water/sewer bill

[Damian Gawle]

Hi all!

Looking into buying  a 3 family in the springfield ma area.  Anyone have any ideas on the avg monthly water/sewer bill in that area?  I have looking for multi families for a while now but seems water/sewer costs are all over the map.

Also ,this property i am currently looking at, a 3 family legally but have been used as a two family.  First floor is currently rented as a 3 bedroom for 850 a month (below market value) and the 2nd and third floors have been rented together as a 5 bed room (3 on second and 2 on third).  My dilema is that the utilities are not seperate on 2nd and 3rd floors.  my realtor said to just lower the second floors rent and have them pick up the electricity and hot water.  She said this is common practice... Is it?  Please Let me know what you think.

Thanks!

[Vahe Ohannessian]

Damian, I'm in a similar situation where a 2-family is being converted to condos while there's only one water meter. I've looked everywhere for a solution and this is the best I found - it's a sub-metering system that can be installed so that you know who is using how much, and you can monitor remotely: http://www.ekmmetering.com/remote-water-and-or-gas...

You'll have to find someone savvy enough to install it, but the system is a few hundred bucks, well worth the investment to avoid the headaches.

I haven't installed the water sub-meter yet so I can't say how easy or difficult the process is but it looks promising.

Good luck.