I’ve always dried pretty much everything on the low setting, since it’s gentler on the clothes and less likely to shrink things. I don’t know if that has also contributed to the longevity of the dryer.

Please DO NOT leave your dryer going when you leave the house or when you go to bed at night unless you are truly compulsive about the above maintenance practices. There are some 15,000 dryer fires a year. If you’re at home and awake, there’s a chance you can limit your property damage. If you’re home and asleep, you or your kids might end up one of the dozen or two people who die each year.

It’s also not a good idea to leave a washer going unattended, in case a hose should happen to break and flood your place. Rubber degrades with the passage of time. With car tires I know it’s seven years, I’d guess with hoses it is probably longer if you use only cold water, maybe the same if you use hot. If you do have to get a washer serviced for any reason, ask the technician if, given their age, it might be a good time to replace them.

“And if you don’t clean your drier vent periodically, you might burn your house down.”

At first I read this to mean that you were talking about cleaning out your lint trap. If someone can’t handle doing that after every load, then they probably shouldn’t be living on their own…

But, it’s true that the outside vent is often overlooked. Some places sell a cleaning tool that is basically a giant pipe cleaner that you can stick in the vent and use to move the debris out (also works for getting out stuff around the lint trap too).

Another thing that can help reduce danger of a vent-based fire is to replace the flexible vent tubing that is often used with smooth metal vent tubing. The crinkles in the flex tubing can catch gobs of lint and even with the giant pipe cleaner you may not be able to reach it.

And if you don’t clean your drier vent periodically, you might burn your house down.

So, do inspect your washer hose and clean out your drier vent if you want these calculations to be at all relevant.

(I do have a washer, and I have no drier connections, so I air dry my clothes. I have take clothes to a laundromat, even on a bus, where you want to make sure a towel is covering your unmentionables. I looked forward to reading while I was there, plus getting a small workout carrying all my clothes. Note that your thinner and synthetic clothing dries quickly–if you pull that out halfway through the cycle, the rest of the stuff is more likely to be done by the end of the cycle.)

Well, this is another area which is very dependent on your personal situation. If you *don’t* have babies or small children – or any children at all – it’s quite easy and reasonable to get by on only one or two loads a week.

My husband and I also buy washable work clothes. We send nothing to the dry-cleaner. He ends up with one load a week (he does not separate the colors), and I have two loads that could easily become one if necessary since the load of whites is so small.

I’m dont’ want to live without a washer and dryer and owned them even before marriage and children. Even as a single person I had sheets and towels, sweaty workout gear and everyday clothes, plus I’ve always tried to buy washable work clothes to save on dry cleaning. How can people get by with only one or two loads a week? Unless you send everything to the dry cleaner? When I change the sheets on our bed weekly, that’s a full load (husband is over 6 feet tall so king size is the only thing that fits us both) and with three of four kids in queen size beds due to their size (all over six feet as well) that’s another two loads right there. Towels and other bathroom linens get changed once a week so that’s two loads for six of us. I use cloth instead of paper towels to do almost all the cleaning, so that’s another load right there – adds up to six a week before I’ve even started on clothing. We both work out and our kids play sports and those clothes get sweaty and smelly – do I keep them around for a week to go to the laundromat? My mother in law lived with us before she passed away, and since she had health problems I had to change her sheets several times a week. When your babies throw up – do you keep those burp cloths around for a week? It seems to me there are health and sanitation concerns here as well.

I save on dry cleaning costs and chemicals by washing everything at home that I can. I save by doing full loads, and using cold water when possible. Hanging outside to dry is not an option as we have a homeowner’s association which doesn’t allow it.

I would love it if we could work out a sharing situation with neighbors so we own a lawn mower and they own the washer and dryer and someone else owns the ladder, and we all swap as needed, but I don’t live in that kind of neighborhood.

I do only full loads. My dryer has 2 settings – one for the whole time and one for half the time. In the winter, I throw in a very big dry towel with the wet clothes and put on the halfway mark. When done I let it sit for an hour or so while the dryer still holds heat. All my clothes are permanent press, so I just have to hand press a few of the items. It has cut my electric bill some and I love it. I also line dry in the summer.