Separating out meters

[Ajay A.]

Hello Idahoans!,

I see a lot of listed properties that have one or more utilities in common.

There was one in Caldwell that had Electricity shared between 2 units, and a lot of them have either water or gas shared between one or all units.

Anyone have any experience in separating out utilities(Electricity OR Water OR Gas)? How much did it cost? 

I would love to hear from investors who are managing properties that have shared utilities. How do you pass on the costs to the tenant?

Just dividing the utility by the number of units doesnt seem fair to me, and (seems to me) might aggravate the tenants on the remote chance of them discovering it. And how would one share the utility cost between units that have different number of bedrooms?

[Anthony Angotti]

Hi @Ajay A.,

I've heard separating them can get kind of pricy, but I've never done it so I too would like to know the answer to this question. Although, I've heard other people say that this is a great way to improve cash flow.

Shared utilities can be split still. I have done it based on occupancy (when I was a renter myself), so if it is a shared water bill and there are 2 people living in one unit and two in the other they pay 50/50. If there are 2 people in one unit and 1 person in the other then it is 67%, 33%. And so on and so forth.

You just need to bill the tenants and make sure they agree to those terms. I've seen that applied to all types of shared utilities and it was successful in my case, but I can see many cases (with picky tenants) where it wouldn't work out so well.

If all else fails you can just up the rent to cover your utility expenses (unless the market prohibits the cost increase).