State Specific Question About: COLORADO (CO)

I have been a tenant in my current apartment for 4+ years now. The house I live in was sold to a new owner 2 years ago, and I got a 5-star rating from my previous landlord, so the new owners offered me a 2-year lease with a $50 increase from $850 to $900/mo. That lease expires on 31 Jan and my landlord now wants me to pay 1/2 the utilities for the whole property "based on my square footage and the fact that I have the washer & dryer."

The house consists of 3 units: I occupy the whole first floor (and I am already paying more for the sq footage + washer/dryer). Below me are a 2-bdr apartment and a 1-bdr apartment. The rental of those apartments over the last 2 years has been like a revolving door. Either there is no one in them or there are up to 6 people in them.

The entire house is on single metering for utilities, which is why utilities have always been included in my rent.

First off this is a landlord site.

But to answer your questions.

1. Yes.

2. Fair is subjective. You don't think it is so from your perspective then No. From a LL perspective it might be. More area to heat and light and more hot water to use. You have half the squarefootage so why not half the utilities? Do you have guests from time to time? Do they use utilities? The number of people are hard to monitor. Square footage is often used to break down utilities.

3. Landlords that do not keep rents at or near market are giving away money. Some do this for a number of reasons. Most work to keep the rent near market.

Finally by all means discuss it with your landlord. You would be better off by finding a couple of places like the one you are renting that are less expensive than yours to use as bargaining chips. If you don't want to move be prepared to pay the increase. Perhaps you will find that you are still getting a good deal and will want to stay without discuss it.

Unless CO state law prohibits it (and I don't believe that it does), it can be written into a contract.

Any contract terms are negotiable.

I would appeal to the landlords in person. State your case, bring your payment record, be polite. You might remind them that you were a model tenant for the previous owners, and you've never been late on rent. You might offer to pay another $50/mo in rent instead of paying for a variable cost that is in part controlled by other tenants.

Your trump card is that you are a model tenant and always pay on time, and if you don't like the terms of the new lease, you'll move, and they'll get someone who may not be a model tenant and may not pay on time. The upswing is they'll get somebody who's (a) paying more and (b) paying utilities / costing them less.

Best of luck.

You need to research your state and local laws. If there is no law addressing splitting the cost of utilities, then he can do it.

FYI, when I lived in Calif., the water bill was split by square footage which is the legally required way in Calif. I didn't think it was fair either (there was a couple with a baby with a same size unit. They had to have been using much more water than me.) To this day, I haven't heard of any other way to do it (if it was based on number of people, then tenants would lie about the number of occupants).

It's not appropriate and should not be done.

Move to a house with just your unit on the meter, if you are unsatisfied with your current arrangments.

Your Lanlord probably can

Sorry. hit the button too soon

Your Landlord probably cannot absorb the higher costs