Landlord Lifeline

Do Your Tenants Have A Plunger?

For the longest time it did not occur to me that my tenants did not move in with plungers… why would they?  Unless you have taken on the responsibility for making sure a toilet or sink drain is flowing well, you probably do not own a plunger.

It has become evident over the years, that many of the “send a plumber” calls could be avoided if two things happened:

1)   Each rental unit had a plunger that stayed there and

2)   Tenants had basic instructions on how to use a plunger.

If Plunger Lessons sounds strange, think about $65 to $125/hour for a plumber‘s house call.  I can’t say that I am really good at remembering to tell tenants how to use the plunger, but when they call me with a stopped up toilet or drain, I have a quick 4 minute tutorial ready.

In case you need a tutorial yourself or want to email one to your tenants, here is a good basic explanation of how to unclog a toilet with a flanged plunger on ehow.com .  Unclogging the sink requires different “training”.  This site has a video for that, as well.

Frequently, we are dealing with the problem AFTER the tenant has poured a bottle of drain cleaner in the fixture and it didn’t do any good.  So making sure there are plungers in each unit can save a lot of “my-toilet-is-stopped-up-and-the-drain-cleaner-didn’t-work” calls.

There are two types of plungers:

·         Cup type is the basic one with a red rubber cup attached to a handle…used on flat surfaces like a sink or bathtub where the cup can create suction to unclog the drain

·         Flanged plungers are designed for toilets to create suction in the bowl where there is no flat surface.

The cup plunger is usually $3 to $4 and the flanged plunger $5 to $6 at Home Depot.  You should at least have an extra that you can take with you when you go on Landlord Calls.

Now there have been a few times over the years that we have had what my husband calls “High Maintenance” tenants… usually professional women who wants things to look real good and work well.  Great tenants overall because they always pay the rent on time and are rarely home. (No stereo-types… just reality.)  This tenant does not want the red rubber cup wooden handled plunger sitting in their bathroom.  For the High Maintenance Tenant, I just found the cutest plunger at Alice Supply Co.  

No matter how often we talk to tenants about what should and should not go down drains, someone still flushes something that requires a professional.  The Building Rules on LandlordLifeline.com details what not to put down drains.  This document is an addendum to all of my leases and saves me a lot of money.  When they have signed off on the Building Rules in the lease and still violate the rules, the professional drain cleaner cost belongs to the tenant.  If they don’t pay, I deduct it from their Security Deposit.

Comments on this topic would be greatly appreciated.  Plungers may be mundane, but saving bucks is called Extra Cash Flow.  Look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks!

B

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Art of Being a Landlord by admin