Hinge assembly for household appliances having an horizontally-pivoted front door, and which comprises: a first coupling element; a second coupling element; and a door-weight balancing device; the door-weight balancing device in turn comprising a supporting rod; a compression-preloaded elastically-deformable member which is fitted to the supporting rod so as to have a first end firmly fixed to the distal end of the supporting rod and a second end; a linking mechanism which connects the proximal end of the supporting rod to the second coupling element, so that the supporting rod is axially moved to further compress the elastically-deformable member when the second coupling element rotates from the first to the second working position; and an adjustable spacer element which is structured so to allow a manually-operated adjustment, thus varying the compression preload of the elastically-deformable member fitted on the supporting rod.