"Doug" wrote in message
oups.com...
Hi,
We just bought a house. It's an older house and the washing machine
drains right into a hole in the center of the floor. It appears that
sometimes that the water is taking longer to drain all the way through
so it's filling the area up where it's built to handle this and moving
on to other areas of the floor (and potentially going to cause water
problems with furniture and such in other areas in the basement).

Not sure of the right question to ask, but I'm curious as to whether or
not we could do something ourselves to maybe clean out the drain
(similiar to say using DrainO in a kitchen sink).

That drain could just go into a drainfield outside your house, which
could be plugged by the washer lint.

You could try putting the end of your garden hose down the drain,
then wrapping a rag around it to seal the opening, Then turn on the
water. If it's just a plugged drain pipe, this may somewhat clear it.

Also, roughly does anyone have any idea what kind of cost/time is
involved in making this so it doesn't drain into the floor but drains
underground some way?

I have no idea about the cost, but I'd sure fix it if it was my house.

Bob