They are not trying to power their home, but cut down on their utility bill over time, so it isn’t stupid. That being said that a communal set of panels going to a central battery that you can pull off of and pay for excess power needed or a tenant sub wired array would be good, but their rental agreements would have to be changed by so much that it would literally take laws to make it work. Through their point of view is they are renting you the space and service some but not all, and sometimes none, of the features in the space. You literally own the flooring and the furniture and when you leave you take it with you or you sell it to the new tenant. So it is seen as roofing and walls/windows belong to the landlord and the rental agreements don’t have rights to it and if they gave you rights to it you would have to rent the roof and return it to its prior state when you moved.
I watched several documentaries over the years that said it is because at the time Football Clubs were referred to as Social Clubs and the team was just part of the Social Club. The clubs were referred to as “Socs” pronounced like the footwear Socks, and the Teams would play what was referred to a s “Soccer” as in Sock-er. Then this got exported to various people in North America, mostly from the South and West of England. Then it fell out of usage in England but no one told us over here in North America so we kept using the term.