Q: We have 12 units in
our condo building, and each unit has its own garage. The
association pays for the electricity for all of the garage
units. What happens if someone purchases an electric car?
Would that unit pay more because they’re using more
electricity?
A: This is a great question. We, too, have wondered what
condominium associations will do with this issue now that so
many people are buying (and are being encouraged to buy)
electrical vehicles.
The premise of your question is that it doesn’t seem fair to
have all of the unit owners share equally in the electric
bill when there are one or more homeowners that own electric
vehicles and power them in the garage.
True enough. That doesn’t seem fair. Still, condominium
boards have broad discretion on how to run their
associations. We’ve now been to a number of condominium
buildings and seen charging stations. In each of these
instances, it looked to us like the charging station was
tied into the building electric system and was not
separately metered. (One exception: A local workout club has
a meter on their charging station, but the cost is pennies
for several hours of charging.)
If you don’t want to meter up the charging station, you
could consider the charging station an amenity like any
other. Some buildings have picnic and grill areas and
provide homeowners with free gas, logs or other items for
their parties and activities. Other buildings have party
rooms with tables, chairs and other items for their members
to host parties. In most, if not all, of these other
situations any homeowner can take advantage of the party
room, pool, recreational facility, exercise room, and other
available benefits without paying extra fees.
Where the charging station is available for any homeowner to
use, we view it as another amenity offered by that building,
one that will ultimately make the property more desirable to
future buyers (and may even help propel values higher).
However, if the charging station is only available to one
owner (and only that owner), then it may be fairer for that
owner to pay the building the estimated cost for the
electricity – or perhaps reimburse the building for the cost
of installing the charging station.
Perhaps the condominium association could require owners to
sign up for a slot and then charge those owners a monthly
fee to use the charging station.
That’s an easy workaround, since it’s likely too expensive
to install a separate electric meter. But your association
should compare past electrical bills with the current bills
to see how much the extra electricity has cost and come up
with a fair sum to charge that unit owner or any other unit
owner that wants access to the charging station.
Over time, you can decide if the monthly fee is fair or
change it to make it fair for everyone. We’d love to hear
from our readers about how their condo associations are
dealing with this issue, especially since climate change
seems to be on everyone’s minds these days.