My brother found that 14"x14" was sufficient for a boy his age (at the time) to go directly from the second floor to the basement. Unfortunately he forgot that the ductwork stopped about 5 or 6 feet above the basement floor. As luck would have it there was sufficient dirty laundry to cushion his landing.

Be sure to check with your building inspector regarding firestopping. Abandoned or open ducts between floors are frowned upon in many municipalities. A laundry chute can make an effective chimney, and I'm sure that's not what you want.

I'd love to have a laundry chute in our house. However, my wife disagrees that the kitchen (or a cabinet in it) would make a suitable landing zone. I think 12"x12" will be fine for everything except bulky stuff like comforters, and those usually don't get washed very often. Good luck!

Thanks chipshot! Luckily my son is 22 and won't fit down a laundry chute, even if it is 14x14 :-). After reading some of the earlier posts on laundry chutes here I am thinking of having it end in a cabinet, which I believe would also act as a fire break. I will definately check out code in our area too. Thanks again for the advice AND the chuckle.
Sharon

Another thought, Sharon. If you have the room and can resolve the fire and life safety issues, why not consider a dual-purpose laundry chute/dumbwaiter? After all, that once-dirty laundry will need to find its way back upstairs.

What floor of your house is your laundry room on, and (if I may ask) where in Virginia are you? I was once a proud, though temporary, resident of Charlottesville.

My children are young (6 and 10), so I can only imagine the kinds of challenges a 22 y.o. can present. Hopefully grandchildren are your biggest present worry.

I'm still holding out hope that we will someday be able to do either an upstairs laundry and/or a back staircase. Our present laundry room is adjacent to the garage, about as far from the upstairs bedrooms as possible.

Hmmm. Much to think about. Chipshot, my DH suggested a dumbwaiter at one point but I'm not sure if I have the room. I guess maybe I could put a small laundry basket on a platform. Currently my laundry room, like yours, is located in a tiny room off of the garage - which I hate! There is no room to fold, the room gets dirt trekked in from the garage where DH does all of his woodworking etc, not to mention unmentionables laying around in a room that my kids insist on bringing all there friends through! Anyway, I am planning on moving it all to the basement. My mind was made up when we moved one of our heaters to the attic, removing the ductwork that went from basement to attic leaving a big hole in the kids bathroom, that we are now renovating. Perfect opportunity to add a laundry chute - or perhaps a dumb waiter :-). I plan to put a linen closet in the space that was the wall surrounding the duct work, so my laundry chute will start inside that closet. By the way Chipshot, we are located in Fairfax VA. in the craziness of the DC suburbs, far from beautiful Charlottesville. Where you at UVA? As for 22 year olds, they are starting to get better again by then. I also have two daughters, 20 and 12, and I can tell you I am not looking forward to going through the teenage years again :). Enjoy your children while they are young, it really does go too fast : P.
Sharon

Fortunately our laundry room is a decent size (although there never seems to be sufficient space) and is not directly on the path into the house from the garage (it's at the end of a long, space-eating hall from kitchen). One nice feature is that it has a door to the back yard. That will come in handy when entertaining outdoors and when the dog needs to go.

I think you may be the only person here who is moving their laundry room TO the basement.

Yes, I was a student at UVA.

Yes, the laundry chute is what makes moving TO the basement do-able.

I have a laundry chute that leads from the 1st floor master bath to the basement laundry. It's a little too small, 7x10, but very convenient nonetheless. I would think 12x12 would be plenty big. Larger items fit fine as long as you "feed" them down instead of shoving them down wadded up in a ball. Normal sized things like tshirts and sweaters are no problem and slide right down. Ours has two doors, one in a cabinet in the bathroom and the other in the wall in the hallway. Love it.

Just wondering, has anyone else put in a dumbwaiter?

Sharon,

I looked into a dumbwaiter for our previous house, but it was very expensive. We had a laundry chute that emptied into a cabinet and that worked well.

Just find out the code in your area for chutes and you should be fine.

Sharon S.

Does anyone have an idea of the cost to install a chute from the 2nd story to the basement? Our contractor quoted $2000 to install a chute in our existing house. This seems expensive to me, but I'm not sure what the usual cost is.

K Sissy, a fair price depends on the details of your house, and on where you live. Get some more quotes and see if they're comparable.

Thanks suburbanmd. I'm just getting started with this. The idea of not having to carry laundry from the 2nd story to the basement is so exciting to me. I can't wait to install my laundry chute.

Any possibility that you could move the laundry room up to that dead end hall on the second floor? That way you wouldn't have to worry about getting the laundry down the stairs OR back up the stairs.