Fort Leonard Wood, MO · Member since 2018 · 62 posts · 20 votes
Ok so there was a water leak about 5 feet from the meter outside of the home. The tenant notified me of the leak 27 Jan and it was fixed 3 Feb. I spoke with the water company and the leak began during the billing cycle between 20NOV - 20DEC. The bill was issued early January. Her bill at the time was 229, indicating a leak. She did not inform me until she received her second high bill from the cycle from 20DEC -20JAN, receiving the 514.92 bill end of January. I will agree to pay the first bill and for the usage from 27 Jan - 3 Feb ( when leak was fixed) but do not agree with paying for the remainder. My justification is due to the fact that her inability to pay her bills on time resulted in the leak being undetected for approximately a month! Am I right or wrong?
The first bill isn't high enough to have her concerned. The second bill is. She notified you as soon as she knew about the water leak. If the utility company will work with her, she may be able to not have to pay the bill, as there was a repair needed. If the bill does need to be paid, it is your responsibility as the property owner to come to a meeting of the minds on this. After all, it is your property, and hence your leak.
I think calling the utility company and seeing if they can work with you on the bill should be attempted first. Then if there is an amended bill you can focus on next steps. From your description it sounds like this was mechanical failure or perhaps a faulty installation issue with the water meter and it resulted in an unusually high water bill. The tenant did not install the water meter, I assume? Tenants sometimes pay their bills late, they forget, or maybe they pay 2 months at a time, things happen, it is not their fault that the water meter failed. They didn't provide you with a warranty on the water meter, did they?
@Dan H., your water bill is about $500?! I live in the Desert of California as well with 2,500 sq. ft., family of 5, 3 dogs, 2 cats, 16 chickens, veggie garden and grass in front and back and mine is usually $150 during the summer. Do you trend average for your area according to your bill? That sounds like nightmare.
Our highest for the year is over $600/month. Our tenants in multi family are over $200/month on the lowest months. Water is very expensive here. It comes all the way from the Colorado River. I suspect San Diego’s water likely is transported further than virtually anywhere in the US. A lot of miles of aqueduct, losing water every mile. Then local water storage in reservoirs created by large, expensive dams.
Geez, some people need to calm down. The guy just came here apparently looking for advice and it seems like several people took it personal or something and jumped on him for some reason.
I can’t believe you’ve actually got people trying to blame this on his “lack of up keep on the home” or him not inspecting the home’s pipes. (What exactly do you “keep up” on water pipes and who the heck inspects their below grade water pipes on a regular basis?)
Then we’ve got some calling him names (whiner) and others declaring him irresponsible and summarily deciding that he is 100% wrong (without ever having read his lease or likely knowing much about his local laws I might add). Really?
Sometimes leaks just happen. It doesn’t have to be someone’s fault.
Bottom line, it sounds like he was just here to find a fair solution and, from the sounds of it, he ended up doing just that as he said the tenant was satisfied with what he ended up offering.
So good for you for taking it all @Robert Kough. Hopefully some of the advice you got was helpful. (Now I’ll probably get flamed for this post but oh well. That’s how online forums are sometimes.)
Your first mistake was letting the tenant control the water bill and PU it directly. In almost every county in the US, an unpaid water bill can become a lien and attach itself to the property. Smart and deadbeat tenants know this and if they decide to rabbit, it’s the least thing they worry about. My recommendation is to have the water bill in your/your managements name and bill the tenant for the actual usage. This way you can see if there is an unusual spike in usage that could an indicator of a major leak or just a running toilet etc.
Most times property owners responsibility starts on the house side of the meter. If it breaks or leaks and you have a high bill, you should call your water utility and request and adjustment or set a date for a hearing with them to review the usage and present the repair bills. Most times they will make some accommodations to offset the higher cost vs the average seasonal bill over the last year. Most tenants are poor managers of their money and a situation like this is difficult to manage for them. Work with them and the utility company to get the bill reduced to a reasonable level.
@BOB CRANEY great advice. The water company didn’t budge but tenant and I came to a 50/50 split of bill. She admitted to not notifying me on time and not paying her bills on time which are both explicitly stated in lease agreement. I like your idea. I will incorporate that into my business asap. Thank you.
hi Robert this happened to me already all you have to do is give the utility company the repair bill for the pipe and they will probably reduce the bill to what it’s suppose to be. This happened to me before and I’m actually going through it again on another property
This is an owner responsibility item. Just because it took her some time to realize what was going on doesn't make her responsible. I have had a leaking toilet that took a couple of billing cycles to really show up on the water bill. This kind of thinking breeds ill will and doesn't promote long term tenants. I would consider a reward system for your tenant for paying their rent on time, keeping their units in good condition and just being a good neighbor. Perhaps a lunch n learn with your tenants on what to look for in their units so that this type of thing is caught much earlier. Bring value and contribution. It goes it a lot further in the long run.
@Kyle J. Thanks for that! I just wanted some advice haha. So it was completely resolved. The tenant broke two articles of the lease, which she admitted to. Ultimately we worked out a 50/50 split for the water bill. Which she agreed was definitely fair.
I think people perceived that I had the intention of screwing her over. Not sure
Side note: i payed 100% of cost to fix leak. Which i know is my responsibility. I dont know if that was clear.
Thanks again man. You and a few others brought back some hope that id get solid advise from reasonable people here on BP forums.
@Robert Kough this happened to me recently but the tenant informed me as soon as they knew. So we fixed it and paid a portion of the high water bill for the month it was high. It’s your responsibility to fix but because she informed you so late, the bills she had for the months after the first sign there was a leak, are hers to pay imo.
@Robert Kough did the water company not issue anything? Usually if there’s a leak and your meter is constantly running, the city will send a letter informing the resident. Sometimes I takes a month to discover but it took your tenant two. See if you can find out if the city sent her a notice of the water meter running, that would help justify your charging her and prove she neglected to inform you
@Jonathan Watt that’s exactly what we did. I paid initial bill she payed the bill she was late on. Also, i paid the entire cost to fix of course. Sucks but worked out. Thanks for your input man.
This thread illustrates some of the differences in how things are done in different parts of the country. For instance, in many parts of the country, the owner is ultimately responsible for the water bill being paid so the owner can have knowledge of the amount of the bill
However, in many parts of the country this is not the case. For example, in the towns I own property in Texas, the tenant initiates the account with the city and I as the landlord have no access to their account and zero responsibility for the bill. It seems like this is the case here
So now we have a repair to the waterline. I am a little stunned with those who indicate the landlord did not properly maintain the waterline. Exactly how do you do that when a line is a couple of feet under ground in the south and can be 10 feet underground in the north? The answer is......they can't
Personally, I do place the responsibility on the tenant to notify of the issue as explained earlier. How else would I possibly know? I value my money and if my bill went from $60 to $219 it would surely catch my eye. Saying that, I would offer to meet somewhere in the middle or just north of the middle
I have an Overuse of Utilities clause in my lease agreement specifically for this unforeseen situation. If you neglected to protect yourself in the lease, then you the owner are responsible.
I know the situation is a tough pill to swallow, but chalk this up as an expensive learning fee and update your lease to protect yourself in the future.
"Upon them knowing" Sounds like actual knowledge to me, which she did not have, so your statement that "[t]his did not happen" is unsupported by the facts.
But then again, I'm just a lawyer, so what would I possibly know about contract interpretation? Stop whining.
@John Clark she admitted to knowing before she contacted me( for longer than 24 hrs). Again, you are wrong. Have a good one. I may have left out some important info but instead of assuming you know all just ask. If she didn’t already admit to knowing ahead of time you may have a case. Looks like you lost this one john. Thanks for your admit attention to the issue.
@John Clark the situation developed along with this thread. We are splitting 50/50. And like i said before. After she reviewed the lease and admitted to not abiding by two sections she agreed it was completely fair. Again i believe this was after she sought legal counsel.
Side note: i paid for entire cost to fix leak. I obviously knew this was my responsibility as owner.
"I am a little stunned with those who indicate the landlord did not properly maintain the waterline. " --------------------------------
Not a question of the landlord "properly maintaining" the water line, it's a question of allocation of loss/responsibility after the inevitable decay/damage/loss occurs. It's a structural problem, and therefore the landlord's responsibility. It's called "risk." SHOULD the tenant have told him of a suspected leak when she got the first bill (and by the way, we don't know what her previous bills were -- the poster said that water "usually" ran about 50 or 60 "around here"), perhaps, but we don't know what the difference is between her regular bill and the $216 bill. It may not have been enough to put her on notice. At $500+, she immediately relayed her suspicions.
So where did she go wrong? I won't finger the tenant based on a landlord's guesstimate of what a normal bill is, let alone what her normal bill is, particularly where the landlord is trying to lay off his responsibility for structural maintenance. I am not being unreasonable here. He is.
We have established here that this account is the tenants water account correct? Therefore the tenant made an agreement for payment with the municipality to be 100% responsible for the water bill. The owner is not on the account in this case although we understand this may different in other parts of the country
When the tenant received the initial bill, they were then informed of the difference in the amount of the bill. Whether they read it at that time is on no consequence under the law correct?
@John Clark you continue to disregard what I am saying. SHE CONTACTED ME STATING THERE WAS A LEAK AND ADMITTED SHE DID SO LATE!!!! Lol. Hope that clears it up.
They ultimately came up with a solution that both were happy with, so anything further is really just for the sake of an academic discussion.
One thought that I had was did she have renters insurance? It sounds like a building system failure caused damage to the tenant (By way of water bill). If it leaked into the basement and damaged her belongings they would have covered that. They would have covered loss of use or any of the other things. This does sounds like a loss to her that may be an insurance item. Of course if she has a $500 deductible it wouldn't be worth it.