Community Supplied Water Cost

[terry+carmen]

I'm putting together a draft budget for Emerald Resort Juristic Entity and got stuck on the price of water. They have wells, pump, filter and the send the water to each household. Everyone has a meter but they never worked out the cost of supping the water. I'm thinking electricity, filter maintenance, pipe repairs in common areas....does anyone have experience of this? We will eventually go onto mains water and life will be much easier or will it?

[hhfarang]

I don't know how you calculate the cost of electricity for a well and pumps. Is there a meter associated with the well equipment to isolate the cost of the electric.

The way I've heard the cost of all common development bills divided up (if you can calculate them) is charge each household according to the size, i.e., square meters of their either their house or land. If on a well I would think by land area would be best as they would use more water in the garden. Unscheduled maintenance like a broken well pump would just be shared the same way as soon as the bill was paid.

[terry+carmen]

Each house has a water meter so we can calculate the water usage accurately. The pool can be estimated. I have though about fitting a water meter at the pump outlet and another for electricity then just divide the output by the usage. Add a percentage for maintenance and repairs and it should be right. And developers, management companies out there with a formula?

[kalbow]

Good work Terry. I shall look forward to moving in next month. I would like a breakdown of the common charges so I know what I am paying for.

What do you mean 'divide the output by the usage'?

Maybe the pool maintenance company we settled on could assist in estimating likely costs.

Cheers
Kalbow

[kalbow]

P.S. I believe this post should be in Properties or Ask the Expats forums - not one about eating places

[icebear]

Hi T+C,

The developer can charge the house owners at his own discretion, as it's nothing to do with the Tessaban.

Please bear also in mind that this water is not suitable for the swimming pool (cracking of tiles) as it's containing a lot of calcium and the water is hard.

[terry+carmen]

What do you mean 'divide the output by the usage'? We know how much water is used because we all have individual water meters. More water used around the development to water communal gardens, sub contractor and so on. If we know the total water pumped out of the wells, the cost of pumping the water, maintenance and so on and the total usage we could fix the price per m2.

As far as I can establish most developers fix the charge taking into account all costs. Some charge more than the actual cost to make a profit. We want to keep the cost to the minimum trying to find out if there is a formula to work out the cost.

Kalbow welcome to the neighbourhood PM me and I can send the draft budget.

[hhfarang]

It seems pretty simple to me if you each have meters. Everyone pays the cost of water on their meter at a rate divided roughly by the amount registered on all the individual meters on a given day each month. Then the extra cost for common areas is either divided up evenly to the number of residents or by the ownership square meters.

Having said that, I'm very glad we bought our own land and have no connection to a development or neighbors in all of our decisions and bills.... I've heard from many people how much of a headache that is.

[kalbow]

We know how much water is used because we all have individual water meters. More water used around the development to water communal gardens, sub contractor and so on. If we know the total water pumped out of the wells, the cost of pumping the water, maintenance and so on and the total usage we could fix the price per m2.

I see, so total usage less individual usage, plus maintenance etc, divided by meterage to give shared cost.

Will PM to get details of expense budget.

Many thanks
Kalbow

[bozzman101]

hi there are 19 houses in out estate we have 2 wells all houses have a meter we charge 10b per 1000 liters this pays for the electricty and some maintance we have a contingcy fund for major repairs

also the moo baan employ our own pool man / pool cleaner his wife is our gardener

we charge 1100 b for pool cleaning a month 700b gardening this has been working very well for the last 4 years

cheers

[sateeb]

hi there are 19 houses in out estate we have 2 wells all houses have a meter we charge 10b per 1000 liters this pays for the electricty and some maintance we have a contingcy fund for major repairs

also the moo baan employ our own pool man / pool cleaner his wife is our gardener

we charge 1100 b for pool cleaning a month 700b gardening this has been working very well for the last 4 years

cheers

That idea sounds good on your development of 19 but Emerald has 100+ houses so that's a lot of work for 1 poolman and cleaner.