Actually, Cummins/Onan makes a line of quiet, smaller generators in diesel, propane, natural gas, etc. that I've personally seen working very well in diesel RV's. The RV generators are from 3200W to 10kW and can be plugged into a house system quite easily. There are also permanently mounted residential generators from 11kW to 45kW but the prices get prohibitive quickly.

As for solar, a decent solar installation absolutely can supply residential needs *if* your home is designed for it. Almost all modern homes in the US can't function without central air, use lots of power to overcome awful thermal design, and are not candidates for solar or most sorts of off-grid power. Normally, the solar *is* the hot water heater as solar does a fantastic job of that. Once you've got decent shades minimizing incident sunlight on your high-R windows and better insulation installed in your walls and attic/ground interfaces, a high-efficiency heat pump can supply your home's moderate cooling needs.

If you're using solar without a battery, you're on the grid and running the meter backwards during the day. It's an extraordinarily bad plan to use plain solar to directly drive your 110V circuits. The moment the transient load exceeds the transient supply, your breakers would all go. If you expect to run detached from the grid, an appropriately sized battery bank is not optional.

Strange thing about the US. Home construction here is absolutely terrible. If you don't spend a lot of money, you get a small, cheaply made, stick-built home. If you do spend a lot of money, you get a large, cheaply made, stick-built home. You need to provide a rather extraordinarily large degree of effort to get anything better. Or buy something made more than forty years ago.