Laundry

[Laura Kyser]

I am a landlord who lives in one of the three units of the multi-family we own. The second floor unit has its own washer and dryer in the basement that the tenants own and pay the utilities on. Our unit also has a washer and dryer in the basement that we pay the utilities on. The third floor does not have a washer and a dryer. The machines are just regular machines, not coin-op.

My husband thinks that we should offer the use of our own washer and dryer one set day a week to the next third floor tenant, in order to attract a good tenant. Since we're expecting a baby in the next two weeks and plan to use cloth diapers (and I do all of the laundry), I really don't want to do that. Also, the washing machine is old and I don't want to push it.   (Tenants are so much harder on appliances than owners.) I'm wondering about others' experience - about how much in monthly rent do you think you can charge extra if laundry is on-site? Do quality tenants really skip over rentals without on-site laundry? Would it be the disaster I imagine if the tenant was allowed to do laundry in our machines, say on Mondays only? I've tried researching what other apartments offer in my town, but we're in a small suburb, so the sample of one bedroom rentals is really small.

Thanks for your insight!