The Law on Urban Leases (hereinafter the LAU) establishes in principle that the parties may agree that the general expenses for the proper maintenance of the property, which cannot be individualised, and which correspond to the dwelling and its accessories, are to be paid by the tenant. Likewise, the expenses of those buildings that are in community of owners will be those that correspond according to the participation quota.
In particular, we are referring to water expenses (although sometimes also heating, hot water and rarely electricity), which are very common in many old buildings (prior to 1998) in Spain and Mallorca.
It must be taken into account that the Energy Efficiency Directive 21/27/EU requires the installation of individual meters, as this means an overall saving of about 25% of consumption.
But what happens if these expenses were originally part of the community expenses and were paid as such, but were subsequently individualised? Can the landlord force you to pay them?
Article 20.3 clearly states that “The expenses for services of the rented property that are individualised by means of metering devices will in any case be paid by the lessee”.
What happens if before individualisation it was agreed that a service was to be paid for by the landlord and after individualisation the landlord demands that the tenant pay for it?
If it was originally agreed in writing that in the event of individualisation these costs are to be borne by the landlord, the tenant cannot be required to pay these costs or be terminated on the basis of non-payment of these costs. However, in the absence of a written agreement, if it were the lessor who had to pay for this service, we would be dealing with an unjust enrichment and an abuse of rights on the part of the lessee, which our legal system would not tolerate, as it is understood that these are expenses related to consumption made by the lessee himself and, logically, it would be up to him to pay for them.
The logical thing to do here would be to reach a middle ground in such a way that the community/rental charges would have to be reduced by a proportional part. Especially if the contract did not foresee that these costs could be individualised and that the tenant would then have to pay them without being entitled to reduce the rent.
Lawyer
Email: alonso@cornerabogados.com