I'm not an expert, but I think the reason is that laundry rooms tend to be loud. Also, most people building a house that size have kids and kids tend to generate a lot of laundry. SO the laundry is located in common space, not near private space.

Personally, I'd be fine with a stackable in a closet near my master because I can use a queen or king bed for a folding surface. As you already know, if you need a real laundry room you will have a hard time finding a stock plan.

salty

we have a master on the 1st floor and modified the plan to put the W/D into the master suite where we have his and her closets. Guess who lost the closet space to house the W/D? (hint - it wasn't the DW). It was one of the best mods we made.

The original plan had the W/D in the utility room as you enter in from the garage. problem was that this room was also to be where the dogs sleep and to house a second refrig. Just as we started to frame we decided that the room would be too cramped. So we moved the refrig into the garage, moved the W/D into the His master closet (OK - I had to give it away), and then added a second W/D stackable into a second floor closet of a room called the Artist Suite (too funny because we draw in stick figures).

This arrangement works great. When guests come, we can wash sheets and towels upstairs. When it's just the 5 of us (2 people and 3 dogs) we use the W/D in the master suite. No lugging of cloths - very convienient.

As far as noise goes - just don't wash cloths before you go to bed. otherwise - noise is not an issue.

You can take just about any floor plan and make this modification if the closets are big enough.

Not an expert. As to the logic of laundry room placement, I doubt there is any, although if the designer does his/her own laundry him/herself, it's far more likely to be located conveniently. Ahem.

Solie has a good suggestion. Almost any closet can hold a stackable set. There are excellent stackable models available, and the noise issue can be nearly solved with sound-diminishing tactics (special wallboard, insulated walls and doors, put the machines on 2 layers of heavy-duty rubber mats, etc.) However, I'd go for a flip table-top for folding convenience and a flip-down ironing board installed on the inside of the doors concealing the W/D.

I suspect you will have more difficulty find suitable plans that also have doors and halls of sufficient width and bathrooms that are easier to use when wheelchair-bound. Remember that unless you go to the considerable expense of having an elevator, 2-story homes are not particularly convenient for seniors and even less so if one is dependent on a walker or a wheelchair. Yes, there are 90 y.o. folk who spend their lives tromping up and down the stairs, but I suspect an awfully high proportion of them wish they didn't have to do so -- all of the ones I know (80 and older) actually end up living on one floor -- the second floor is wasted space.

We had to do custom plans to get what we wanted and I can tell you from experience that the laundry near the MBR is indeed LOUD. You just can't run a load of laundry before bed. Not the end of the world.

The location of a laundry is always a compromise. If you hate to carry clothes, put it near the bedrooms/bathrooms. If you hate to go upstairs to transfer a load, put it near the kitchen/mudroom. I have a client who put one in each location. Sometimes the best of both worlds is also the worst of both.

Our laundry room is off our master. As mightyanvil says, it is a compromise because it is on the first floor, near the kitchen, garage entrance and master, but this dislocates it from the "other" bedrooms. I saw this is as a disadvantage carrying loads between the floors, but the advantage of having it near to where I usually was outweighed the negative. It wasn't in our budget to put in a second laundry room, which may have been ideal, but I still think the main floor one would have been used primarily since I don't think I will be upstairs regularily to flip loads.

try these for ideas-Sorry I couldn't seem to just get a link to work:

http://www.davidweekleyhomes.com/site/Floorplan.aspx?UID=645eb8de-abd5-4f67-b995-acff920f3556

http://www.davidweekleyhomes.com/site/Floorplan.aspx?UID=082dbd57-0b11-4b68-abe5-9182ab6a14d3

http://www.davidweekleyhomes.com/site/Floorplan.aspx?UID=b40d3629-724b-426a-9d29-fdd72024ded2

I remember seeing one plan (of the thousands we saw) that had a door from the master closet into the laundry room. The laundry room also opened into a hallway somewhere, if I remember correctly. That seemed like I great idea to me- convenient and also removed enough to possibly cover the noise. I usually carry the load of clean laundry across the house in a big lump with socks and underwear falling out all over the place onto the bed in the master bedroom, since our laundry room has nowhere to fold stuff. We have three laundry baskets, but they are invariably full of dirty clothes waiting their turn or clean clothes that never got put away. In our new house, the laundry room will still be across the house from the Master, but there will be counter space for folding. I'll probably still carry it all across the house anyway so I can keep a better eye on the kids and watch a few minutes of tv while I fold. And I'll probably still have no empty baskets.

In the original plan the W/D was in a back hall closet next to the garage. MBR was downstairs, all other bedrooms upstairs. We knew that design would lead to a cluttered back hall. Plus, clothes would have to be carried 50 ft through the kitchen, across to the MBR to the WIC.

We modified the plan to bump out a new MBath off the MBR and took the old MBath area along with the original W/D closet and split the area into a new Master walk-in closet (8x10) and a dedicated laundry room (8x10) with a door into the back hall and a door into the WIC. We can practically stand in the doorway and transfer freshly dried clothes from the dryer to the WIC. We can also easily access the laundry from the kitchen area without having to go through the MBR and WIC.

For the other bedrooms upstairs we took in a corner of the bonus room and built and plumbed in a closet for stackable W/D in the near future. The girls will wash/dry their own clothes! Yea!!

You're right, it's hard to find but I love a good challenge. I can find a few that have the laundry close to the Master but then the kitchen is not off the garage. In any event, this is one of my favorite Mascord plans (but kitchen on the other side) I'll keep looking. That's quite a large house for just the two of you and possibly a MIL. This one...MIL would have a mini kitchenette upstairs if she wanted.

Hutchcroft Plan

whitneymac, is this the one you saw? Slightly bigger than what the OP wanted but you could cut back some of the room sizes?

The Holdsworth

The entrance from our garage enters into the mudroom with the laundry room on the left and kitchen to the right. Our MB suite is directly behind the laundry/mudroom area. We used Quiet Zone insulation on the walls of the MB to help with any future sound problems. We're not living in the house yet, but we can already tell a difference in the sound of that room compared to others.

The kids rooms are on the opposite side of the house, so they will have to haul their own laundry to and fro. They have far more energy than I do. :o)

A few more:

Plan 682

Plan 1129

What I was taught and a few ideas. Laundry rooms have ended up by kitchen often because of has an electric is closer to that side. This has also been made the "work side" of the house. Doing laundry while doing dinner or other daily chores.
I prefer it closer to MB. One way that has been easy to design the laundry room in this area is to sacrifice a bedroom and make a bigger closet or bathroom and still have the laundry room. It is often easy to make a laundry chute from a second floor, or a dumb waiter. One home I designed the home owner added a chute from MB closet. This was also a buffer for the sound issue.