Field notes from a condo corp treasurer

Article from Volume 13, Issue Number 2, 2025

Field notes from a condo corp treasurer

By Alan Forbes | Other articles by Alan Forbes | Regular Column

How is your condominium corporation’s budget looking for the current fiscal year? Were you prepared for the tax and rate increases passed by your municipal council?

Since my condo is in Winnipeg, the numbers that follow are based on the City of Winnipeg’s increased sewer and water rates and the new waste management fee, as documented in a news item on the CCI Manitoba website. At my condo we have seven townhouse units in each of the three buildings, for a total of 21 units. Note for context that there is one water meter per building as opposed to each unit, so the corporation pays the bill.

Also, the new waste management fee replaces the previously announced but never enacted multi-family waste diversion fee, which was last discussed in our summer 2023 newsletter. Since the new fee didn’t start until April 1, 2025, and my condo corporation’s fiscal year is the same as the calendar year, the impact is only for nine months in the current fiscal year.

At $31.75 per unit per quarter, the additional expense for this fiscal year is $2,000.25, which represents a 2.2 per cent increase to our planned operating expenses for the year. Since it was a new fee, we had nothing budgeted, so it will consume part of our budget contingency.

Increased sewer and water rates

Since sewer and water rates increase every year, we had at least some provision in our budget for the increased rates — we planned for a 7.6 per cent increase or an additional $873.

Estimating the impact of the increased rate is a bit tricky because the quarterly bill contains both a consumption rate (92 per cent of the bill) and a fixed daily charge (8 per cent of the bill) and separate billing for sewer (outflow) and water (inflow). While the consumption rate increases are well documented, increases to the fixed charges aren’t.

Actual water consumption varies considerably each quarter due to weather conditions in the summer (lawn watering needs) and household use (travel, absences, change in unit ownership or family structure).

Based on our prior four quarters of consumption of about 2,100 cubic meters and the new sewer rate of $4.40 per cubic meter versus the former rate of $3.47, the additional expense for the current fiscal year for the remaining three quarters is $1,464.75.

Similarly, based on a 3 per cent increase on the water rate and the former rate of $2.09 per cubic meter, the additional expense for the current fiscal year for the remaining three quarters is $98.75.

Ignoring possible increases to the fixed charges for now, the combined increase for the sewer and water bill is $1,563.50. Since we did budget for an increase of $873, the net impact to our budget for the sewer and water bill is $690.50.

Overall impact

Overall, the increased sewer and water rates and new waste management fees increase our expenses for the current fiscal year by $3,028.25 or 3.3 per cent of our budgeted operating expenses. As mentioned above, we did budget for a smaller increase to the sewer and water rates so the overall impact is manageable. We do follow a policy of keeping an accumulated operating surplus of at least 15 per cent of our total annual budget. This contingency planning means that we need not go after unit owners for a special assessment nor reduce or eliminate some of our discretionary expenses.

Bottom line, given U.S. President Donald Trump’s actual, threatened and ever-changing tariffs, trade war and 51st state comments filling the media channels, I’m not going to complain about the City of Winnipeg and increased fees to pay for required services.

Other municipalities

Since I live in Winnipeg I don’t hear much about the other municipalities in the province and the impact of their budget decisions on their condominium corporations. If you would like to share your story, feel free to email me at cci.mb.news@gmail.com and/or join our condo board Treasurers’ Facebook group — treasurers can click here to join.

Alan Forbes lives in a condo and is the treasurer for his condo corporation. He also is a director of CCI Manitoba and is its vice-president.

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