In Sweden its common if you rent a apartment you share a laundry room with others and use a booking system. Is this common in other European countries too?

19 comments

1. In the UK, we don’t really have a laundry room. We have our washing machine and/or dryer in our kitchen.

2. No, the apartments are equipped with their own washing machines, usually installed in the kitchen or, if it’s big enough, the laundry room (in the home, not a shared one)

3. Not unheard of in Norway, but it’s less common in newer appartments

4. No, not really common in the Netherlands, I think. What’s a booking system?

5. I haven’t seen a booking system, but in some buildings there is a shared laundry room where tenants can put their own washing machines.

6. No, each flat has its own washing machine in the kitchen. I think if there were communal laundry rooms, two things might happen. In a “nice” area, someone, probably an older lady, would become self-appointed queen of laundry, and would keep reporting people to the manager for leaving a carton of detergent in the cupboard or leaving passive-aggresive notes around the place. In a less nice area, the room would be messy and the machines would get broken really fast.

7. German fron munich living in canada now.. only place ive ever seen that was when i visited someone in zug/schweiz.

8. Not at all. In Poland every flat is equipped with a washing machine, either in bathroom or in the kitchen (in my case it’s in the bathroom). I haven’t heard of anyone who had a separate laundry room in their house, it’s definitely unheard of. And we usually use drying racks instead of dryers.

   I’ve heard of shared toilets in really, really old blocks of flats, but never of a shared laundry room.

9. No, everyone just has a washing machine in their bathroom.

10. Something like that might exist in student housing in cities, but people living in “real” apartments typically have their own washing machines.

11. I’ve mainly seen it in student housing, usually people have their own machines in the bathroom or kitchen.

12. The other tenants and I have a common laundry room on the ground floor equipped with a washing machine and clotheslines, so we note our turns/when we’ll be using it on a physical calender. We each have a card we put our money on for the washing machine’s payment system.

    However I live in a tiny one room apartment because I’m an engineering student ~~read: broke/with a very limited budget~~ so it doesn’t have a dishwasher, bathtub nor washing machine. More modern and more expensive apartments will have washing machine more often.

13. No. There is no laundry room in our house. There used be one when house was built but now it is a part of the flat (with the rest of the attic)

14. Nope, each house has their own washing machine.
    Now you got me thinking on the benefits of your system. Less machines needed for one. Less space waisted in each apartment.

15. Some buildings have a shared laundry room with shared machines, some have a shared laundry room, but everyone just puts their own machines there and some have their own machines in their apartments. Never seen a booking system anywhere though. You just see if the machines are free when you want to wash.

16. In Denmark, yes it’s very common in apartment buildings.

17. In Switzerland, i guess it varies. In my (parents’)building almost everyone has its own washing machine and we have a laundry room as well (that is basically used by the few families that don’t have their own machine or when you have to wash a lot in a short time). But at my Friends’ (students, so people who usually rent the place, not buy it), I often see a laundry room only (they don’t have their own washing machine) and the use of a calendar. Not exactly a booking system – more like « family A can do laundry on Monday morning, family B on Monday afternoon », and so on. Some just have the laundry room and people go whenever they want.

18. Shared laundry rooms exist. In public housing, which is around 25% of households in Vienna, they are very common and I think there is some kind of booking system.
    Most privately rented appartments have their own washing machine.

19. They are fairly common even in apartment buildings were flats are owned not rented. Most people do usually have their own machine in the flat, but the facilities are used when you something larger to wash, like duvets and pillows.