Insane water use my landlord wants to force on me (August: rental, lawyer)

[GoodTenant1]

I just moved into a nice home with a large lawn in Northern California. I pay top dollar rent, and pay all water and utilities in addition. In my lease (handled by a management company) specifies that the owner pays for a gardener once a week. Keep in mind that in this climate zone, lawns are not recommended because the summers are so dry and water shortages are always possible.

The gardener has the automatic sprinklers set so that each zone waters 20 minutes - but there are a lot of zones. The end result is that at midnight, the system starts watering the lawn and plants and doesn't shut off until about 9:00 am - 9 hours of watering, 7 days a week. There is quite a bit of sidewalk and driveway watering besides the grass and plants. We have talked to the gardener and asked him to point the sprinklers away from the house (they were watering the outside walls too!) and to cut back on the length of time to conserve water (and my finances!) He cut it back to 9 hours 5x per week instead of every day.

The ground is rock hard despite this long daily watering, and since it has been a hot summer, the grass is showing a bit of drought signs (hasn't rained since winter), despite the automatic sprinklers. And by the time the sun is up, any moisture from lawn watering that took place between midnight and 4 am is long gone and the ground is rock hard. However, some of the plants (large bromeliads, etc.) seem to me to show signs of OVER-watering, which makes sense to me because when water pools under a plant on top of hard clay soil, it can drown the roots.

Imagine my surprise when I got an email from the management company saying that the gardener told the owner that I was not permitting sufficient watering and it was killing the lawn, and that if the grass died I would be responsible for replacing it!

My first call was to the water company, who informed me that the owners (previous residents) had one of the highest residential water uses in town (150,000 gallons every two months - most homes here in the summer are under 30,000 gallons for two months), and that the bill for the same was about $1,000. OMG!!!!!! I haven't received the water bill yet but will need to go bankrupt to pay a water bill like that.

It does not specify in my lease that I must water the landscape per any schedule, nor that I have responsibility for buying new grass if it dies.

My belief is that if the owner is responsible for the gardener, and if the gardener chooses to water the lawn in a way that results in an extremely high water usage / cost to me compared to neighboring homes, that the owner should be responsible for the water bill as well. If I have no choice in the watering, is there any legal reason why I can't just cut back the time and schedule of watering to something reasonable? Or can I insist that the owner pay for the water if he insists on that much watering?

[rparz]

I'd tell them that's fine. I'll keep the lawn watered, and deduct the water bill from the rent.

If they prefer to find an alternate means, that's on them, but I'm not carrying the expense to water a lawn -- More specifically, maintenance and upkeep of the property.

[spotlesseden]

in CA, if you let your lawn died, you get fine. I found out this the hard way. I didn't take care of my lawn and let everything dies. The city fined me(like $600) for it and force me to take care of my lawn. wtf.

This is more of a city or State issue instead of your landlord. maybe talk to a lawyer is a good idea if you have to pay $1000 a month on water.

[DocGoldstein]

Deduct it from the rent.

[bmw335xi]

If the lease doesn't specify you are responsible for the cost and care of the lawn, I THINK you are fine not to pay. I'd find a legal advice website and pay whatever it is $10-$25 to have a professional give you an answer though.

[California Vagabond]

First, you have my sympathy. This sounds like a difficult situation.

I recommend consulting an attorney who knows the law for your town, and going with the attorney's recommendation. A response that seems just and reasonable to you, me and to most everyone else on city-data might not jibe with the local rulebook.

The renters' rights section at Nolo might be some help:
Renters' Rights & Tenants' Rights - Nolo.com

[ImRandy]

I would probably start with contacting your local water district. I know a lot of them publish recommended watering schedules for the local climate. For example, I'm in Contra Costa County and the water district recommendation for the pop-up style sprinklers I have in August is watering 3-4 days per week using 3 cycles of 3 to 6 minutes. Each cycle separated by an hour to allow the water to soak in instead of running off. Other types of sprinklers (impact, multi-stream rotator) may require longer. They also recommend watering between 3 and 8 am so the plants aren't wet all night and less prone to disease. If he was watering every day and for a long period of time it's possible that a lot of the water ran off instead of soaking in and created a situation where the grass has very shallow roots. Every gardener I've known cuts grass too short which also increases water needs. You might consider asking him to leave the grass a little longer (3"). This also promotes deeper roots and keeps the soil cooler so you don't need as much water.

[FrenchKissed]

I would rent an aerator and aerate the lawn. You can rent one at the home depot for three hours for about fifty bucks. Don't use the spike type aerator- you need a good plug/core aerator to help loosen compacted soil. Then tell your landlord that your gardener is not a good one and suggest he find another one (if you don't want to do the lawn care yourself)

If your lawn is a cool season lawn (many are in northern California) it will tend to brown out in the summer anyway. It takes a lot of water to prevent this, but it is normal. You can always spray paint the lawn green with special lawn paint to keep your neighborhood association from having fits. If it totally dies, replace it when you move out. Chances are it will green up starting in late fall, but if not, a new lawn installed will be cheaper than 10 thousand dollars.

[rparz]

My cutoff for lawn maintenance on a rental property would be about 5 minutes a week, and $10 a month.

[Ultrarunner]

Your situation is not unusual...

I've run into less extreme examples often.

Part of the draw can be a well landscaped, park like setting... unfortunately, this type of yard can get very expensive water wise during the dry season... especially since many water districts have tiered water rates.

I'm not a lawyer... it does seem clear that you had no understanding of the cost of water and it might be a way to approach the landlord/mgmt to break the lease.

I've had similar problems with single family homes... sometimes, a tenant will complain the lawn doesn't look right and they want me to replace it... I tell them, all it needs is more water and it will thrive... even put in sprinklers and the lawn became one of the nicest in the area over about 4 weeks... then the tenant got the water bill and hit the roof... it had doubled...

My standard practice is to fully explain water usage in writing with seasonal adjustments and make sure the prospective tenant agrees... some of my owners have spent a lot of money, time and effort on landscaping and pay for a professional Gardner.

It is very possible, you high water usage will drop dramatically during the winter... only you can decide if living in a lush park like setting is worth it.