Where to Buy a Washer and Dryer

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As many of you might remember, I took a break from kitchen updates during the holidays to work on the laundry room. For good reason, too: I was getting a new washer & dryer as a graduation gift, and that meant I needed to install a new floor before the appliances arrived (which required first laying down a tile membrane, then tile, then grout… still haven’t sealed the darn thing).

I justified the break by telling myself that after the tile, appliances, and paint were in, I wouldn’t likely get back to the project until after the kitchen was finished (to help me from having yet another unusable room in this chaotic house). But you probably know me too well to believe that I won’t still skip around from project to project as I please, don’t you? Let’s get you up to speed:

1. My dryer was bad from the start. In full disclosure, my first choice for new appliances had been to get a Samsung pair after reading all of the reviews (Samsung and LG were about neck and neck, but I’d heard Samsung had better service). Only by the time that I had a chance to order the ones I wanted over Black Friday, the Samsungs were sold out until February (which meant additional months of no laundry and lots of waiting). I stressed out about this a good bit and very unhappy to have to spend slightly more on the brand I didn’t want as much, but the LG option was my second choice, so I pulled the trigger. In hindsight, and I know it sounds silly, but I think this was the proverbial straw that got me sick just before finals; after all of the events in the fall, I think I just couldn’t handle one more thing, and I probably should have waited a few more months for life to get back to normal before dealing with this (instead of leaping on Black Friday like it was the only day all year that has a decent sale).

Anyway, back to the dryer:  after using it dryer only three times (first time I have ever been excited about doing laundry), I noticed a puddle of water forming around the base of the dryer. And that’s not a typo: the dryer, not the washer, was leaking. I wasn’t using the steam function (I hadn’t even taken the plastic off of the compartment to pour water into), and a damn puddle was forming under the front… all over my unsealed tile floor. As you might imagine, I was a little confused and felt around under the dryer to see what was wrong. What it felt like was condensation forming all along the front of the dryer, which would then drip onto the floor in the same spot. Huh. I called LG (the manufacturer) after doing some online research to see if it was a common problem; it wasn’t. LG’s customer service was, unfortunately, also incredibly unhelpful after explaining what was going on. I was fuming mad by the time I got off the phone because

1. they didn’t believe me
2. they told me that if they had a tech come out to look at the dryer, and they couldn’t find anything was wrong with the machine (which meant I’d have to expertly time a load of laundry with their wide window of when they’d show up to prove to them what was happening), they’d charge me service fees for the visit. On a brand new dryer that had been in my house for less than 48 hours.

Yeah, clearly I’m the problem. But, luckily, my research during The Great Appliance Hunt of 2013 also turned up some useful information about where to buy my washer and dryer. Many retailers have different policies on delivery, installation, and warranty service. Part of the reason why I was so unhappy about the lack of the brand I wanted because I was invested in the store I was buying the set from and had limited choices if they didn’t have the set in stock. Lowe’s and Home Depot both had free delivery, free installation, and would replace my washer/dryer without issue if anything were wrong with them. I’d compared this offer to places like Sears, Best Buy, etc., and good ol’ Blue and Orange had the best deal once these factors were added in (and still had the same prices!). So, all I had to do was call up Home Depot and tell them what happened. The rep on the phone even asked if there had been any damage as a result of the leak and apologized for the inconvenience; we set up a time for their techs to come check things out. About a week later, they stopped by and fiddled around with it (mostly stared at it and asked me questions) before deciding it was a manufacturer’s defect and they would just replace it instead of trying to figure things out. Two weeks after that, they delivered a new dryer & installed it again. The replacement seems to be doing its job, so hopefully that’s the end of this long (and frankly, boring) story.

The other three updates are a little shorter:

2. My art for the room arrived! It’s exactly the colors I was hoping for. But I don’t have the right size of frame for it yet. So tape will have to do until I can get it into a frame (I’ve decided:  no more leaving things packaged & stored; that’s not motivating me enough to get something done, so staring at the ugly green smear every day will nag remind me to get a frame).

3. Target clearance does it again. This time, it’s keeping my little high-efficiency detergent pods (that sounds weirdly sci-fi for laundry) contained in something other than an ugly plastic bag.

4. Hey, look, FOLDED laundry! This whole “fold in the room” thing is working. Now, I just need a proper counter.

I’ll have one more update on the laundry room later this week, but that involves a few more steps in tutorial form to give you all of the details (hint: I finally did something to the found trashcan). And of course, a big ass kitchen update you (hopefully) won’t want to miss! Have a great week!