Allconnex, Gold Coast Water Charges and Property Investors

The Queensland State Government tackled water reform in the region in response to the drought at that time to make the rapidly growing region drought resilient and generally improve the delivery of water and wastewater services.

Allconnex Water was created in July 2010 under this State Government’s South East Queensland (SEQ) Water Reform and it is owned by the Gold Coast, Logan and Redland councils.

Water and wastewater services is now billed separately to local council rates and the cost of water has shocked many. The local Gold Coast Bulletin and many local property owners have waged a war with Allconnex over what they see as a massive rise in water costs.

Water charges are very important to local property investors. The vast majority of investment property in the Coomera district are water effecient because they have been constructed in recent years and therefore the cost of water can be passed in full to the tenant.

In our expereince many local property managers are failing to recover water costs that be as high as $500 from the tenants because of a lack of training and understanding of the law.

According to the RTA Water Charges Fact Sheet the the minimum criteria for water charging are:-

Lessors are able to pass on the full water consumption costs to tenants if:

the rental premises are individually metered (or water is delivered by vehicle), and
the rental premises are water efficient, and
the tenancy agreement states the tenant must pay for water consumption.

If your property manager is not recovering your water charges from your tenant call the expert team at First National Upper Coomera Real Estate to discuss your options or complete the form to request a property management proposal be rushed out to you.

Consider This :- If your property manager is not recovering your water charges from the tenant then changing to an agency who will recover the charges may be the equivalent of getting a 30% to 40% in your management fees. Can you afford not consider a change?

If you want to follow the Allconnex Saga these are links to the articles as they appeared in the Gold Coast Bulletin and goldcoast.com.au

About the Author

Glenn Batten - Glenn Batten is the Principal Licensee of First National Real Estate Upper Coomera which provides residential property sales and property management services throughout the Northern Growth Corridor suburbs of Upper Coomera, Coomera, Pimpama, Willow Vale, Ormeau and Oxenford.