I share a well with my neighbor. For both of us, the well and pumpwere supplied by the developer who old us the land on which we builtlast year. Both houses use the well and pump, but only one housesupplies the electricity--and that's our house! We agreed that wewould pay for the electricity along with the rest of our electricity,but our neighbor should pay us half the cost of the electricityrequired to run the pump. Problem is, I don't know how to charge forthat. I don't even know how much electricity the pump uses. It's ona circuit connected to our house's electrical service--there's noseparate meter. What would be a fair amount to charge?In case it helps, both families have two adults and two children withtypical water usage--no hot tubs, swimming pools, etc.Here's another thing I'm wondering about... Ours was the first housebuilt, and ours was the first plumbing connected to the pump, so I'mwondering if we paid for some initial set-up that our neighbors didn'thave to pay for. For example, besides the electricity each month,wouldn't there be a cost to initially run the circuit out to thepump? What other initial costs might there be that should be sharedwith the neighbor?Finally, when our house was built, we installed a pressure tank. Thepurpose of the pressure tank is to improve the overall pressure of theplumbing in the house and to provide a sort of pressure reserve sothat the pump doesn't have to turn on so frequently. I'm not sure thecost of this tank and it's related controls, but I know it was over$1,000. I also know that our neighbor did *NOT* install one ofthese. My question is this... Is our neighbor benefiting from ourpressure tank? Besides lessening wear and tire on the pump, is italso improving the pressure for our neighbor's house, too? (The tankis located in our house's mechanical room.) Is this something thatour neighbor should be compensating us for?Any advice is greatly appreciated.- Johnnie

That's a crummy situation. Essentially you've paid for the well, plumbing and wiring as well as support equipment, and the neighbor gets a tap off of it. It's hard to believe the building codes would even allow that. His use is causing wear and tear on your equipment. The electric is only a small part of the cost, eventually the pump and other expensive parts will go. Will he agree to share those costs? What if he moves, and the pump fails right after a new owner moves in? I think you should get paid as though you were selling water to the neighbor, assuming you are the legal owner of this equipment. I would also expect your and his deeds to spell out this situation and clarify how to handle it

Sharing well and pump--how much should we charge?

Feb 26, 2008 Last reply: 6 years ago 41 Replies

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Kd 5 years ago

So we have an agreement with our neibors 7 dollars a month for there part of the electric on the pump and any repairs we split in half. Also if the electric goes out since we have the pump they have a generator that will run it! So it’s even work! This was in place way before we bought the house.

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hadel 4 years ago

why dont you get an electric usage meter to meter the electric usage of your pump? if it plugs in to an outlet , you can get one on amazon for $20. otherwise you need an electrician to hook it for you.

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