Before I was out of town for 1+ month in January-March (snow months), I shut off the main valve. However, the subsequent city water bill still showed a non-trivial water usage (6 CCF). I checked and didn't find any in-house water leakage. Is the water in the sun pump included in the water bill, since my sun pump is operating frequently?
Rental Property Investor · Cedar Park, TX · Member since 2014 · 414 posts · 272 votes
7y
You didn't say this was a single-family home. Consider this scenario, which happened on the first property I bought, many years ago. My townhome was an end unit in a newly built row of four. Another single guy lived in the other end unit.
When I went on vacation, I had an unexpected water bill. As it turned out, the meters had been marked wrong after construction, and the two of us paid for each other's water for months -- maybe a year. Only the vacation made our bills different enough for the error to be discovered.
If the meter clearly was yours, consider a leak between the meter and your main valve. To check for this, turn off the main valve again in the evening. Then read the meter carefully. In the morning, read the meter again before turning on the valve. If you see any usage, you must have a leak.
Also, the meter itself probably has a valve, which may not be the one you turned off. You could experiment with the result of turning off that meter valve.
Your sump pump should be expelling ground water that has migrated to the basement or crawl space. Barring a leak in a pipe, that water should not be coming from the water utility, so it should not affect your bill.
Rental Property Investor · Jersey City, NJ · Member since 2011 · 1k+ posts · 876 votes
7y
I don't know what a sun pump is, but 4500 gal is a lot of water! Is the meter in your house? Have you had it checked? Only scenario I see is if your main valve was leaky and you had a running toilet.
Rental Property Investor · Cedar Park, TX · Member since 2014 · 414 posts · 272 votes
7y
You didn't say this was a single-family home. Consider this scenario, which happened on the first property I bought, many years ago. My townhome was an end unit in a newly built row of four. Another single guy lived in the other end unit.
When I went on vacation, I had an unexpected water bill. As it turned out, the meters had been marked wrong after construction, and the two of us paid for each other's water for months -- maybe a year. Only the vacation made our bills different enough for the error to be discovered.
If the meter clearly was yours, consider a leak between the meter and your main valve. To check for this, turn off the main valve again in the evening. Then read the meter carefully. In the morning, read the meter again before turning on the valve. If you see any usage, you must have a leak.
Also, the meter itself probably has a valve, which may not be the one you turned off. You could experiment with the result of turning off that meter valve.
Your sump pump should be expelling ground water that has migrated to the basement or crawl space. Barring a leak in a pipe, that water should not be coming from the water utility, so it should not affect your bill.
Rental Property Investor · Indiana...mostly · Member since 2019 · 468 posts · 245 votes
7y
It should not be your sump pump. Sump pumps typically pump ground water from rainfall.
The common culprit is that water is leaking from the toilet tank into the toilet bowl, slowly but steadily, and you don't notice it.
The next thing I'd consider is a leak underground between the water meter and wherever the water line enters the house. Sometimes these show up with greener than normal spots in the lawn or soft wet ground, depending on your area and how deep the water line is buried. Like Bob H said, if there is a main shutoff valve in the house turn it off. If the meter still shows usage then surely it's a leak between the house and the meter, underground. In my area the meters have little red triangle objects inside the glass covered meter gauge. If that triangle is rotating around, spinning around, then water is being used.
I looked again at your post and it appears you already had the main valve shutoff. So I think it's a water line leak. At least that's what I'd think in my area.