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Expenses
Why do most landlords pay the water bill in a rental unit?
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I pay the water bills for two reasons:
(1) I own multi-family properties and they are not separately metered.
(2) It is local custom here for landlords to pay for water. Even if I were to incur the expense to separately meter each unit, I would be at a competitive disadvantage to other landlords who had it "included" in the rental price based on a tenant's perception when they shopped for vacant apartments.