Landlords feel the pinch as heating costs increase

Wednesday, March 14, 2001 By STAN FREEMAN

Wear sweaters, lower the thermostat, put extra blankets on the bed. They're all reasonable things someone facing soaring heating bills this winter would do.

However, landlords who pay for the heat for their tenants can't force their tenants to do any of those things, and the result for some property owners has been an economic nightmare.

Betsy A. Cavanaugh owns 11 rental units in Springfield and this month she got nearly a $500 heating bill for one person in one five-room apartment. She said that when she visited, the thermostat was often set at 75 degrees.

Together with the electric bill, which Cavanaugh also pays, there's almost nothing left of the $750 in rent she got from the tenant in a recent month to cover her mortgage payments and other expenses.

"It's a real hardship for landlords. We're stuck," she said.

"It's another case where we end up being the bad guys. One of the options is to put a lockbox on the thermostat, but that's not something most people feel comfortable doing," Cavanaugh said.

Ralph H. Schloming of the Massachusetts Small Property Owners Association, which has about 4,000 members statewide, estimated that landlords pay for heating bills at about a quarter of the rental properties in the state.

By law, a tenant can only pay heating bills when a separate furnace serves their apartment and no others. Many older homes, which were converted from single family homes into apartments, had a single heating system, and installing a separate heating systems would be too costly for the property owners.

In those same houses, there is usually only one electric system and meter, so landlords who pay heat often pay the electricity bill as well. But it is the monthly heating bills in winter that tend to be the budget busters for them.

Schloming said he faces the problem first-hand. He lives in a residence in Cambridge and rents out the upper floors, paying for the heat for those tenants.

"I went up to the third floor because the tenant wanted more heat. We were wearing sweaters in my apartment, but his window was open, none of the storm windows had been put down, there was an air conditioner still in the window and the skylight in the bathroom was open," he said.

Tenant advocates say there is often another side to the story. David Waldfogel, executive director of the Massachusetts Justice Project office in Holyoke, said that while some tenants call to say landlords are keeping the heat too low, presumably to save on utility bills, the more common complaint from tenants is about the complete lack of heat.

"It's sometimes a problem because some landlords don't pay their (utility bills) or the fuel oil is not getting delivered," so the furnace shuts off, he said.

Some tenants acknowledge they are not always as diligent about conserving heat when they're not paying for it.

Elizabeth T. Hnitecki is a marketing major at University of Massachusetts who shares an off-campus apartment with other students in Amherst.

"The problem is some of us like it hot and others like it cold," she said.

So to please everyone, the apartment is kept warm, and those who prefer it cold open a window. She also said the students usually have too much on their minds to always monitor the thermostat, but with rents in Amherst as high as they are year-round, she doesn't feel that sorry for landlords who are faced with a few steep bills in winter.

While landlords will eventually raise rents to recover heating expenses, in most cases they cannot do so until the current lease ends. In the meantime, they try to convince tenants to conserve heat, but often their pleas are ignored.

"It's very frustrating," said Beverly Barclay, president of the Rental Housing Association of Greater Springfield.

"You try to impress on tenants the importance that ultimately it's going to reflect in their rent. If heating bills go up, rents go up. But some just don't seem to listen," she said.

Schloming said, "Historically, when these houses were first built and there were tenants, there was a great spirit of frugality and it wasn't a problem. But as we've become more affluent, people have stopped thinking about the extra cost."

He said if energy conservation is the goal, then it makes sense that the responsibility for heating bills be put on tenants.

"It really is the most prudent thing for both the landlord and the tenant that the tenant pays for the heat. Otherwise, the tenants won't conserve or economize," he said.

http://www.masslive.com/newsindex/hampfrank/index.ssf?/news/pstories/ae314lan.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), March 14, 2001

Answers

Putting a lock box on a thermostat is not big deal. I've known landlords who have done it for years with no problems from tenants. Buildings with hot water heat can control the temperature of the water. Reducing the setting on the hot water heater also saves energy.

-- John Littmann (LITTMANNJOHNTL@AOL.COM), March 15, 2001.