Yesterday as I was drinking a beer and waiting for the Georgia/Auburn football game to start, I get a text message from a tenant who says sewage is backing up in the bath tub and the toilet is overflowing. I sent a text back saying I would contact my plumber and he will deal with this on Sunday. Well, my text irritated my tenants and they said this is an emergency and they demanded I get a plumber there that day.

There is more to this story which I will provide, but for now, I want to know how YOU would have handled this situation? It is obvious they need a plumber that can snake their drain, but on college football Saturday right at kick-off, no plumber here will answer their phone or text. Should I have done the same, not answer this text?

If sewage is backing up into the tub and the toilet is overflowing, that sounds like a city sewer line problem.

I would have told the tenant that I would be over to take a look and then gone when the game was over. After looking at it, I would call a plumber if I needed one.

Ya..on 4th of July we had someone call us with a similar situation. Turned out it wasn't as crucial as she made it out; she could have taken care of herself.

Another time we were off to board a plane for a 2 week vacation and had let our tenant know ahead of time. An hour before we left we get a call from a tenant about a leak under the kitchen sink. Went to look; it wasn't something that just happened and was barely a drip. I had brought a bucket with me and put it under the drip...and said to watch it and empty before it filled up and we'd call a plumber to come over to take care of it. Not many plumbers are available on the fly.

Oregon,

The tenant reported this after running his washing machine. He texted me photos and the water in the bathtub was mostly clear but the tenant assumed it was raw sewage due to an odor. I did not go over there since there is nothing I could do to solve this problem. Plus, I did not see this as a life or death type emergency.

6x6- My lack of concern here? What do you expect me to do here? I always hire my plumbing out but on Saturdays during an SEC game, finding a plumber is next to impossible.

My tenant is freaking out over nothing here. The best I can do is try to keep him calm and reasonable.

For more than 45 years I've been a landlord of apartments, homes, strip malls and offices. I'm also a California Licensed Plumbing Contractor.

In your post, you did not mention if the property was a single family home, duplex, apartment house or how many units.

But lets take the worst case, there is another person upstairs and they go to take a bath. After wards the pull the stopper and around 40 gallons of water goes down the drain. You say, "Well no big deal"!

The main sewer line is clogged. Maybe it's a paper towel that a tenant accidentally flushed down the toilet instead of toilet paper-- and the sewer line is blocked from draining.

So the force of the "upstairs" tub water, that's 8.75 pounds of force per gallon x 40 gallons of water, or around 350 pounds of water coming from upstairs and then hits the blocked main sewer line. The water has to go somewhere! So every drain close by will have water backing up.

We are talking about shower drain, other tub drains, sinks, toilets and more. You are about to have a 40 gallon flood of sewerage drain on your interior floors, drywall, baseboards, etc. Not clean water but soiled sewer water with bacteria.

So why ask your plumber to make a special trip and pay 1.5 times their normal rate. We are talking about $150 per hour. Compare that to a bacterial mold infestation, remediation, repairs, insurance and tenant relocation -- hum lets call this a $30,000 mess.

And you wonder why your tenant is pissed? Maybe it's because you have a Bad Manager?

Don't cry, around 200 of my clients refuse to pay $20 for an automatic spring loaded clean out cap that would open when the interior pipe water pressure goes above a curtain level, releasing sewer water OUTSIDE onto the Ground, Grass or Walkway. I mean why spend $20 to save you $30,000 in damages. This is called penny wise and pound foolish.

I ordered a hundred of assorted sizes of sewer spring loaded sewer caps, from sizes 1-1/2" thru 4". And to day, I still have half of my order left because narrow minded, cheep owners/landlords wanted to save a buck.

Dh has installed the sewer caps at pretty much all of our places because we are all septic everywhere. If they start backing up there's a reason. Not always the fault of the system, but there's a reason.

So now Tenants call us quickly if they find poop on the ground outside - but are a lot happier it is not inside in their tub and we don't have to pay a plumber overtime - it can wait until Monday!

**automatic spring loaded clean out cap that would open when the interior pipe water pressure goes above a certain level**

I agree with 6x6, plenty and NE. You handled this in completely the wrong way. I would have foregone football and headed over there. There are sacrifices we make to be in this game. Even if I was not willing to do that, I would have not just given them the brushoff. I would have said "Let me try to get a hold of my plumber." Then I would have watched the game and after the game headed over the same day.

Tell tenant that you will try to find someone ASAP. Make several call and then call your plumber and arrange for a Sunday clean out.

Text back at halftime and tell the tenant that you mad3 several calls and finally found a plumber, but, he cannot be there until tomorrow.

On a side note, I never meet a tenant if I have started a beer. There are too many things a tenant can complain about to the judge. Alcohol is one thing my tenants cannot complain about.

I'd call a plumber, give them the tenant's contact info, then text the tenant to let them know how sorry I am that they are having issues and that we're going to get this resolved for them ASAP. They can expect contact from our contractor to set up an appointment shortly.

Nothing more I can do there. It is what it is. Timing of issues sometimes stinks.

My plumber would know to inform me of what the cause of the clog is. If tenant-caused, then tenant gets the bill. If city-caused, then I go after them for the damages. If it's my property's problem, then I eat the cost of doing business and finish watching the game.

I don't have any experience clearing whole house clogs. Nor do I have any desire to GET experience. A competent plumber with the right equipment should be able to clear a clog in an hour or two at most. $120/hour weekend rate and maybe $75 for the machine. At worst, this is a $300 problem.

Always have a Roto-Rooter or a 24/7/365 company on speed dial for those weekend/holiday times. When you have 20+ units, it's bound to happen, so we must be prepared.

I would also have gone over and eyeballed myself but that is b/c DH is a plumber, electrician, HVAC guy, basically multi skilled tradesman.

So, according to most of you all, all landlords should be at our tenant's beckon call 24/7 and 365. Even on Thanksgiving or Christmas Day, most of you all would drop any family plans you had made and would go over plunge the tenant's toilet or snake their drain? Is this what I am reading here?

MMIT - I handled this situation pretty much the way you suggested. I did call my regular plumber and he told me he could get there on Sunday morning. However, my tenant did not want to wait till Sunday and then told me he was going to find a plumber via Google. I told him "good luck" on football Saturday. There is more to this story but I will save it for later.

One more thing: After drinking just one beer, one thing I do not do is drive a car. That was the primary reason I did not visit this property. Am I supposed to stay sober 24/7/365 days a year?

WMH,

All of my rental houses (single family only) are on city sewer and they have sewer cleanout ports with lids that are screwed down tight. Sometimes a tenant will unscrew the lid and let the raw sewage flow out and make a stinky cesspool in the front yard. When the neighbors smell this foul odor, they call the health department and then the health dept. calls me. You can connect the dots on what usually happens next.

6x6,

Roy, you manage how you see fit. They are your properties so treat them as you want.

However, sewer backing up is not a "deal with it later" situation. Plumbing leaks, fire, electrical shorts, tree through the roof, anything that can damage my house, gets immediate attention.

Something that causes temporary inconvenience to the tenant but doesn't do any more damage can often wait. One of my good tenants called me to tell me the porch light would not turn off. She was told I would get it fixed as quickly as I could but an electrician will not consider that an emergency and they are busy, so it might take several days to get one out there. I was out there the next day with a handyman who couldn't figure out the very weird wiring, so I got an electrician. Delt with it as quickly as I could without paying an emergency fee.

I'm certainly not on call 24/7/365. My phone goes on DO NOT DISTURB from 10 pm to 7 AM the next day. Anyone who calls will get a voicemail greeting with instructions for "Fire, Flood", "Blood" emergencies (Call 911-fire department, call City Utilities to shut off the water, call the cops to handle the break-in/etc). Anything beyond that is NOT an emergency that has to be handled right now and probably isn't something I can do anything about anyway.

Oregon,

In your porch light example, I would have just unscrewed the bulb and waited for the qualified electrician to arrive. In this case, it sounds like a faulty light switch problem.

6x6,

No, my rental houses do not have constant plumbing problems. What I do have is tenants who sometimes flush things down the toilet they shouldn't,...baby wipes, tampons, tons of toilet paper, cigarette butts, etc.

A couple of years ago, I had this confirmed after I paid $250.00 to have a plumbing snake with a video camera on it put inside the drain. The video plumber and I looked at his video monitor and it was obvious the drain was not the problem here. That plumber said, "you have 5 women living in this house and you need to go have a talk with each of them!

Who ended up paying for the trainee who took care of the problem?

Oreo,

ROY: fair enough. We do the same for a tenant having been there a short time...unless we have had our plumber clear ALL drains and sewer cleaned before they move in. In which case, we show the plumber's bill which outlines what he did and I stress that any plumbing bill related to those items will be their responsibility.