Cohousing-L Mailing List: common laundry

[HeidiNYS (HeidiNYS]

Dearm Nancy, Michael & Neighbors,

Congratulations!

I wonder if you have checked Consumer Reports' reviews of Washers & Dryers.   

They have included energy efficiency as a criteria.   Our household finds it 
incredibly useful.   Whi;le it's available in Library, and we don't refer to 
it that often, we do subscribe partly cause we like to read it, and partly to 
support them.   

We do have a laundery room here at Cantines Island, and it functions pretty 
well.   Not quite   half of our 16 households use it.   Ours consists of 
hand-me-down machines, with the exception of one dryer.   
We have simply chosen time slots, ie, one household may have a 9AM-2PM 
Tuesday slot, for example.   Some are looser, and 2 households are signed up 
for 
Sunday, for example.
Undesignated times may be used by anyone.   
We charge $1.25 per load, intended to basically cover utility costs, tho we 
seem to come out ahead.

We do have one home for sale, if you know of a family interested.

Best,   Ruth J Hirsch
Cantines Islnd Co Ho Saugerties NY.   


> We have a laundry in our common house which will has hook-ups for three
> washers and three dryers.  We have money to purchase new machines and would
> like to get energy efficient ones.  Approximately 16 households will use the
> common laundry (a little less than half the community) for their personal
> laundry.  The laundry will also service the common house needs.
> 
> Our questions are:
> 
> What recommendations do you have for the purchase of washers and dryers?
> Anyone have experience with energy efficient models and have brands to
> recommend?  What advice regarding residential vs. commercial machines?  What
> type of features for both washers & dryers would you suggest.  Any
> recommendations on size?
> 
> Do you charge for laundry?  If so, how did you determine what to charge?
> Anyone use coin op machines?  How does your payment system work for you?
> 
> One thing we're considering is leasing the machines and paying an outside
> contractor half the coin op proceeds with the other half going to the
> community.  Anyone have experience doing this?  How has it worked for you?
> 
> How do you schedule use of the laundry for residents and the common house?
> 
> Thanks for any help you can send our way in answering these questions!
> 
> Nancy Scott &
> Michael Swettenam
> Oak Creek Commons Cohousing
>