Condo buyers are often moving up from a rental apartment, where having access to a washer/dryer may or may not be included. But when you’re renting, it’s almost a rite of passage to haul your dirty clothes to the closest laundromat. You’ll rent an apartment without laundry, knowing where you rent is typically not going to be a permanent home.
But it’s not something you dream about doing after you’ve invested a substantial amount of money on a new condo. Having in-unit laundry, or at least shared machines in the garage, for example, are must-haves—particularly at higher price points.
If you own a condo that doesn’t have any laundry on site, be prepared for a majority of the buyer pool to bypass your listing in favor of a unit that has a washer/dryer. But because I like to focus on solutions vs pointing out shortcomings, I’m offering some ways to get around this issue.
Here are two ways you can address the lack of laundry, short of buying and installing a washer/dryer yourself:
Get an estimate for a washer/dryer install. There may be a closet near the kitchen or bathroom that you could convert into a laundry area (see photo, left). A plumber would be able to give you an idea as to how easy it would be to connect to the water line, and provide an estimate. You could then include that estimate in the disclosure package for prospective buyers.
Credit the buyer for the cost of a laundry service. There are many options for pickup/drop-off laundry services. Some will come to your house, but if you’re near a laundromat, that could be a good route, too. Determine what it would cost to do, say two loads of laundry weekly with a particular store or service, and credit the buyer for that amount for up to, say, six months. This is the equivalent of kicking in a few months’ worth of leased parking when you don’t have a garage at your property.