Anyone else's water bill/sewage very high in apartment complex? It's always this high.

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Adept_Check9143@reddit

I live in a 4 bedroom 2000sf home and mine is half that. I'm actually passed it'd $159 this month because it's usually around $114

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Conservice is a 3rd party meter reading and billing service for landlords. This means that your landlord has the option of padding the bill and layering in an additional profit margin for themselves; they do this with electricity most often. Sometimes, in older buildings, they do this with cable/internet, and in newer buildings, providers like AT&T just pay them a rebate annually or paid a big payment upfront, the the choice limitation. All this is to say, if your utility bills are higher, check rates with local municipal water district and compare to rate on your invoice and you will know if you are being up charged.

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AnxietyDepressedFun@reddit

This is 100% demonstrably false. The state of Texas actually has laws that prevent landlords from making any kind of profit on utilities, specifically water & waste water. Not only that but they can't even charge you for things like disconnect or reconnect fees. Yes Conservice is a third-party billing company that manages the billing for multi-unit buildings, but there is ZERO chance the landlord is profiting from this - I worked in Property Management for over a decade and in Texas we generally under charge by a small percentage if we are bulk billing because profiting from utilities is an immediate loss of your occupancy license. [https://ftp.puc.texas.gov/public/puct-info/consumer/facts/factsheets/waterfacts/TenantGuideAllocatedService.pdf](https://ftp.puc.texas.gov/public/puct-info/consumer/facts/factsheets/waterfacts/TenantGuideAllocatedService.pdf) I'm all for saying fuck the giant corporations that are making renting untenable but this is just misinformation.

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Rare-Future-5495@reddit

20+ year investor in large Multifamily projects all over. I have seen the up charges first hand. Not misinformation if it’s happening. OP can verify if this is happening on their bill.

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AnxietyDepressedFun@reddit

It is illegal in Texas. This bill is obviously either an error or a leak but now you're intentionally spreading disinformation because if you have EVER worked in Multifamily then you'd know they absolutely overcharge & price fix for just about everything, EXCEPT utilities because it's not legal. No third-party would agree to jeopardize their business & no multifamily management company would risk their occupancy license. Apartments do not make money on your utilities. It's as plain as that, they don't & if they did then they'd be out of business immediately.

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dietcupofjoe@reddit

Just because it’s illegal doesn’t mean it’s not happening

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AnxietyDepressedFun@reddit

It's not happening. They have hundreds of legal & totally acceptable & even endorsed ways of screwing you, the renter, this large company is not breaking the law just so a community can make a few dollars per unit in fees. This bill is clearly incorrect it's not a "hidden illegal fee". Just stop

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dietcupofjoe@reddit

Repeating yourself, doubling down on your statement, and telling others to stop questioning it does help your point. Whether it’s lumped into an existing fee, a dedicated convenience fee, or lumped under an existing fee. Easy to frame it as an error when called out, genuine human or machine incompetence/error or not.

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dietcupofjoe@reddit

I’m not here to argue with some chronically-online landleech defender who can’t entertain property management companies use third-party billing platforms to prey on unsuspecting tenants.

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Icy_Huckleberry_8049@reddit

The ENTIRE COMPLEX is split between all the rental units, so you're basically helping to pay the water bill for others in the complex.

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SleeStaK911@reddit

I'll bet your toilet is running. I've had this happen before. Put in that service request.

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lobohog@reddit

That is more than double what mine is. You should be provided with your actual usage amounts from the meter. You either have a leaky faucet/toilet or there is a billing issue upstream.

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awkward_mallard@reddit

I have a 1200 sq ft home and accidentally left my sprinkler on for 11 hours straight last month and my bill even with that was only 113 for water / sewer / trash combined. That bill is nuts.

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mangoburrito@reddit

My old apartment had a running toilet (barely noticeable) and our water bill went up to $200+. They fixed it and it went back down to <$25. I would guess running toilet

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EpicNex@reddit

I pay less than 10 dollars each for sewer and water.

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Doobieous1411@reddit

I’ve been in two big apts (one in Houston and one in Dallas) with conservice bills similar to that, and the water/sewage charges were never that high. Something seems off.

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Biodark11@reddit

That's crazy. I live in the manor house this is my bill. It's $29 bucks.

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playballer@reddit

Is the complex fairly empty? It usually not individually metered, They divide total bill by rented rooms/squarefeet leased. It needs to be close to fully rented to spread all the costs as you’d expect

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frenchezz@reddit

That's about 30 bucks more than me and I live in a house with a wife obsessed with fancy plants. You need to call someone and figure out what's going on or see if there's a leak somewhere.

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sfa1500@reddit

Most apartments sub meter the water. One large meter feeds the entire building and then an individual meter tells them how much the person should be charged. They very well may have a leak, but there's a greater chance the apartment overall has a leak and they are getting an inflated bill because of it.

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Swdannycactus@reddit

this, house owner and my bill is less than this. either a leak, or apt complex is adding fees to the bill as their cut.

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Pidder_Paddy@reddit

I think my old complex lumped everyone into one bill then split the cost evenly so it’s possible to be paying for one or two very thirsty neighbors.

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Swdannycactus@reddit

this is how spectrum raked everyone over the coals. that multi fam housing water bill splitting is crazy work.

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Limp-Good-6737@reddit

I live a 2b/1ba house and pay between $75-90 for trash, sewage and water

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NeoRa3rdEye@reddit

usually your sharing the cost of the entire building

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Big_Television9854@reddit

Holy shit yeah that’s more than having a house with a lawn where most water is spent on irrigation and evaporates af

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Super_Internal@reddit

My apartment does a flat fee each month for water/electric. It's $130 for studio, $145 for 1br +

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RodinBigD@reddit

Conserve is a third party billing company. Toilet leaks are the worse waster of water. Ask the complex or conserve to ask maintenance to check leaks. then check the meter. Ask for a bucket test. Conserve asks complex’s to this a lot. Basically maintenance reads the meter. Fills a five gallon bucket from the tub and reads enter again. When I did apt maintenance this happened several times and is common especially in older communities.

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Wonderful-Run-1408@reddit

That's high (and for sewer as well).

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teitelman93@reddit

It happens sometimes per people use and they calculate that in your building

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pilot333@reddit

Yours is like mine but I've got a house w/ pool

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NinjaStiz@reddit

Dang I live in a 2bd 2bh duplex and I just about pay that with electricity included. That doesn't seem right

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Professork08@reddit

I just got billed $109 1800sqft house Live in Texas About the same price year round House built in 2021 Hand wash 2 cars about twice a month Use dish washer, clothes washer, kids and wife take baths everyday Even with guests for several days at a time, not really any different

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Possible_Resort9672@reddit

i paid $40 for water this month and they do the thing where they divide the amount of money amongst everyone in the building based on usage

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hellooomarc@reddit

Not as bad, but my water is like $7 and sewer is around $35-45.

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nomnomnompizza@reddit

My bill for my house all summer was around $120 and I watered 2x times a week.

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bufbills13@reddit

Your toilet is running. Or something else could be leaking. That’s the only explanation

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CyCyclops@reddit

Check your toilet. Only time I've ever had a bill for water that large, the clasp was slightly ajar and it was using water constantly

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Noel3leon@reddit

This is the right answer. I build apartments for a living and 99% of the time it’s not some conspiracy land lord price gouging thing. It’s a toilet that’s constantly running and they should fix it.

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basic_model@reddit

You can cut a portion of your ceiling and find your neighbors waterline from there you can route water to your apartment circumventing your meter.

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basic_model@reddit

Because either way this bill is theft!! Definitely concerning.

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Mr_Hotshot@reddit

Over 200 for water and sewer? That is absolutely bonkers. In a 1,500 ft house mine is 60-70 per month.

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Armed_Lorax_@reddit

I average $20 in my apartment and this month its $110. Something is definitely wrong, yet front office is tryin to tell me dallas upped everyone’s rates. No shot they increased it 500%. i fucking hate these Dallas apartments, so ready to leave

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Consistent_Leg_6765@reddit

Looks a little nickel and dime -ish to me. $75 internet, if you have an option, opt out and spend $50 monthly for the T-mobile cellular internet, that's what I use and I can take it with me anywhere. Super fast too. What maintenance service do they do monthly to qualify for $15 - is that lawn, paint, air filters, plumbing, ac...etc? That should be included in the base rental price, not an add on. Garbage, sewer, sewer base, storm water drainage all appear in line with city rates. $6 Service fee for statement preparation is absurd, Hell, I want that gig, I could write a program to dump those numbers in to a statement and email it out each month and take in a butt load of cash. If there are 500 units at your complex, that's $3k per month of easy money.

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svpz@reddit

Do you own a private lake? looks like you are not telling us something ))

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SilverBubble1@reddit

I pay a little over a$100 in utilities monthly, something aont right

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animalhappiness@reddit

Is your apartment low occupancy? If so and if you have a lot of green space with irrigation, or of they refilled a pool, they could be spreading out the common area water to a smaller number of residents.

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2-4-6-h8@reddit

I live in a 2bed/2.5 bath in downtown Dallas. I've checked my last 6 months of my Conservice bills and my water charge was never over $25 each month. Definitely get this checked out, you might have a leak somewhere.

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noncongruent@reddit

Sewer is typically not metered on residential, only certain commercial applications, because flow meters for mixed solids and liquids are expensive to purchase and operate. Instead, residential sewer is normally calculated as a percentage of water use. Because landscape water use doesn't end up in the sewer system water companies will typically look at wintertime water usage where landscape water usage is at a minimum, that gives the best approximation of sewer use relative to water use. Typically they'll take the three lowest water use months in winter and use that as the base for the rest of the year. If you have significant water leaks then those leaks will count toward wintertime use. Since you have your own water meter what you should do is go take a picture of it, wait an hour or two without using any water in the house at all, then go take another picture. The dials should not have moved in that time. If they did then you've got a leak somewhere and need to investigate. If you're in an apartment and have no landscape water use then you should contact the apartment manager and start investigating from there.

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