Multifamily Unit Turnover Plumbing Check

Purpose

A vacant unit is the only window in which the whole apartment can be shut down and metered with nobody in it. That is what makes turnover the right time to find the running toilet and the weeping stop that the last tenant lived with for two years and never mentioned. This procedure guarantees a measured still test rather than a walkthrough, a fixture-by-fixture pass with numbers, and an honest rent-ready verdict. Skip it and the property pays for the leak twice, once on the water bill through the last tenancy and again on the first work order of the next one, which arrives in week two with a new tenant already annoyed.

Scope

Covers the plumbing portion of a unit turnover in apartments, duplexes and small mixed-use buildings: unit isolation, still leak test, fixture pass, angle stops and supply hoses, trap seals, in-unit water heater condition, and cross-connection check on tenant-installed devices.

Does not cover water heater service or replacement beyond a condition check, owned by the water heater annual service SOP. Does not cover any work needing the riser down, owned by the shared riser shutdown and tenant notification SOP. Does not cover appliance repair, cabinetry, or the make-ready trades. A drain that will not clear routes to the drain cleaning service standard rather than being worked here against the clock.

Roles and responsibilities

Procedure

1. Confirm the unit is vacant and that nobody else is working in it before the test starts. Acceptance: the unit empty, the door controlled, and the make-ready trades held out or finished, agreed with the property manager. Wrong looks like a still test run while a painter washes brushes in the tub, which produces a false leak. Stop rule: if other trades cannot be held for the test window, do the fixture pass now and book the still test for the last day of make-ready. Hazard: an empty unit with the power partly off means dark bathrooms and an open floor, so carry your own light and check the tub and shower floor for a removed drain cover before stepping in.

2. Walk the unit and photograph what the last tenant added or changed. Acceptance: photographs of every fixture, the laundry connection, under both sinks, and the water heater compartment, plus a written list of anything tenant-installed. Wrong looks like a walkthrough that only notes what is broken, when the thing that matters is a hand shower coiled into a tub or a hose on a laundry tub. Stop rule: anything tenant-installed goes on the list even if it looks fine, because you will be judging it against cross-connection rules at step 8. Hazard: cabinet interiors hide sharps and dried chemical residue, so open with a light first and use gloves rather than sweeping a hand into the back of a vanity.

3. Run a still test on the unit's meter or submeter with everything closed. Close every fixture, read the meter, wait a stated interval of at least 15 minutes, read it again. Acceptance: no change at the meter's own resolution over the interval, with both readings and the interval written down. Wrong looks like relying on the low-flow indicator alone on a meter whose indicator sticks. Stop rule: any measurable change means the unit has a leak and step 4 finds it before anything is called rent-ready. Hazard: none at this step, it is two readings and a wait, and using the wait to start another task is how the second reading gets taken late and the arithmetic goes wrong.

4. Isolate branch by branch to find what is moving, closing one stop at a time. Close the nearest suspect stop, re-run a short still interval, and work outward. Acceptance: the leaking fixture or branch named, with the still test coming clean once it is isolated. Wrong looks like guessing at the toilet because it is usually the toilet, and then finding the meter still turning after a new flapper. Stop rule: if the meter still moves with every fixture stop closed, the leak is in the concealed piping and that is a different job, escalated to the lead the same day rather than absorbed into make-ready. Hazard: closing an old stop is the act most likely to make it weep, so have a towel and a bucket under it before you turn it and know where the unit's main shutoff is.

5. Work every fixture in turn and record a number, not an impression. Run each faucet, flush each closet, fill and drain each tub and sink. Acceptance: measured flow in gpm at each faucet with a container and a watch, each drain accepting a full basin without backing up, each closet clearing in one flush and stopping cleanly. Wrong looks like "all fixtures operational" on a sheet, which tells the next tech nothing. Stop rule: a slow drain routes to drain cleaning as its own work order rather than being snaked in the last hour of make-ready. Hazard: the hot side is a scald route in a unit whose heater may be set high, so run cold first and keep your hand out of the stream to judge temperature.

6. Exercise and inspect every angle stop and supply hose, and watch what you moved. Close and reopen each stop, then look at the stem and the joint under full pressure for a witnessed five minutes. Acceptance: every stop closing fully and reopening, nothing weeping at five minutes, and every supply hose either braided stainless in sound condition or replaced. Wrong looks like leaving a stop you just moved without watching it, which is how a tech creates the flood that arrives after handover. Stop rule: a stop that weeps or will not close is replaced before the unit is handed back, and where that replacement needs the riser down it routes to the riser shutdown SOP and the unit is not rent-ready until it is done. Hazard: an old multi-turn stop can shear at the stem or the nipple with the line live, so support the stop body with a second wrench, keep your face out of line with it, and have the unit main located first.

7. Check the in-unit water heater's safety devices and delivered temperature. Acceptance: the temperature and pressure relief discharge piped full size to an approved termination with no valve or reduction in it, the pan present and its drain clear, no scorching or corrosion, and delivered temperature read at a fixture and written down. Wrong looks like a relief discharge line terminating inside a closet or capped, which is the defect most often found and least often reported at turnover. Stop rule: a missing or obstructed relief discharge takes the heater out of service until it is corrected; do not hand back a unit with it noted as a comment. Hazard: do not test-lift a relief valve on an old tank as a routine check, because a valve that has never been operated may not reseat, and the discharge is scalding water; inspect the piping and leave the lever alone.

8. Check for cross-connections, including the ones the last tenant created. Acceptance: no hose or hand shower able to lie below the flood rim of a tub, sink or laundry tub without an approved vacuum breaker, and every hose bib or laundry connection carrying the backflow protection your adopted code requires. Wrong looks like leaving a tenant-fitted hose on a laundry tub because it is not your work; it is the property's water system and it is now yours to report. Stop rule: remove or correct what you can and write up what you cannot, because a submerged hose end is a direct path from a soiled fixture into the building's potable water. Hazard: none at this step beyond the reach under a fixture, and the risk it addresses lands on people who never see the fitting.

9. Restore, refill every trap, label the shutoffs, and give a written verdict. Acceptance: every stop open and holding, every trap in the unit refilled and holding a seal, shutoffs labelled, and a rent-ready or not-rent-ready verdict with each failing item named. Wrong looks like a unit handed back after three weeks vacant with dry traps, which the new tenant reports as a sewer smell in their first week and which reads to them as a dirty apartment. Stop rule: a unit with any open item is handed back as not rent-ready in writing, whatever the pressure from the schedule; that verdict is the only protection the shop has later. Hazard: this is the step that leaves the unit pressurized and unattended, so open stops in stages, walk the whole unit once more after everything is open, and check under both sinks last rather than first.

The record this produces

Per unit: both still test readings with the interval and the meter resolution, the leaking fixture if any, measured flow per faucet, drain result per fixture, stop and supply hose condition per fixture with anything replaced, water heater relief and pan findings with delivered temperature, cross-connection findings, traps refilled, and the rent-ready verdict with named exceptions.

These land on the unit's record, not the building's. The next turnover reads the previous stop and hose replacements to know which ones are original and which are five years old. The maintenance supervisor reads the escalations to schedule riser work across several units at once instead of one shutdown per unit. The property manager reads the verdict, which is the document that decides whether a lease starts on time, so it says rent-ready or it names what stands in the way, and never both.

One worked pass, including a failure

Two-bedroom unit, vacant three weeks, submetered, make-ready deadline in two days. Step 1 confirms the painters finished the previous afternoon.

Step 3: submeter reads to 0.1 gal. Start reading 41,265.0 gal, everything closed. After 20 minutes it reads 41,265.6 gal, so 0.6 gal in 20 minutes. 0.6 divided by 20 is 0.03 gpm, and 0.03 times 60 times 24 is 43.2 gal per day of loss. The unit is not still.

Step 4 closes the guest bath closet stop and repeats a 20 minute interval: 41,265.6 to 41,265.6, no change at the meter's 0.1 gal resolution. The flapper is the leak, replaced, and a third interval after the stop is reopened holds still.

Step 6 fails at the master bath lavatory hot stop. It is an original multi-turn stop, and it will not close fully; the stem turns without seating and a thread of flow continues at the faucet. Stop rule taken: the stop is replaced before handover, and because there is no other isolation between that stop and the unit's riser branch on this stack, the replacement needs the riser down. It routes to the riser shutdown SOP, the property manager is told the same afternoon, and the shutdown is scheduled for the following morning with three other units on the same riser bundled into it.

Step 7 finds the relief discharge piped full size to the pan with no valve in it, pan drain clear, delivered temperature 124 F at the kitchen faucet, recorded. Step 8 finds a hand shower on a hose in the guest tub with no vacuum breaker at the outlet, removed and written up. Step 9 refills five traps, three of which were dry after three weeks vacant.

Verdict at handback that day: not rent-ready, one named item, the master bath hot stop, with the scheduled shutdown time on the record. It clears the next morning and the unit is re-verdicted rent-ready with a fresh still test.

References

• IPC Sections 504 for relief valve discharge piping and 608 for cross-connection control and backflow protection, in the edition your authority having jurisdiction has adopted; the UPC parallels reach you the same way where that is your adopted code.
• Water heater and fixture manufacturer literature for relief discharge termination and temperature setting.
• See related: the Plumbing water heater annual service SOP, the shutoff location and labeling visit SOP, the shared riser shutdown and tenant notification SOP, and the drain cleaning service standard.