NEED HELP!! ASAP! WATER ISSUE AT APARTMENT BUILDING! PLEASE!

Multi-Family and Apartment Investing
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NEED HELP!! ASAP! WATER ISSUE AT APARTMENT BUILDING! PLEASE!

Nik S.
OH · Member since 2014 · 454 posts · 227 votes

Hi everyone! I am in a big jam, here's my situation....

One of my recent aquistions was a 12 unit apartment building. After the 1st month, I received an astronomical high water bill/sewer. Where I purchased this building, the water bill can be $300 and the sewer bill is $900 (EPA mandates blah blah).... The building was trending between 27-55 CF's per month.. Since I received the more than double bill, I had the PM schedule a unit inspection the next day to check for water leaks. The guys found nothing major, few leaky showers and/or faucets/toilets.....nothing major. The next bill I received was 122 cf's. This month just read @ 145 cf's....

Besides all the money I'm spending on these high water bills eating profits, I CAN'T FIND ANY LEAKS!

I am lost what to do....I have checked all units, no one has complained about water issues or leaks from above units etc.

I feel helpless and a bit worried as to what to do. The only thing I changed/upgraded was putting in NEW washer/dryers which are MUCH more efficient than the last ones.

Can anyone please advise me as this problem is constant and I have no clue what to do.

The water is entering my building therefore being metered. My usage of water has now tripled in comparison the buildings last 1 year usage.

Any suggestions/help/advice would be greatly appreciated.

The building is located in Akron, Ohio

Thank you.

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Jon Holdman
Rental Property Investor · Mercer Island, WA · Member since 2008 · 22k+ posts · 14k+ votes
11y

The water meters in use here have a small spinning piece on them that will show movement with even the slightest amount flow.  Does yours?  Can you see it?  If so, start by making sure everything is shut off in every unit.  Then check the meter.  If you have movement, something is flowing.  If each unit has a shutoff, close all those. Still have movement?  Its something in the lines between the meter and the shutoffs.  That can be tough to find because its very possible the problem is a buried line.  You may just have to start digging.

OTOH, if shutting off all the units stops the meter, then turn them on one at a time until it starts moving.  That's your culprit.  Something as simple as a leaky toilet can dump a LOT of water.  There are colored tablets you can drop in the tanks.  If there's leakage, you'll see color in the bowl.

You say:

I think you're too quick to discount these "not major" leaks.  I had ONE leaky toilet that by itself dumped over $100 of water down the drain over the course of a month. This was in no way gushing.  If the house was quite and you listened closely you could hear a slight trickle.  If you watched the water closely in the bowl you could see very slight movement.  A "few" leaky showers, faucets, and toilets could well be dumping a lot of water.

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  • Steve Olafson
    Scottsdale, AZ · Member since 2014 · 659 posts · 536 votes
    11y

    Any updates? 

    0Reply
  • Nik S.
    OP
    OH · Member since 2014 · 454 posts · 227 votes
    11y

    @Steve Olafson 

    Appreciate the interest! Here's what I have done so far.

    1. *Replaced the meter (this Tuesday they are doing the meter test in which I'll be present for)
    2. *Locked the utility room and restricted access to the washer as it was the ONLY variable that was changed in the equation
    3. *Dyed ALL toilets and found about (4) total that were either running or had slow/silent leaks. 2 of the toilet replacements/repairs will be finished by tomorrow.

    Prior to the above activities, I was trending at a daily rate of 4 cubic ft per 24 hours.

    I am NOW currently trending at an average of 2.25 cubic ft per 24 hours. After completing the toilet replacement & toilet rebuild (tomorrow), I will then see if the water consumption continues to go lower. IF it goes lower, I will then re-open the laundry room.

    I am VERY interested to see where this goes... I am now between the leaky toilets AND/OR something wrong with the water line going TO the washer. Also the meter test will be another part of the elimination process.

    I am hoping to have this issue handled within 1.5 weeks. Stand by!

    Thanks all!

      1Reply
    1. Nik S.
      OP
      OH · Member since 2014 · 454 posts · 227 votes
      11y

      ***FINAL UPDATE***

      Well BP's the problem has been SOLVED! Here's how it went down.

      Went to the "water meter test", go figure the water meter tested accurately! Upon talking with the technician, he mentioned that he would come out to the property to take a look. When he arrived he then was nice enough to call his foreman.

      The foreman went thru ALL the units (12) and pointed out toilets that were causing the issue. Some toilets had slow leaks, 1 tank was leaking. I replaced 2 toilets & rebuilt 6 others. FluidMaster fill valve's were the foreman's recommendation & FluidMaster flappers. A lot of toilets needed a new flapper.  

      From trending at 4.5 HCF's a day, we are now down to 1-1.25 HCF's per day........

      LESSON LEARNED

       Thank you ALL for the help & support!

      I learned a lot about toilets & leaks this time, looking forward to tackle the NEXT adventure.

      1Reply
    2. Dennis Wilson
      Maumee, OH · Member since 2015 · 1 post · 0 votes
      11y

      We have a similar problem on a double wide trailer where we have an old meter and a fairly new remote sending unit.  The tenant is a traveling nurse and lives by herself so usage should actually be minimal (FYI, according to our local water department 1-person household uses 100-300 cubic feet per month).  But for the last 2 years the monthly bills have shown usage of 500-1500cf! 

      And as far as we can determine there are no leaks anywhere!   We have checked the toilets (usually the culprit in these situations), every faucet inside and out and can't find any problems (nor can we hear any water running anywhere).

      We even paid to have an outside plumbing contractor's crew check it out and they couldn't find anything wrong either.

      It's all very frustrating and of course killing our bottom line.

       But we may finally be on to an explanation.

      I decided to check the water department's calculations and accidently clicked liters instead of gallons. Voila! Suddenly using the 3.785 conversion of liters to gallons the bills made a lot more sense.

      But how can this be? A wrong mechanical setting at the meter? An error in the Sending or Remote reading unit?  We are still checking but getting the information is difficult.  If anyone has an idea on this we'd love to hear from you.

      Dennis

      PS We are trying to find out who made our Sending unit. There is no name, sn or model, just a label that shows 91508 over a bar code and 08202449 below it.  (my bar code scanner says this lower # is the actual UPC )  We can't find anything via a Google search. Does anyone have an idea as to who makes this unit?

      0Reply
    3. Barbara G.
      Hartsdale, NY · Member since 2015 · 874 posts · 218 votes
      11y
      Originally posted by @Rocky V.:

      I would also recommend dropping food coloring into the tanks of toilets and seeing if you notice it in the bowls.  There may be a small leak from your tank to bowl connections. 

      =======================================================================

      I would also examine all the flappers and the tanks and ask the water company to tell you exactly what to look for inside the tanks.  How old are the toilets?  Can you ask the water company to send over a rep/technician to accompany you when you look at each of the 12 tanks?

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    4. Barbara G.
      Hartsdale, NY · Member since 2015 · 874 posts · 218 votes
      11y

      Sorry I did not realize there were 5 pages and that you had solved the problem on page 5.  I answered when I was on page 1.  

      So it was the flappers after all.  We had the same problem in a duplex we owned and it was the flappers also.

      1Reply
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