We describe the vibrational transitions of the donor unit in water dimer with an approach that is based on a three-dimensional local mode model. We perform a perturbative treatment of the intermolecular vibrational modes to improve the transition wavenumber of the hydrogen bonded OH-stretching transition. The model accurately predicts the transition wavenumbers of the vibrations in water dimer compared to experimental values and provides a physical picture that explains the redshift of the hydrogen bonded OH-oscillator. We find that it is unnecessary to include all six intermolecular modes in the vibrational model and that their effect can, to a good approximation, be computed using a potential energy surface calculated at a lower level electronic structure method than that used for the unperturbed model.