Small combination washer/dryer?

Hardware and technical stuff
1

I’ll be moving out of a condo with laundry in the unit to a condo with no laundry… :(

But I’ve heard you can get these small portable combination washer/dryers and hook them up to the kitchen sink.

Has anyone done this? How does it work? Is there a particular model that works great? Any recommendations?

2

I don’t know much about these things, but check the rules where you’ll be to make sure it’s okay to use one. My housing organization gets calls from time to time from tenants who want to use one and have been told it’s against the rules because of water usage or danger of leaking or some such crap.

3

If your laundry facilities are open 24 hours and easy access then honestly go the coin route because it’s far far cheaper.

I was debating purchasing a small washer/dryer and figured out I spend roughly $10-12/mo on laundry, which is $120-144/mo. If you pay electricity and/or water usage in the condo you’ll be moving you have that added cost + initial payout.

If you don’t have 24 hour access then the questions you’re going to ask are - is there a proper hookup, if not can I get a proper hookup installed? Does my building allow insuite washer/dryer or is that against the strata act / building bylaws? Does it have to be portable?

4

Well the condo won’t have a proper hookup.

Is the extra cost on the laundry or added electricity usage that significant? I never considered that. So I’m basically sacrificing cost effectiveness for convenience.

I’m thinking portable because the place is pretty small and I’ll want to be able to move it around easier.

5

You’d have to look at the kW usage of the washer/dryer in question to figure out what it’s going to run you.

I’ll be honest I find having a laundry room handier because it’s got 5 washers and 6 dryers so I can just go down and do all my laundry in one go. So basically instead of doing laundry for hours it’s about 2 hours and I’m done about 2 weeks of laundry.

Also factor in where you are going to store it when you’re not using it and if you have a convenient place for that or not.

6

A friend of mine had one and from what I remember:

  • It was small and so you were rather limited on load size
  • It took forever to run a full wash/dry cycle since it’s all done in one tub