Do you wash the bed linen and towels your guests use in your own washing machine?

My AirBnB is an apartment downtown that we don’t live in. It does have a washing machine and drier for the guests but my wife doesn’t like to use it for the apartment linen and towels because the drier vents into the bathroom (3rd floor so no external venting) and she is worried about mould developing on the ceiling.

I then suggested we wash all the linen etc. at home but she was aghast at the idea. We don’t sterilize the laundry as a commercial laundry might do so she is worried about germs etc. coming into contact with our home machine. So I am left with the wonderful job of schlepping all the laundry to the local laundromat, something I haven’t done since my college days :frowning:

Certainly meet an interesting lot of people there (I kill my time watching Netflix).

Just wondering what other people do. Do you wash guest laundry in your own machine, have it done by a service or use a laundromat?

We have 3 machines and do all laundry ourselves.
Laundry services are expensive and their quality control is not that good.

We only use powder (no liquid soap!), and run linnen and towels at 40-60°C.

We wash it all in our home but use bleach with detergent and hot water. We also do a pre-soak and an extra rinse and dry at the hotest setting. I don’t think germs could survive that.

curious as to why your wife was so aghast at the thought of washing airbnb stuff at home. The man hours and price of a laundromat…

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Wash at home. I saw on another group where a guy does his laundry once a month at a laundromat and thinks he saves a lot of money and the whole thing takes about 2 1/2 of his time.

Personally, I time my laundry during the sunny party of the day when my solar heating system gives me free hot water.

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I imagine that you and your wife are lovely people but you sound to be highly disorganised when it comes to your Airbnb business :slight_smile:

Incidentally, our rentals and my own apartment are in a small complex that has a coin-operated washer, ditto drier. These are used for all guest laundry, and my own, and I always use cold water. I can’t imagine what germs your wife thinks Airbnb laundry has that would contaminate your machine.

The fact that the dryer doesn’t vent out properly needs to be fixed if it really could cause mould. If you haven’t already, you’ll have guests who use the washer and dryer every single day of their stay. (Guests do that - a shirt one day, a towel the next … it’s not their electricity or hot water). It’s a legitimate expense against your rental business taxes.

Also if the laundry is done in the rental it simplifies your accounts - the water and electricity costs are automatically part of the rental’s utility expenses so there’s no need to record and itemise your laundromat expenses.

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I wash my laundry in my own home machine. At around 1000 loads and I’ve yet to be contaminated.

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I can’t believe your wife is more concerned about getting Airbnb Guest germs in her washer (I assume it does it’s job and there aren’t any when you’re done) than she is about producing mold in the bathroom if the rental. It is a huge health and liability hazard not to mention not to code (in the US anyways, I’m assuming you are not in the US though by your spelling it mould). Get it properly vented to the outside. What does being in the 3rd floor have to do with anything? There are ways, no matter where the apartment is, to properly vent the dryer.

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If you are talking about having a commerical laundry service it depends on the methods they use. If you are talking about doing it yourself at a laundry it still depends on your methods. The most important thing is to use hot water (sorry @jaquo :slight_smile: )

I’ve never been able to find any credible evidence that one cleans better than the other. Cardboard boxes of powder are better for the environment than plastic liquid bottles. Anyone with a HE machine is not going to be happy using powder unless they use hot water and a higher water setting.

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Germs from guests’ laundry via a washing machine? Heard it all now, lol.

Of course I was everything in my own washer/dryer, I also don’t walk around in a hazmat suit in case I pick up a germ from another member of the general public. :slight_smile:

You can easily vent a tumble dryer. Mine is not plumbed in and I just bought a length of flexible vent hose from Amazon which I poke out of the window when drying stuff.

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At home of course. That’s what washers are made for cleaning! Please show your wife this thread so you can stop wasting your time and money at the laundromat.

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AT HOME. Eco-friendly soaps and such.

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Yes, I wash all guest laundry in my own washing machine…gasp…along with my own clothes and bedding!!! I separate by 4 colors and sometimes fabrics so putting full loads together makes it more efficient. I have lots of spares so I wash at my leisure and replace the spares as they get cleaned. Oh, that also means that I have guest used laundry sitting in my own sorting hamper in my own personal bathroom, sometimes for a week or more! The horror!

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I wash linen at the rental and my own home machine, but mostly the rental because I don’t want to be transporting stuff back and forth if I don’t have to.

Does your wife go out to eat at restaurants? I know many people who have never worked in a restaurant are under this impression that food is always prepared to the highest cleanliness standards, and always kept to proper temperature, and everything washed and cleaned, sanitized, etc.

But, I’ll tell you that the “5 second rule” is real. The next time she is eating out, tell her to take a look at her plate. An employee may have just scraped off the stuck on cheese that didn’t come off the plate after being run through the washing machine (that “sterilized” everything). Her hamburger might have fallen on the floor, taken a quick rinse under the kitchen faucet, and tossed right back on the grill.

When she starts to envision all of the possibilities of what she is likely ingesting at a restaurant, she will quickly realize that her washing machine and germs is a non issue.

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Many people from the US seem to dislike the UK system of having the washer and dryer (many times a combo washer/dryer) in the kitchen. I’ve read things like ‘ew, the thought of my dirty underwear near where food is prepared and stored…’

Which just makes me wonder exactly what is lurking in their underwear!

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For my off site Airbnb, I bring a laundry basket with a new set of linens and towels. Then I flip the unit and do the laundry at home.

Tips for laundry:

Use about 200 ml of vinegar per load to keep your whites white and fresh. Vinegar kills germs and dissolves tough stains.

If you have a bad lipid/protein stain such as food, make-up, blood etc, you can spot treat that with ammonia and let it sit for a minute. The ammonia will break down just about anything biological.

Don’t use bleach. It doesn’t help and it turns whites yellowish.

Use biz. I put a small scoop in each load and I rub it into tough stains.

I also use regular laundry detergent.

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I would tackle the issue of getting the dryer properly vented first, you don’t want a mouldy ceiling - it’s unsightly and could make your guests feel poorly. If there’s a washer and dryer available in your rental your guests are probably going to use it (even if you aren’t), so you need to sort out the vent issue quickly.

Once you’ve done that you will be able to just use the washer/dryer in your rental to launder the linen - saves you taking it home if your wife isn’t keen, and will save you from having to sit in a launderette and watch your washing go round and round!

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My first thought on this too? She must never use a ‘public’ restroom …whether at a restaurant or Walmart …

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As we respond please don’t bash the honest feelings presented. We all have our quirks that may or may not make sense to others. (Also if OCD involved belittling the person will not change their views, it will discourage any one from sharing honest feelings again)

Absolutely say if you think laundry at home is acceptable/easier/cheaper/clean/ideas on vents etc. Some washers have sanitize functions but cleaning soaps etc can be very effective.

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Our listing is a 4-bedroom house with 6 beds for up to 10 guests. We have extras so that if we want to do a fast turnover, we can just swap out the dirty linens for clean linens and wash the dirty linens in our home. However, we live directly across the street from our listing and we usually use the machines in our listing and our home at the same time since it gets the laundry done in half the time.

BTW, the washer in our own home has a sanitize feature, but we never use it.

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