If the room is on the other side of the master bath, you’ll need to insulate to deaden the sound. You may need to bring in a structural engineer to see whether your floor joists can withstand a washer’s vibration. If not, the floor will need reinforcing.
A finished basement with a play area is ideal, and this is probably not what the two professors meant about the negative effect of a basement laundry on sale price. If you don’t have a finished basement, a spot near the kitchen is also ideal, especially if the kitchen opens onto a family room so [...]
Another study showed that having a laundry room in the basement tended to detract from a house’s sale price. Yet owners of existing houses often have no choice but to put the laundry room in the basement: Apart from having the needed space, it often is the place with ready access to hot water and [...]
Put the laundry room anywhere but the basement. It’s probably just a marketing tool to sell more washing machines, but one major manufacturer, Whirlpool, has been pushing the concept of what I call the “super laundry room.”