Jim’s ‘Lectric Washouse

Without warning, A FAT ROACH dropped off of the ceiling directly in front of me and began to scurry all across the floor looking for cracks and holes for refuge. Washers are always out of order while clothes are washing. They leak puddles and the management sticks a dirty mop on top of the spill. The dryers never work. I always end up depositing millions of dollars in quarters for my clothes to dry. Lots of times I have loaded dryers to find they do not work at all and have to take the clothes out and reload again. This time I took the liberty in nicely /​briefly explaining to management that I spent lots of money on the dryer and clothes were still soaking wet. He did not resolve my problem or offer a refund. Instead he proceeded to tell me how many minutes a quarter will get me. as if I did know. He had his back to me while I spoke to him. Lots of transients frequent this place and hang out here. I like the musical selection they have. They don’t deserve an honest person’s money. This is a crack house not a wash house.

Will never go to this laundromat again. Owner watched a man assaulting a child and when cops were called, pretended nothing had happened. If you let someone do that in your place of business and don’t act, you are complicit in their crime. If you want a laundromat where crime doesn’t happen daily with no action taken, take your business somewhere else. PLEASE. Plus the driers blow.

I wasted about $ 10 on broken machines. Had to keep buying more soap and trying new machines. Totally horrible and unacceptable. If the owner reads these reviews please contact me with an apology or a refund. Seriously, you’ve got one job.

I was in this business on November 19, 2015 around 3pm, the manager was there I explained that I had lost my money the last time I was here. He had me to fill out the refund form. I did get my money back. He was a pleasant man to talk to and there was a lady there cleaning the place.

Change machine ate my $ 20 dollar bill and then decided to turn on its out of service light.
Zero employees to be found. The phone number on Unilocal is also conveniently out of service.
Waited for about 15 minutes. No sign of anyone who could help me. No number to contact.
What in the actual hell.

Omg!!!
Clean this place ASAP!!!
There’s pee in the corner and it reeks!!!
I only come here because it’s never crowded and there’s a private parking lot with plenty of parking.
Luckily I haven’t had a machine break down but the thought is there.

So, I’ve been doing my laundry here for several years because it’s in my neighborhood and is walkable but I am going to start driving somewhere else. It’s always been pricey (he just raised the prices), and you run at least a 33% chance that the machine you choose will eat your money or decide to stop working half way through your wash leaving with you with no choice but to pull out sopping wet clothes and try again. Most of the dryers have sharp parts where the metal is sticking out that leaves holes in your clothes.
Recently though, this place has become home base to several individuals from the homeless population around here. They smoke inside all day, are always sleeping on the counters or loitering around drinking. I’ve been cornered when I’m by myself by one of them as he insists I give him some of my quarters. Do not dare put your clothes in the dryer and leave, and even if you stay, pay really close attention anyways because these guys frequently open up the dryers and take whatever they please.
The owner is nice enough but he’s rarely around and pretty much never when you need him. He used to have complaint cards you could fill out if a machine broke while you were using it or if it ate your money and he said he would mail you a reimbursement, of course that never happened and eventually that system went away all together.
I will be going somewhere else from now despite it’s convenient location. Avoid it if you can.

I’ve recently been venturing to laundromats due to increasing amounts of laundry I’ve needed to do lately and specifically the need for front load washers. I have tried (and liked) Able Fabric in Rockridge but it closes at 9:00 p.m. (last load in at 8:00 p.m.) so I drove over to Jim’s ‘Lectric Washouse. True be told, I was a little nervous due to the ‘hood it’s located in.
The prices seemed reasonable ($ 2.50 for a regular sized load) and dryers worked well. The two guys who came in to do their laundry during the hour I was there were harmless and sane. There was a man working there who seemed to be keeping a close eye on things and he even asked me in a friendly way if everything went OK with my laundry.
In the two laundromats I’ve been to in the past month, they seem to always play 80’s R & B. I listened to Rick James and Teena Marie belting out «Give it to me, Baby» while watching my dryers go around. Kind of got transported back to my high school years…
So, in general, I would say that Jim’s ‘Lectric Washouse is A-​OK. Its main benefit is it’s always open (24 hours) and all the machines I used were working. And I now have three loads of clean laundry– YAY!

I am a night owl so I thought I had found a great place to get my laundry done on the late night and get some studying done on the late night. The last time I went I believe I arrived at about 530 in the morning and I entered to find 3 people randomly scattered around the room asleep — needless to say no clothes got cleaned that morning. If you are in desperate need then proceed with caution other wise wait until daybreak.

This homeless guy came in to sleep on the benches. He reeked to high hell, personally I don’t want to smell that shit. They need an evening attendant. Also the machines are kinda dirty, actually the whole place is dirty. The machines do work though. I did 6 loads and not a single problem. I think the people complaining about the driers don’t realize that you need to clean the lint filter.

I like to try new restaurants, so I figured why not try a new laundramat. BAD IDEA! I won’t be back to Jim’s cause I’ve realized not all laundromats are created equal.
PRO: Open 24 hours.
CON: I wouldn’t feel safe there by myself after dark and the place kind gave me the heebie jeebies.
PRO: Not crowded and plenty of parking.
CON: There’s a reason people don’t stick around — the benches are definitely not ergonomic. The place feels run down/​dirty with dim lighting. I was folding my clothes over by the dryer and felt like I was in the dark.
PRO: The dryers seemed to work pretty well.
CON: There aren’t many different washer sizes. I like to use the bigger washers to get everything out of the way at once, but Jim’s only has a few and half of them were out of order. Plus, they don’t tell you how many minutes the cycle is.
Not planning to go back but I’ll put in 2 stars because at least I have clean clothes.

I am definitely one of those people who leaves her laundry undone until she’s wearing chonies she’s had since the 7^th grade. (Hanes 3 pack… thanks Mom!) If there is any other testament to my extreme laziness it has to be my patronage of the ‘Lectric Washouse. It’s two blocks from the house, dirty as can be, and I have probably lost a total of $ 50 from their machines in the last year. BUT IT’S TWO BLOCKS FROM THE HOUSE! The only really sketchy part about it is the total creep that used to live in the house behind laundromat who spent his time trying to get anything with a vagina to smoke out with him in his backyard.
My clothes are there right now though, I should probably go get them before someone runs off with my She-​ra pillow case.

24 hours? Srsly? My current place has no laundry and sometimes you need for favorite jeans washed at an ungodly hour!
Byob!
Minus one star because it is a little icky and sketchy stuff has the potential to happen at 24 spots!

This place sucks hard and deep. I suspect it will continue to suck forever and ever, outlasting its competitors by millenia. Why? It’s open 24/​7, it’s in a prime location, there’s parking, and lots of machines. The sucky part is everything else.
The place is dirty, there are all sorts of unseemly characters in there most of the time, and many of the machines have issues. I could tolerate all that, but what really pisses me off is the tightwad who runs the place. The machines I have problems with are nearly always driers. They don’t dry your clothes. After running the machine on high for 6 minutes the window of the drier doesn’t feel close to warm.
When this happens I always complain to this character and he always responds by running the drier for a few minutes himself then claiming that it works just fine. Never mind that it’s obviously running so cold that it would take take 90 minutes to dry a polyster shirt. (if I had one).
You can gripe as much as you want, but it won’t get you anywhere. So you just have to move your clothes to another machine, hoping to find that miraculous drier that will actually dry clothes.
This is what makes this place so expensive for me. I want to leave with dry clothes and that’s a lot to ask for here.
Unfortunately, I’ll probably be stuck with coming to this dump for the indefinite future, since it’s 2 blocks from my apartment. Sometimes life just doesn’t seem fair.

Once I was doing laundry here in the daytime, not too many people in there, just a few women, when all of a sudden a big ass bird of prey flew in and was trapped, it was trying to get out by banging on the windows and not realizing it was hitting glass. Because it was such a big bird, every time it hit the window it was really loud. We wondered if we should call someone, but who would we call about something like this? We ducked and screamed as it flew around. Then a guy showed up and he somehow grabbed it when it was on the ground and tossed it out the window. We cheered. Then a few minutes later it was hanging out on the sidewalk and eyeing up a sick pigeon with one foot, stalking it from a short distance. I swear to God this happened.
Another time my husband and I were awakened by our neighbor’s retarded car alarm and we were wide awake on a Sunday morning at 5:00 am. My husband said, do you want me to help with laundry? And I said hell yes, so we got in the car and drove in the darkness to Jim’s ‘Lectric Washouse and loaded it all in, and started reading the Sunday paper on one of their broken-​down benches. A bum who had been sleeping on the other bench got up and slowly walked out. He had paper rubber-​banded around his feet for shoes. I looked back at the newspaper and realized that daylight savings time had just ended, it was Sunday morning, and we were in a ghetto laundromat at 4:00 AM. Afterward we made waffles and watched The Ramones RAW, and went back to sleep for 3 hours.
One star for easy parking, one star for being open ²⁴⁄₇.

My local laundromat has been angering me lately. I drove down to it and was unable to find parking anywhere near it. The whole reason I drove to the laundromat in the first place was because I literally had ASSLOADS of laundry. So, going off of a tip from my friend, we headed down Telegraph toward ‘Lectric Washouse.
I’ve seen ‘Lectric Washouse before. Sitting sort of haphazardly on the corner of Telegraph and 59^th, across the street from a dilapidated liquor store. I rode by it on my bike the other day and thought «Hm, maybe I should go there sometime.»
So I found myself here with my friend at about 8:30 PM. The back parking lot was dark and contained one other car. The street was eerily quiet. We walked into the laundromat and I proceeded to get down to business.
I get easily confused in new places and turned around in a few circles until my friend was kind enough to smack me upside the head and point me in the direction of the washers. The only other guy in the place was awkwardly standing in front of the washers, reading a book, even though there were plenty of places to sit. It was annoying me that he was practically standing right behind me as I loaded all of my unmentionables into a washer.
Two of my loads (heh heh, I said LOAD) began washing immediately. But the third wasn’t going. The washer was broken. And I’d already poured in my detergent and fabric softener, and put in $ 1.75. Bummertown!
So, annoyed that book dude was STILL standing behind us, I transferred my detergent-​soaked clothes to the next washer and paid another $ 1.75. Ugh. The washer started immediately but it then dawned on me that I was nearly out of quarters and probably wouldn’t have enough to dry my clothes.
The only option was to begrudgingly leave my clothes unattended and rush back to my apartment to get more money. But, my friend being the fucking champion amongst men that he is, offered to stay behind and even swore he wouldn’t steal my panties. So, after driving ALL THE WAY home, fetching more money, and then coming back, I saw that my clothes had just finished their wash cycles.
When I loaded them into the dryers, one of the dryers refused to work, but I only last one quarter on it this time around.
While my clothes were drying, weird standing man with the book continued to read and stand in our way. Whatever.
‘Lectric Washouse is big, so we hustled to the other side and grooved to the sweet sounds of adult contemporary music. Classics such as «Endless Love» and «Time of My Life» played while my clothes dried.
A nice crackhead lady wandered up to the door and stood there in awe as my friend and I sang along to some terrible tunes. It was good. Maybe it scared her off.
All right, so almost $ 10 and copious amounts of awkwardness later, my clothes were finally completed. We headed out once again into ‘Lectric Washouse’s freaking SCARY parking lot and were on our way.
Best part? Saying ‘Lectric Washouse.

I ventured into this laundromat almost at random when my normal laundromat (Advantage Laundry) was packed to the gills with zero parking. Times like these, it’s frustrating that your favorite laundry can’t accommodate you.
Pros:
Plenty of parking.
Security.
Cons:
Not so many machines.
What machines are there seem more expensive compared for the norm.
The place was not quite clean.
And the worst? A copious lack of the laundromat carts. I don’t like lugging soggy laundry in my laundry tub.
But hey, it was there and it was open. What else can I say?

Have loved this place for years. It’s always been a great place for an insomniac to get their laundry done. Plus the guy who worked there was really nice!
But what the hell has happened?
Went there tonight. Thankfully it was an early laundry night for me. Thankfully because as I was drying my clothes I noticed a sign that said the hours had been changed. ‘Lectric Wash House is no longer 24 hours. WTF?
New hours are:
M-​F till Midnight (lastwash at 10:30pm)
Sat & Sun: 24 hours
So the clean-​up guy came… but he wasn’t the usual clean-​up guy. It was a new guy who didn’t speak English. And every time I tried to ask him a question:
«When did you change your hours?»
«Are you under new managment?»
… he just pointed to the sign with the new hours.
I am very disappointed! This place has been a staple of Oakland living for years. Up until tonight, I have still driven there to do my laundry even though I moved to Lafayette 3 ½ years ago.
Oh and also:
They have decreased the drying time on the dryers. 25 cents used to get you 10 minutes. Now it only gets you 6. And also some of my light colored clothes got black marks on them from the dryers.
I won’t be back. I guess the good old days are done.

If you don’t have to do your laundry here… don’t!
It’s a rough ‘hood’ even in broad daylight.
On top of that, the place is very dirty… and very expensive… and you won’t always get hot water!
The owners used to be pretty good about sending you a refund when you lost money in their machines… but I was told that they would no longer refund money if you didn’t get hot water!
Since the local dealers come in to re-​charge their cell phones and unplug washers to do so, your chances of not getting what you pay for are pretty high!
Of course, if you are in the Police Academy and need ‘extra credit’… c’mon down!

Back in the day, in my younger, more naïve (than I am now) undergrad years, this was a place I’d hit up every once in a while to do laundry in the middle of the night. All night laundros are there own special hell. Seriously. So, anyway, this place is disgusting. It’s dirty (which, by the way, is a bit ironical since it is a place you take your dirties to make them clean). Once, while laundering my delicates in the wee hours, a strange man in a trenchcoat approached me with a roll of quarters… uh, make that his PENIS… in his hand and generously showed me what he was made of… and, apparently what he was made of was the same color as the off-​white walls. GAG.
Needless to say, I have never been back. One star because Unilocal made me.