Tips for including utilities

[Genny Li]

I'm renting to a student market and am targeting out of state and international students with a fully furnished apartment, down to kitchen goods.  This bumps my rent up by a minimum of $480 per month if utilities are included and the unit is rented out on a per-door basis, because this demographic fears financial uncertainty over all.  (I will test to see if I can get $540 per month more--it's likely but not certain.)

Because this is a student market, I can be a bit more controlling than you can be with regular tenants.  I have a nicely framed sign saying what shouldn't go down the kitchen drain, for instance.  So this is what I'm in the process of implementing as I transition to this model over the next few years.  Tell me if I miss anything!

This unit has an electric water heater, so the main concern with water is specifically HOT water.

This is out of town for me, in a southern state that's an AC-dominant area.

• Turn washer spin speed up to the highest setting because they're unlikely to change it.
• .5 GPM aerator on bathroom faucets
• 1.25 GPM aerator on kitchen faucet
• 1.25 GPM showerhead
• 1.28 gp-flush toilets--I'm only replacing them because they're the horrific 90s toilets that clog CONSTANTLY, as the water savings will literally never pay off
• New tub spout diverters because the current ones leak around the edges badly
• Y-splitter on top load washing machine to connect the washer only to the cold supply (it's not a high-efficiency, so it cleans well at any temperature) 
• Smart thermostat with 74 degrees minimum cooling temp and 71 degrees maximum heating temp until 10 pm, dropping to 68 degrees until 6am
• Alarms on doors and windows that alert me if either is left open while the heat or AC is on
• New windows, because the current ones are single panes in need of heavy maintenance and are already causing problems
• Possibly solar screens on two of the windows that get the most light, particularly a west-facing one

[Patrick M.]

The easiest utility to have transferred to a tenant and have attach to a tenant is the electric. Including water and heat is one thing- and a huge selling point, but I don't see the plus in all of the extra work to ensure someone is responsibly using electric? Just have it run in their name.

I have friends that rent out houses to multiple students and they just have the electric run in one, "head" students name and they divvy it up... It gets paid that way.

As for the water, I think you are going overkill a bit. A conservation, personal shower head makes showers end quicker then a fixed one (easy to rinse). How much is your water? I pay a fortune for water, have implemented many cost saving features... but my best was inserting a pressure regulator, (after seeing a kitchen faucet jump) Saves on the life pipes and cuts down on the amount of water released per second. The pressure on mine was through the roof... Perhaps check yours.