Water Submeter Installation Steps: A Guide for Multifamily Property Owners

Water submeters allow multifamily property owners to reliably recover water utility costs each month by ensuring residents are billed for their actual water usage. But how do you install submeters in the first place? In this blog, we provide a complete overview of the water submeter installation process.

Installing water submeters is a major project that shouldn’t be taken lightly, especially if you’re retrofitting an existing multifamily property with submeters. To get the job done right, you need detailed planning and specialized expertise.

If you opt to do it yourself (or work with an inexperienced contractor), you expose your property to two risks:

1. Billing your residents too much for their water usage – angering your resident and hurting your property’s reputation.
2. Not billing residents enough for their water usage – hurting your cost recovery and the return on investment for your water submetering system.

That’s why “step zero” of the process starts with finding a licensed professional to assist with your multifamily water submeter installation project. They will ensure your system is properly installed and implemented, so you can generate accurate water bills.

Once you have a reputable professional hired, you can begin the submeter installation process by following these general steps.

Water Submeter Installation Process: From Planning to System Calibration

Step #1: Assess Your Property

The first step in any water submeter installation project is preparation, starting with assessing the state of your property. At this stage, it’s important to determine your water billing needs, the state of your existing plumbing system, and if submetering is even possible in your property.

Here are a few points to keep in mind as you assess your property.

• Evaluate your building’s existing plumbing to determine if submeter installation is even possible. If units share pipes, it will be impossible to get an individual water usage reading. In that case, you may want to consider other water billing options like ratio utility billing (RUBS).
• For older buildings, retrofitting water submeters may require additional plumbing system upgrades.

Step #2: Review Local Laws and Regulations

Many state and local governments have legislation regarding utility billing and submetering. Before moving any further in your assessment, it’s critical to ensure submetering is legal for your property.

Find Your State’s Submetering Rules Here

If you have questions at this stage, an expert utility billing firm can help determine what is and isn’t legal on your property. They can also help you decipher any building codes that may impact your installation, ensuring you don’t expose your property to any legal trouble or code violations.

Step #3: Determine the Right Submetering System

Once you’ve assessed your property and reviewed local laws and building codes, it’s time to select the right water submeter. There are a few factors to consider:

• The environment: Outdoor meters need to be able to handle tougher conditions than indoor meters.
• Meter size: The meter needs to align with the size of the plumbing it will be installed on.
• Fixture unit demand: Determine the maximum amount of water your plumbing system will need. This will also affect meter size.
• Automatic or manual read: There are many submeters with automatic read capabilities, making meter reading and access to usage data much easier. While they usually come at a premium compared to manual read meters, they provide a lot of useful data and make billing much easier.

Step #4: Create an Installation Communication Plan

Next, it’s important to keep your residents in the loop with your submeter installation project. You should notify them well in advance about the installation project with important information like:

• Installation dates
• Expected project timelines and phases of work
• When water lines will be shut off
• The benefits of the new system

As the project progresses, it’s important to keep those lines of communication open in case any updates or project setbacks may affect residents. At the end of the day, you want to make sure this process is as seamless as possible for them so they remain satisfied residents of your property.

Step #5: Test and Calibrate Submeters

Once your submeters are installed, you should conduct thorough testing to ensure they are functioning properly. With this testing, you have the information you need in order to:

• Calibrate meters to verify that they measure water usage correctly.
• Address any leaks, pressure issues, or inaccuracies detected during testing.
• Ensure all usage data is flowing in properly for bill generation (if you have a property management system).

Once everything is working properly, don’t forget to provide your residents with information about how the new system works and what they can expect in terms of billing.

The Benefits of Proper Water Submeter Installation

By following the steps above, multifamily property owners can ensure their water submetering system is installed properly and in the best shape possible. Proper installation is the first step for multifamily property owners to see the many benefits of water submetering like:

• Increased water conservation: When residents are billed for their usage, they become aware of their consumption. When they are aware of – and responsible for – their consumption, they use less. That lowers water usage across your property.
• Better water cost recovery: With submeters installed and tracking the usage of each unit in your multifamily property, you can generate fair and accurate bills to bill back your residents for their actual water usage each month. This gets rid of a huge, variable expense for you and allows you to share it equitably with your residents.
• Faster leak detection: Water submeters allow you to monitor water usage in real time, meaning you can determine water usage trends and quickly spot spikes that can be an indication of a leak.
• Lower operational costs & better NOI: When residents use less water, the master water bill goes down for the entire building. That decrease reduces operating costs and increases net operating income (NOI).
• Increased property value: Installing water submeters comes with an up-front cost, but that expenditure is recovered quickly. Plus, water submeters are an attractive building infrastructure feature for prospective buyers and investors should you move to sell.

Conclusion: Work with Water Submetering Professionals

Properly installing water submeters is crucial to the success of your water billing and cost recovery program moving forward. Working with a reputable installer and taking the time to properly plan out your installation will ensure your water submeters reliably measure water usage for years to come.

Want to start your water submetering project on the right foot? Get in touch with the experts at Synergy.