As a Philadelphia multifamily property owner, you have to manage fair sharing of common utilities such as electrics, gas, water, central heating, and cooling systems among your tenants. Naturally, with all these utilities, you need to ensure that tenants are paying their share of utility bills on time.
There are several options to manage and pay your utility bills. For a very long time, landlords used to divide these payments equally among tenants and renters had to pay them separately from the rent. Not only was this inconvenient to both tenant and landlord, it also consumed a lot of time and was often unfair to those who were not using the utilities as much. Now, with the growing number of automated solutions designed to track independent usage and accordingly calculate energy bills, landlords can eliminate the difficulties in this task.
Here are some ways to charge for common area utilities in your Philadelphia multifamily property.
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Install Utility Meters
Utility meters monitor the consumption of gas, water, and electricity in residential and commercial properties. It is an effective tool to measure the actual usage of utilities.
You can also install submeters on your Philadelphia multifamily property to easily distribute utility costs among tenants. The sub-meters are installed individually in each unit and help landlords track tenant-specific consumption to calculate fair utility expenses.
The submetering system also calculates non-utility expenses such as parking, trash, storage, cable, and bills the renters individually.
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Implement RUBS
When submetering can be logistically challenging or expensive in some cases, landlords can use Ratio Utility Billing Systems (RUBS). It is a more cost-effective and profitable system to track utility bills.
RUBS measures utility bills based on the size of the unit, layout, amenities, number of occupants, fixtures, and bathrooms. It varies according to the type of property and is different from merely submetering the unit. The system calculates the total utility cost for water, gas, electricity and divides it, overall residents. It consolidates the costs into a single utility bill for each tenant to pay.
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Outsource Billing
It is not always possible for multifamily owners to keep track of so many individual utility bills, especially, if they have a large real estate portfolio. Here, they can choose to outsource the billing task to a third party.
The said company keeps a detailed record of the utility bills for each unit, sends a bill to each resident, and calculates what each resident owes. In addition, these companies store the data of your utility bills in your property management software.
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Include Utility Bills in the Rent
Philadelphia landlords can also include utility bills in the monthly rent. One of the main benefits of adding utilities in rent is that landlords do not have to bill tenants separately for utilities. It also saves time for both landlords and tenants. Rather than receiving the bill, sending it to tenants, and collecting rent from them, landlords can simply include the utility bills in the rent.
Landlords need to be upfront about how they are charging for utilities. It keeps tenants aware of the process, and it does not come as a surprise to them. A trusted property management company in Philadelphia, like TCS Management, can help you and your tenants easily manage utility bills for your multifamily properties.
TCS Management is a full-service property management company headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, serving Cherry Hill, NJ, Wilmington, Delaware, and the surrounding areas. We are specialized in single family, multifamily management for homes, condos, townhomes and apartment buildings.
Contact us at TCS Management for more details.
