Tenant got charged $3000 water bill! What would you do/recommend?

Question

Hi guys!

My tenant of a year is having an issue with the city. The tenant recently got a $3000 water bill, and their normal usage is $300-$400. I called a local plumbing company to inspect and do a leak detection test and found no leaks. The city came out to the property and checked the meter and determined there was no leaks. So after a water bill adjustment, the city is still charging the tenant $2200 for the water bill. Is there anything I need to do? What should I recommend to my tenant? Any help, suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Katie Miller · Answer

@Quan Chau whoa!! My favorite suggestion is always to first check that they aren't hiding a grow house somewhere in the unit. Living in Colorado, this is always a fun conversation topic! Second, maybe the bill was backdated and the city didn't charge a few (or a lot of?) previous months?

Quan Chau · Answer

@Katie Miller that was my reaction! I checked the property and no grow house on the property. And the bill was only for 1 bill cycle!

Deanna O. · Answer

Oh, and DO take a pic of the meter to make sure it was read accurately -- earlier this year our meter person came up with a reading on our meter that had it running backward. Needless to say, even our useless water department figured out that was a mistake. My parent have had the problem where their meter was hard to read, so the water dept would just put "1 unit" for months at a time, then suddenly "17 units" when they could finally read it. Problem was, above a certain level each unit cost more. If that is what was going on, possibly your tenants $35 bill was just way too low all year.

Deanna O. · Answer

Next-door neighbor had that issue -- turned out to be a bad valve on the sprinkler system. The "turn everything off" tests didn't show that type of leak. If the little triangle stays still when everything is "off", it's not an underground leak before the house. A few drops of food coloring in each toilet tank will "flush out" a leaky flapper valve (though seriously, just replace those every 1-2 years - few $, 5-10 min each, easy DIY task). Run the sprinklers for a few minutes, read the meter and calculate out to see if the usage is high. Check to make sure the sprinklers didn't get set to have extra cycles (though THAT much extra watering would generally show...). Depending on the soil, a broken irrigation pipe underground may not show up as a soggy spot; here in the desert CA a patch of unusually happy enthusiastic plants = leak.

Quan Chau · Answer

@Anthony Angotti the city did come out and checked the meter and determined there’s no leaks. They did not check the connections since they said the meter was working properly and has no leaks.

Nathan Gesner · Answer

The most likely culprit is a toilet that runs or flushes regularly. These eat up thousands of gallons in a month. I'm really surprised the plumber didn't mention this.

Philip Coiro · Answer

@Quan Chau

I just had a similar issue with the water company in Pittsburgh as a vacant house I had on the market got very high readings. They sent out a tech to check the meter and said everything was fine. I said nobody is here using any water?!! They didn’t care. My wife called back and gave them hell and like a miracle they admitted they found a lose wire and we’re going to credit back the bill.

Tenant got charged $3000 water bill! What would you do/recommend?

Tenant got charged $3000 water bill! What would you do/recommend?

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