Water Usage not paid for a year

so this problem seems to be happeneing more and more to others as we ll as myself

recently, ive done a few audits on my IPs, and have noticed some tenants are behind on water, and the PM never let me know of them, one of them hasnt paid for a year,

not going into specific detail,

isnt this the bread and butter of property managers

I would expect a PM to quickly put the tenants on a payment plan and/or isssue notices, and then if the tenant doesnt pay to compensate the landlord

a PM compensating for their mistake!!!! pigs might fly

sorry to the genuine good PMs out there

/mini rant over

 

Majority of tenants do the right thing. The minority however, you can remind them and send them notices every day, can't get blood out of stone though. At key handover at the commencement, we sit down and go through all the rules and responsibilities with them so that everyones clear - this helps minimise a lot of problems.

Not sure why you keep saying this in most of your threads. I doubt its a PM mistake in most of the examples you've given.

 

well thats where me and you disagree, you're a smart cookie, think about it

so who's reposnbility do you think it is if a PM doesnt follow up water for a year?
and please dont say, "its the landlords to follow up on their investments"

 

obviously, this is in non VIC

 

The question is are you willing to evict your tenants over an unpaid water bill 'now', or wait till they vacate and claim against the bond/pursue it at that stage where it won't jeopardize the otherwise good tenancy? You need to pick your battles and timing, by leaving minor things to the end of the tenancy and making a claim against the bond, assuming you've lodged the claim first, the onus is then on the tenant to go to the effort of disputing it through xCAT at their initial cost, most just cave. You can do it mid-tenancy but you have to pay for the xCAT hearing (which you can claim if successful), but again this is work on your/PM's behalf which generally you'll have to pay for. If they haven't paid because they've never been invoiced by the PM and there's no excuse, well yeah that's just plain the PM's fault. Also, a lot of PM's won't proactively ask you for the water bill and if you don't send it they've got nothing to chase the tenant for. Then if the bill is older than 6 months they'll say they are not able to claim it from the tenant, blah blah, however there are lots of ways to skin a cat and a good/savvy PM should be able to get money owing and entitled from the tenant for the owner. I actually do my own water meter readings and create my own invoices based of the utility providers published prices and charges, in line with the RTRA Act etc, this way I don't need the Landlord to be sending me bills/forgetting to do it, it's just apart of my routine inspection process. Not many PM's do this because it is a lot of extra work.

 

couldnt agree more, choosing your battles is something that you need to do as a landlord, that is what ive learnt over the years. For this particular case, if they get on a payment plan, ill be happy to keep them on, as long as they stick to it. But as you are well aware, payment plans are no guarantee they will keep up on it. that being said if they dont stick to it the agent should not be blamed, provided they have given them the appropriate warnings/notices

In this case, the tenant has been billed on time, Its the PMs job to be on top of them paying on time, not the landlords

ps. being the slumlord I am, its my expereince that if they are going to leave (eviction or not) with any outstanding utilites or rent, they wont leave it in a good condition, so its in my best interests to preserve as much bond as I can

got any tips for newbies or just for general discussion?

 

Can you clarify - they have been issued water invoices and not paid or has the PM not issued water invoices?

In either case above, whilst the response may be different in terms of what the PM does, fundamentally the issue is lack of communication from the PM. If we want the perception of PM to change we have to start taking some accountability for these things.

If the invoices have been issued and not paid you absolutely should have been informed. Whilst I agree with @Michael Mitchell above, that is a discussion that should have been had with you as an owner.

- Luke

 

Every Landlord must hedge their risks with insurances. Foolish not too, and if they "can't afford it" then their figures were wrong to begin with as the cost of insurances should be part of the cost of doing business equation, and if that's no longer profitable then it's a loss making exercise unfortunately (unless they're fine with it being negatively geared).

1. Landlords insurance
2. Debt collection plan like Barclay MIS
3. Tenancy database listing as leverage
4. Fully prepared to take it to xCAT seeking an order to pay
5. Fully prepared to then take unpaid order through magistrates court to enforce they pay
6. Can mutually agree for them to go on payment plan, if they stop paying just start from the top of the list again - the idea is they never get away with it, and you get compensated by insurance and/or they pay back the money they owe, so in some cases you get paid twice as I've found when insurance pays out a claim that doesn't absolve the tenant of the debt they owe..

 

can confirm that the tenant has been issued the water bill,
and have not paid, ultimately, the PM is not a magician and cannot force people to pay, however, feel free to disagree, but its completely the responsbility for the PM to issue warnings/notices, so that I can evict if need be,
also as you are a PM yourself, you know that the bigger/more behind the tenant gets, the less chance of them paying.
the fact that 1. I was not informed, 2. notices/warnings were not given, are the agents fault, and they should be made responsbile

if the tenant has been given their warnings, and still doesnt pay up, I never blame the agent.

 

landlords insurance is a mere $300-$400 per year, its peanuts compared to their building insurance, anyone who doesnt have LL insurance is nuts, unless they have a long term tenant who has a proven track record, but even the best tenants can turn to S*&T

edit: as for barclays, Its something I considered, but after reading a few testimonials, I decided that its not worth it, as in this testimomnals case, they were simply told, "its too hard"

 

Catch 22 - if you issue notice to remedy breach and they don't remedy and you then don't issue a notice to leave, you can be seen as allowing it to continue, as opposed to if you know they're not going to pay now, don't issue the breach and wait till the end and circle back to address it then. (It's crappy I know..)

 

Did you look at this product or something else just out of interest? http://www.realmgmt.com.au/docs/b_mis.pdf

 

Agreed to all. There are things to consider as mentioned in other posts, but that conversation should have been had when the first water invoice became overdue so you could make a decision as to how you were going to proceed. You working out yourself that the tenant is 12 months behind on water is just not acceptable.

Whilst I'm not qualified to make an assessment on the agents liability, I believe from an ethical point of view they certainly have a case of accountabilty to answer.

- Luke

 

Just to be clear, I don't think anyone here is disagreeing that the Property Manager has been negligent in their failure to follow up the unpaid water invoices, and to advise you as such. They're really just constructively suggesting ways that you can protect yourself in general from unpaid water.

The reality is that many Property Managers are terrible at following up unpaid water, and your enforcement options are limited. In my experience the best method for the worst of them has been simply to nag the tenants- which is time intensive, hence why many PM's struggle with it.