Individual metering of water in a housing association, the whole picture.

What is IMD Water?

IMD Water stands for individual metering and billing of water. Instead of the association splitting the total water cost evenly between all apartments, every apartment gets its own meter, and each household pays for its actual consumption on the ordinary monthly invoice.

Two things happen when consumption becomes visible. The cost becomes fair, because nobody is subsidising anyone else's water any more. And consumption falls, because residents see a direct link between their behaviour and their cost. That effect is well documented: hot water use tends to fall by around 30 percent once metering is in place.

A fairer split

Without individual metering everyone pays the same regardless of how much they use. Picture a family with children who bathe and shower every day, and a neighbour living alone who showers every few days. They pay the same for water, even though their consumption differs sharply. The frugal household subsidises the one that is not. Toggle between with and without IMD below and see what each of them pays per litre.

A worked example with illustrative, rounded figures. With IMD Water everyone pays for their own consumption. The association's total cost is the same, but it is split according to how much each household actually uses. The family gets a reason to look at its habits, and the neighbour pays a charge that reflects how little she uses.

It is often that fairness, rather than the money, that makes the question easy to decide at the general meeting.

How the system works

The route from installation to running billing goes in a few clear steps.

1. Installing meters. A water meter is fitted at the apartment's tapping points, so that each household's consumption is metered separately. The meters can be installed in both older and newer buildings. It is the property's existing pipework, not the age of the building, that determines how the installation is laid out. An experienced supplier keeps the work as small as possible.

2. Wireless reading. Modern meters are remotely readable and report wirelessly. The values are collected continuously and quality-assured in a digital system, without anyone having to read meters on site.

3. Billing on the invoice. The cost of each apartment's consumption is calculated and passed to the association's financial administrator, who puts it on the ordinary monthly invoice alongside the other charges.

4. Insight for residents. Every household follows its own consumption in an app or web portal. It is that insight that drives the change in behaviour and therefore the saving.

What can you save?

Hot water use typically falls by around 30 percent, and cold water by 5–10 percent. Taken together, total water use tends to fall by 15–25 percent. Because hot water carries the energy cost of heating with it, the largest saving sits there.

Say an association with 50 apartments pays around 250,000 kr a year for water and for heating the hot water. A reduction of 15–25 percent then corresponds to roughly 37,000–62,000 kr a year, money that otherwise runs straight through the pipes. The investment in meters and system normally pays for itself in 1–2 years, and after that the lower consumption is a running gain for the association and its residents.

Try Nordic Propeye's calculator for your own estimate of what your association could save.

If you want a figure anchored in your own property you can request a free quote. It is property-specific and carries no obligation.

Why now? Water and heating are getting more expensive

Two costs drive the association's water bill, and both have risen sharply. The first is the water and sewage charge, the price of water and wastewater, which has increased throughout the 2020s with the largest rises in 2023 and 2024 and a continued increase in 2025. The second is heating: hot water takes a lot of energy, and the district heating price has risen at the same pace. Hot water is therefore the item where a housing association has most to gain from lowering consumption.

We have put the regional differences together in Water and sewage charges 2025: the counties with the highest rates. When both costs point upwards, every cubic metre saved is worth more, and a measure that lowers consumption by 15–25 percent has a greater effect with every year that passes.

An example: BRF Furan

BRF Furan in Oxelösund, 85 apartments built in 1958, introduced IMD Water with a clear result. Hot water use fell 26 percent in the first year alone, with the aim of reaching 30 percent, and the investment paid for itself in about two years. The spread between households turned out to be wide once everyone paid for their own consumption, from ten kronor or so a month up to several hundred kronor.

My recommendation to housing associations is to start with IMD Water, because it gives an incredibly good return on the investment.

Boris Klintsjö, board member at BRF Furan.

Rules and legal requirements

Individual metering of domestic hot water is governed by the Act (2022:333) on energy metering in buildings and by Boverket's regulations (2022:3), which came into force on 1 June 2022. Whether metering is required depends on whether the case is new build, a major refurbishment or an existing building.

Beyond this, new installations must be remotely readable. Residents must receive their metered values at least once a month when the meters are remotely readable, and billing must be based on actual consumption.

The technology: wireless meters

Wireless water meters are the most common solution today, particularly in older properties that were not prepared for metering. They are read wirelessly around the clock and need no new cabling, which makes the installation simpler and cheaper and gives freedom in where the meters are placed. It is the same kind of wireless collection that sits behind the association's other metering in the Propeye portal.

The foundation for more than metering

Once the water is metered, the property works as a system where consumption is visible rather than merely totalled. The same platform gathers electricity, heating and water in one portal and one app, which makes IMD Water a building block as much as a solution in its own right.

With the metering in place the association can add Comfort heating for fair heat billing and PropSaver to optimise the heating, and all of it sits with one supplier on one contract. Hot water is often the natural way in, because that is where both the cost and the saving are largest.

Is IMD Water right for your association?

The value is greatest for associations with many apartments and for buildings where hot water is a heavy cost item. It also suits associations that want to stay a step ahead of the rules, and those that want to give residents the tools to influence their own costs.

If you want to see what introducing it would give in your own property, we produce a full analysis of the saving and the roll-out. Read more about our IMD Water solution or fill in the form further down, and we will come back to you at no cost and with no obligation.