IN resident-designed housing, there might be a strong demand to share washing machines - and with good reason.
Arguably, the most obvious reason for sharing machines is the prospect of cost savings.
Another is to help reduce the number of machines that require to be manufactured, ie helping save the planet.
Where an individual household might be tempted to spend around £450 on a Bosch machine (such as the model advertised here, on the John Lewis website), four households could together splash out £800 between them for a presumably superior model (such as this one, here).
That’s a cost saving of circa £250 per household, while being able to use an arguably more expensive (and hopefully more robust and ‘cleverer’) machine.
In addition, depending on where the washing machine(s) is (or are) located, shared laundry facilities can reduce the risk of (if in an apartment block) noise disturbance or flooding from the floor above.
Shared washing machines also save on space within individual homes: at a chunky 60cm wide, apiece.
But as posts (here) on the discussion platform - Reddit - attest, the sharing of washing machines is not always as clean-cut a decision as it might initially seem.
Check out the risk of neighbour disputes because of residue, over-use of bleach and even theft of clothes.
In other words, assuming the best of people is not always to be advised.
As for paying for a wash, of course the price could be calculated manually, guided by the likes of the website, Smol (here).
And booking a washing slot can also be done manually.
But there are also several apps to choose from, including appWash by Miele and WeWash (which also offers full laundry room fit-out - including machines - and presumably can additionally advise the optimal number of machines per group of households).
And then there is clothes drying to consider…
Meanwhile, the US-based commercial laundry leasing company, Caldwell & Gregory, offers useful advice, including ‘etiquette rules for shared apartment laundry’ - here.
And the UK magazine, Good Housekeeping, offers half a dozen ‘laundry room rules’ - here.
Mike Wilson is editor of BuildEdinburgh
Image details: outdoor public laundry facilities, Tyndrum; copyright Mike Wilson