My partner and I have a daughter and a second baby on the way. We use cloth diapers. Before we moved in, we read our tenancy agreement carefully and nowhere does it mention additional appliances being prohibited.
Because we wanted to cloth diaper, we purchased an in-unit, portable washing machine for three reasons:
it’s easier for us to do our laundry in the kitchen than to drag it down two flights of stairs;
the portable machine is both eco- and financially-more friendly than the industrial machines downstairs (a difference of about 25 gallons of water per use); and
because while we are more than willing to wash the “waste” out of our own machine, that is not something we will be doing in an industrial washing machine used by the whole building (our building has 2 machines for approximately 25 tenants).
Today we were told that it was Ontario law that these machines not be permitted in apartment complexes but I can’t seem to verify that anywhere. In the morning I will call the LTB but thought I’d post here in the meantime.
If this is an issue that persists between you and your landlord, we suggest you find legal help at a community legal clinic. Steps to Justice has a resource page on getting legal help in housing law. This referral list includes many free to low-cost options for legal services.
We hope this information is helpful. Please follow-up with us if you have any further questions.
Sorry for MY belated response to your response. Thank you so much - we had figured this info out after a few weeks of back and forth with some folks in the LTB. I still appreciate your answer!