water bills

[EmaxisSlim Cultist]

Our bill spiked after we had our first child.

The water guy warned us we might have a leak. Saw the baby, and then said something to the effect of "oh, that explains it".

So, it will vary between households depending on family size.

[captainspoke]

Looking at past budget sheets, we're at ¥14-16,000 every two months, and it seems pretty steady winter-summer. Winter there are baths more often (and we do use some of that in the washer), summer we generally just shower, but...

We have concrete outside all around the house, and a habit from when I was growing up was to use the hose to wash off the driveway. I do our parking area now and then, but around the house I hose off the stuff that accumulates. I try to do it after a rain, since starting with everything wet at least saves a little.

[pfdsa]

2LDK in Sendai for 2 people, we pay between 5,000-6,000 yen every 2 months. Some baths during the Winter, and only showers during the other seasons.

[Roger Van Zant]

I pay 930 yen per month for water. I use about 4 cubic meters per month. Live alone. I almost never have baths, just showers. (There is a riverside onsen about five minutes' drive from my house for bathing!).
Last year I had a long business trip in January, and where I live gets down to below -5c some nights. To avoid burst pipes, I left every tap slightly running before leaving. Those taps were running for a month non-stop.
My bill for that month was 4300 yen....my highest water bill ever in Japan! Still, cheaper than fixing burst pipes!

[KCLenny]

Me and wife live in Kyoto. We never pay more that ¥2000 a month. Never.
Even when we’ve had more washing/showers/baths/bottling water up for balcony garden etc.

[seb]

I pay about 10k/2months for the family house (4 people) and 4.2k/2months for the office space.

Apparently there is a minimum fee to the water contract of ¥3,900 since the first bill I hadn't even used 1m3 of water and was billed that much. Not sure if I could change provider to something more adapted to my situation, because it seems way too expensive for the right to use the toilets and wash my hands in my office...

[Zanuhesu]

Just my wife and myself, we have consistently paid 1300 yen/month for water the past 2 years. We never use the bath, only shower, and haven't topped 10 m3 a month in years, which is apparently when we leave the 基本料金 zone.

[Butterball]

Looks like this varies pretty widely.

My family of 3 are spending about Y6,000 a month on water. We rarely take baths, only showers, but they're often pretty "my-pace" showers. Since Coronavirus hit, we've made it a policy of always taking a shower when coming in from work/shopping/school so that probably increases it a bit. And my wife is the "laundry every day" type. I looked back at our bills pre-covid and pre-child and we were at about Y4,000 a month. I'm surprised the difference wasn't greater.

[Viralriver]

I graphed this up for my water, electricity and gas bills in my previous place - might be helpful for some. It was a 1LDK, 42 sqm and I was usually living with one other, sometimes by myself. I generally use a lot of electricity as I WFH.

[abeltoy]

We always seem to pay the minimum (which I think is anything less than 16m3), which is 3740 yen every 2 months. Me and my partner live in a 64m2 2LDK apartment in a small city in Saitama.

There was an occasion in February–March where the consumption spiked to 17m3 and we paid 4031, but otherwise it doesn't seem to vary at all.

I only shower, but my partner does take baths, especially during the cold months. This is mostly reflected on the gas bill though, since we have one of those bathtubs where the water can just be re-heated, so we only re-fill it every few days.

A very cool thing our city did was to waive the water bill basic fee (i.e. the minimum fee of 3740 yen, any additional consumption is not waived) as a Covid-19 related economic relief measure, which means for August and September the water bill was 0 yen.