C.L.
I like my frontloading washer because it uses less water and washes a ton of clothing.
As for vaccums, if you have carpel tunnel, I would suggest you look into getting a Roomba or two. They are floor vaccuming/sweeping robots. They are wonderful. If you get one of the fancy models, you can program it to go off every day at a handy time (like when you are all out), and it will clean every day. All you have to do is empty it from time to time. The only downside is they don't do stairs. Otherwise, they work great.