The gasoline powered washer was for the farm market, as plenty of them weren't electrified. I don't know more, because it was never purchased and that farm got power in a few years.

Could be; or something built on 'settlement lines' but not all of the logic followed. The stair shown in the recent movie implies an apartment above a business, though it also could have been to get rooms without an internal door/to avoid the dark corridors.