How Property Managers and Landlords Can Stop Running or Leaking Toilet Conditions from Happening in Their Tenants’ Units! (LeakBird)

Dec.11, 2008 in Prop Management, Running Toilets, Water Bills, Water Conservation, Water Industry, Water Leak Detection, Water Rates

(Photo Courtesy of Treehugger.com via AP/David Zalubowski)

Tenants who fail to report leaking or running toilets to Landlords or property managers cause water billing nightmares. Usually, the best a Landlord can do is figure out in which unit the leaking toilet condition occurred, schedule a plumber to fix the problem, foot the exorbitant water bill, then if he’s lucky have one of his minions file the paperwork (bill showing increase in usage, receipt for plumbing work, goods, et cet.) for a possible 50% refund in two or three months from his local water utility, as is the case in San Francisco, home to LeakBird.

Landlords have a few ways they can prepare or prevent this from happening, though, according to our research and the fact that we’re in the industry, most Landlords take an ad hoc, wait-and-see approach, which takes something in the form of the process above.

So, here are a few suggestions for preventing a running or leaking toilet condition from occurring at all, or at least stopping it before it’s too late:

Get Out of The Property Management Business. If you’re not in the business, no need to worry.
Don’t Have Tenants. If you don’t have tenants, then you won’t have to worry about them not reporting running toilets to you.
Don’t Have Toilets. Toilets run, that’s a given, but if you don’t have them, they won’t. (We’ll assume these first three methods aren’t an option for you. ;-) )
Schedule Regular (weekly, monthly, quarterly, bi-annually) Inspections of Your Water Meters or Your Tenants’ Premises (Toilets). You could regularly check your buildings’ building-wide master-meters for anomalous jumps in water usage. This requires a lot of management time and meter or plumbing expertise. Your tenants don’t like to be checked on or hassled.
Educate or Incentivize Your Tenants to Report a Running or Leaking Toilet Condition. The dye test is the most popular recommendation or suggestion on the part of water utilities and water managers. We don’t think it’s very popular with property managers. You basically administer drops of coloring into your toilet tank and if they leak through into the toilet bowl after a few minutes, then you have a running or leaking toilet condition. Many utilities give these packets away for free. Obviously, people are lazy and don’t have the time to do the dye test on their toilets regularly (if you’re going to do it, we recommend that you do it monthly or quarterly), so this method isn’t very effective. There is a myriad of ways you could incentivize your tenants’ to report a running toilet, though. You could give them $25 off their rent, for example, if they reported a running toilet to you that indeed did prove to be a severe case. Of course, we haven’t heard of anyone doing this effectively, though who’s to say a campaign like this wouldn’t work! Tenants love perks, and basically you’d be paying them $25 to stop what could be a $1000 or $2000 problem!
Install Wireless Ultrasonic or Paddlewheel Sub-Metering or Individual Unit Leak Detection Metering Technology. This system, usually called a Flow Meter System, does work. Some examples are Global Water’s Paddlewheel Flow Meters or UE Systems’ Ultrasonic Leak Detection technology. However, these options come with an exorbitant price tag, at minimum $400 per individual unit, and this doesn’t include other fees or the cost of a skilled technician splicing sophisticated metering technology into your rough plumbing. A time-consuming task, as well. However, as water rates continue to rise, methods such as these will increase in their viability.
Have Your Tenant Pay for The Water Bill. If you have the option, put it in the rental agreement. Bill your tenants for their water usage. This will certainly galvinize them to action, and if it doesn’t, well, at least you’re not footing the bill. However, if there’s already a precedent established or if this makes it difficult for you to find tenants in a competitive market, this may be difficult if not impossible to do. As a side note, in some municipalities, the Landlord has to pay for the water, and this often depends on when the building was built and/or bought. You should look into your local laws and codes.
Install the LeakBird™ Running Toilet Leak Detector. We’ll be telling you a lot more about LeakBird in the coming months. However, let’s just say it’s the most viable leak detection system for running or leaking toilets that we’ve heard of, as it virtually guarantees that you’ll have no more surprise, exorbitant water bills, and the cost is a third of other sub-metering options. To learn more, email us at ben@leakbird.com or jordan@leakbird.com.

If you are interested in How You Can Increase Your Cash Flows by $2,500.00 Every Year and Never Pay for High Water Bills Due to Your Tenants’ Running Toilets, sign up for our Free Report here.

Abendigo Reebs is the VP of Business Development for LeakBird Industries LLC in San Francisco, CA. He may be reached by email at ben@leakbird.com

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