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Audience: Condos

Spring Into Savings

By Tom Finley

When you think of springtime, traditional thoughts of warmer weather, flowers, and sunshine often come to mind. It’s a time of renewal, a time of opportunity. But you probably don’t think about your pipes much. Afterall, what do your pipes have to do with the changing seasons?

The truth is, there are a handful of reasons to consider your pipes in the spring, some with a very strong return on investment! Whether you struggled with your HVAC system over the winter or are considering capital improvement projects like in-unit laundry, spring is a great time to evaluate the potential for these kinds of projects at your community.

Waiting to Repipe Your Condo Community? There Could Be Horrors Ahead.

By Tom Finley

Picture it: An older building, nightfall. A foul smell wafts from an unknown source in the hallways. In the stairwells, residents see pipe stacks seeping. Last month, motley-colored spots crept across the lobby walls. This month, several ceilings in the south corner are starting to sag and the heat is out. Tension is rising across the community.

This isn’t a Halloween nightmare. It’s the reality facing many aging condominium buildings whose pipes are reaching the end of their useful life. At first, the leaks and smells are an occasional nuisance, but over time the frequency and intensity of failures increase.

The Power of Hydronic System Upgrades

By Tom Finley

In many parts of the country, multifamily apartment and condominium communities have switched from winter heating to summer cooling and discovered that their hydronic HVAC systems are in jeopardy. Systems that have kept building climates steady and residents comfortable for 30+ years are breaking down or leaking under the stress of age and the change of seasons.

If you own or operate one of these communties, it’s time to put in a new system. And while it can be challenging to take on this capital improvement project, you actually have the benefit of an important decision: Will you simply replace your current system with a like-in-kind solution or upgrade to a system that improves both building efficiency and resident quality of life?

When A Design-Build Solution May Be Best for Your Community Renovation

By Tom Finley

When looking to complete a capital improvement project like a community-wide piping system replacement or upgrade, you have several contracting model options. We’ve previously written about why one model—hiring your service or maintenance provider for a large capital improvement project—is often not the best choice. Even among the qualified general and specialty contractors available, you’ll want to consider a number of factors to select the model that’s right for you.

Stop chasing leaks. It’s a race you can’t win.

By Tom Finley

When apartment community owners and condo boards face repeated piping leaks, they may start “chasing leaks,” which means treating each incident as an isolated event instead of committing to a systemic solution. It’s so much easier to call a plumber or HVAC service technician for a quick repair than think about a large-scale capital improvement project like pipe replacement.

Diagnosing Defects: Understanding plumbing problems in your newly constructed building

By Eric Lecky

It’s a terrible feeling for every property owner and manager. Your brand new condo or apartment community has finally opened. The finishes are beautiful, the paint is perfect.  But then, a spot emerges on a unit’s pristine new wall. There’s moisture seeping through.

Your maintenance team cuts the drywall and finds a bad plumbing joint. They fix it and patch the wall. You hope it’s a one-time plumbing mistake made during construction. Then it happens in another unit. And another. You realize you have a serious systemic issue on your hands. But what are you to do? Who is to blame? And how do you get it fixed?

Top 7 Reasons to Use a Specialty Pipe Replacement Contractor

By Tom Finley

Paramedics excel in medical emergencies. That doesn’t mean they have the skills and experience to perform heart surgery, too. Apply this same logic when you undertake a mechanical or plumbing capital improvement in your apartment or condo buildings. For leaks, maintenance, and fixture installs, your service provider is a perfect fit. They know your community well and you’ve likely established a working relationship grounded in trust. When it’s time for a full community repipe, however, your service provider is unlikely to have the skills, supplier relationships, staff, or time they need for a project of this magnitude.

Including Pipes in Capital Improvement Planning

By Tom Finley

Leverage Useful Life Estimates, Incident Tracking, and Pipe Assessments to Prepare Your Community for the Inevitable

Maybe you’ve never considered that you may one day have to replace a whole piping system in your community. The fact is, it’s becoming more common as about half of U.S. apartment and condominium buildings are more than 30 years old.

“Repiping” is a significant capital investment that owners and operators sometimes hesitate to undertake. In the end, however, the projects are necessary to protect a community’s value and resident safety. 

The Science Behind Costly Pipe Breakdowns

By Wendy Matney

Compatibility is the key to longevity. That’s as true for human relationships as it is for piping systems. Without compatibility, breakups—and breakdowns—are inevitable.

At SageWater, we see a high volume of premature piping system failures due to the use of incompatible materials. Think of a mixture of metals, or plastics and sealants, that don’t play well together on a molecular level.

In this post, we explore some of the issues behind material-based pipe degradation and point out what you can do to help mitigate the risks of failure in your building.