. And the mold starts.

By the time someone opens the door, the damage is done — and the insurance claim is a fight.

A whole-home generator doesn’t just keep the lights on. It keeps the house dry. It keeps the fridge cold. It keeps the air conditioning running so the humidity doesn’t climb. And it does it whether you’re home or not.

Read more: what an outage does to a vacant Florida home.

And if you’re not in the house to hear it start, you need to know it started. That’s what remote monitoring does — it tells you the generator is running, and it tells you if it isn’t.

Read more: remote monitoring.

What does it cost in your city?

Permit fees, fuel lines and setbacks are city rules, not county rules. So the price in Boynton Beach isn’t the price in Boca Raton.

• Boynton Beach generator cost
• Delray Beach generator cost
• Boca Raton generator cost
• Wellington generator cost
• West Palm Beach generator cost
• Jupiter generator cost

Or start with the full Palm Beach County cost breakdown.

The two ways to use this site

Door A — join the consultation request list. You give us your ZIP code and a few details about your home, and when the installer partner is in place and scheduling opens, you’re among the first to hear. We don’t promise a date, and we don’t pretend this is a booking. Join the consultation request list.

Door B — get the free Cost Guide by email. The full installed-cost breakdown, what each line item covers, and the questions to ask before you sign — by email, when the guide is ready. Send me the Cost Guide.

Not sure what size you’d need?

The two most common whole-home sizes in the county are 22kW and 26kW — and the difference isn’t the house size, it’s the air conditioning.

Read more: how to size a generator.

What a whole-home generator is — and isn’t

Palm Beach Backup Power is an information and referral site. We publish the numbers, the rules, and the costs — and when the installer partner is in place, we refer you to a licensed installer for the work. We don’t install generators, and we don’t sell them. What we do is make the decision legible: what it costs, what the permit costs, what the fuel line costs, and what to ask before you sign. If you want us to tell you what size you need, or what brand to buy, we can’t — that’s what the installer does, after they’ve seen your house.