Should You Drain Your Las Vegas Pool Before Nov. 1?

If your pool needs a drain and refill, do it in the next two weeks. On Nov. 1 the Las Vegas Valley Water District’s excessive-use threshold drops from about 26,000 gallons a month to about 14,000, so the same refill can cost a lot more in winter. October’s milder weather is also easier on exposed plaster than summer sun.

Not every pool needs it, though. Here’s how to tell, and how to do it without breaking any rules.

Why does Nov. 1 matter?

Two things change on Nov. 1.

First, the Southern Nevada Water Authority’s winter watering schedule kicks in. Sprinkler watering drops from three assigned days a week to one, through the end of February.

Second, and this is the one that hits pool owners, LVVWD’s excessive use charge (EUC) switches to its winter threshold. Use more than the threshold in a billing period and you pay an extra $9 for every 1,000 gallons over.

Here’s what the thresholds look like for a 30-day bill:

• Fall (Sept. 1 to Oct. 31): about 26,000 gallons
• Winter (Nov. 1 to Feb. 28): about 14,000 gallons

Now the pool. SNWA says the typical Southern Nevada pool is about 470 square feet. At an average depth of 5.5 feet, that’s roughly 19,000 gallons (our rough math, your pool will vary).

Say your house normally uses 10,000 gallons a month. Add a 19,000-gallon refill:

• In October: 29,000 gallons, about 3,000 over. Roughly $27 extra.
• In December: 29,000 gallons, about 15,000 over. Roughly $135 extra.

Same pool. Same water. Five times the penalty.

LVVWD also suggests splitting a refill across two billing periods, about half in each, to stay under the threshold. Do that in October and a lot of homes pay no EUC at all.

If you’re in Henderson, your water comes from the City of Henderson, not LVVWD, so check your own bill for its rate tiers. The timing logic still holds. Cooler months mean less outdoor use, and nobody likes a surprise on their water bill.

Does my pool even need to be drained?

Maybe not. LVVWD says many local pool pros recommend a full or partial drain every 3 to 5 years. That’s a range, not a rule. Your water tells you when.

The big reason in the Las Vegas Valley is minerals. Our tap water is hard: LVVWD’s 2026 water quality report puts it at 280 parts per million, or 16 grains per gallon.

And your pool never stops topping itself off. SNWA figures an average pool loses 48.6 gallons per square foot each year to evaporation. For a 470-square-foot pool, that’s about 22,800 gallons a year.

The water leaves. The minerals stay.

By our math, that much Vegas tap water carries roughly 50 pounds of hardness (measured as calcium carbonate) into your pool every year. That’s how you end up with white crust on the tile line and scale inside your heater.

Signs it’s time:

• Total dissolved solids (TDS) are way up. The Pool & Hot Tub Alliance’s guideline is to look at draining once TDS is 1,500 ppm higher than it was at startup.
• Calcium hardness keeps climbing and balancing the water feels like a losing fight.
• Stabilizer (cyanuric acid) is so high your chlorine stops keeping up, often after years of chlorine tablets.
• Cloudy water or scale keeps coming back no matter what you add.

We test this stuff every week on our routes. If you’re not sure where your numbers sit, that’s the first step before you drain anything.

Why not just wait until spring?

You can. LVVWD points out that May and June also have higher thresholds.

But spring and early summer come with a catch. Exposed plaster doesn’t love direct sun, and both LVVWD and the City of Henderson say to refill as soon as possible because of it.

October gives you the best of both. The normal high in Las Vegas runs from 88 degrees on Oct. 1 down to 75 by Oct. 31, per the National Weather Service. That’s warm enough to swim on a good afternoon and mild enough that an empty shell isn’t baking.

We did just have a run of 90s earlier this month. Your pool didn’t notice it was fall. Neither did the rest of us.

Where can the water go?

This is where people get in trouble.

Pool water goes into the sanitary sewer. Not the street, not the gutter, not the storm drain. LVVWD, SNWA and the City of Henderson all say the same thing, and dumping it in the street can get you a water waste citation. Storm drains run to Lake Mead untreated.

The legal way:

1. Turn off power to the pump at the breaker and shut off the auto-fill valve.
2. Find your sewer clean-out. It’s usually a 3- to 4-inch capped pipe in the front yard near a hose spigot, sometimes hiding under rocks or a shrub.
3. Run a hose from a submersible pump in the deep end to the clean-out.
4. Keep the flow at or under 12 gallons per minute, the max SNWA and LVVWD recommend.
5. Watch your lowest drains (showers, tubs) for backup. If you see any, stop and call a plumber.
6. Refill right away, then check chemistry daily for a week.

At 12 gallons a minute, a 19,000-gallon pool takes about 27 hours to drain. Plan on a full day plus.

A couple of things to know. Never drain into a septic tank. Henderson homes on septic have a separate process: dechlorinate the water and call the city at 702-267-5900 before anything goes to the street. And the hose you put down the sewer line is a sewer hose now. Retire it from garden duty.

Should I DIY it or call someone?

If you’re handy, you can do it. Plenty of people do.

Where it goes sideways is the refill. Fresh Vegas water still comes in hard, so you’re starting over on chemistry. Getting calcium, alkalinity, pH and stabilizer right in that first week makes a big difference for your plaster and equipment.

That’s a big part of what we do. We can test your water first and tell you if a partial drain will do it. If you need a full drain, we’ll handle it, refill it and get the chemistry dialed in.

If your pool’s been fighting you all summer, call or text us at (702) 608-5226. We’re open 24/7 and serve Henderson and Las Vegas. Let’s get it done before Nov. 1.