Dispersing the Water bill

[Miles Peck]

I have 25 units in West Burlington Iowa. The units are split up between 3 separate buildings. Each building has 1 water meter. I have been paying each water bill since I have owned the apartments. I would like to find a way to make that part of the tenants responsibility. I know it is possible to just put in multiple city water meters, but I think that would be expensive. How do I charge the tenants for water when I don’t know how much each unit is using? Thanks for any feedback.

[Tj Hines]

@Miles Peck can you potentially implement RUBS? What is the competition doing? Are they billing their tenants back a portion of the water bill? It's very important to know this. If the competition is billing back the tenants then there may be opportunity for you to do the same. If the competition aren't billing back their tenants, does it make sense for you to bill them? If you do bill them back, could that potentially affect your occupancy? Do you have a property manager? Or are you self managing? If you do have a PM they may be able to conduct some simple market research for you, if not then you should hit the ground with your boots and mystery shop the competition