Is sharing a house/apartment with a friend always a bad idea?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Another poster made this claim- renting with friends can get messy, because petty arguments about whose turn it is to do the dishes can turn into huge fights and then there goes the friendship.

I want to hear others’ experiences with renting with friends. I do see potential for problems, but is it universally bad?

My backstory- I have a friend I’ve known since I was 11 (we’re in our early 20s now). Best friends, spent all our time together, her mom was like my mom. I could probably go over to her parents’ house right now, let myself in, sit down to dinner, and the only weird thing would be that I haven’t done that for several years.

We drifted apart a few years ago because she got into things (read: drugs) that I didn’t. She then moved out of state for a while. She’s back, going to school, not into the things that made me keep my distance before, and she’s looking for a roommate. I might be looking for a roommate, too, (though I prefer to live alone, and have only lived with boyfriends) just because money’s tight.

So, if you’ve shared a house or apartment with a good friend, how did it turn out?

2

I’m doing it right now - my current roommate is a friend from grad school. We weren’t that close when we decided to live together, actually, but so far it’s working out great.

I think it depends on the personalities involved. I can think of a few close friends that if I ever were to live with in the same house, murder would be the result. My current roommate and I are both pretty laidback, so even though we have slightly different lifestyles it ends up being okay.

3

I’ve been living with a few friends of mine for two years now, and it’s still going just fine. While there have been times that I thought about moving out, it was not over things like who does the dishes or other minor disagreements, it was over lifestyle changes like having a semi-live in girlfriend, and wanting more of my own space. In fact, I can’t think of any minor inconvenience that has been left to fester. We have different preferences, but we talk through them and work out a compromise.

Like living with anyone, I suppose.

4

I lived for five or six months in a tiny little semi-studio apartment with my best friend - we’d been friends since we were 12 and were in our early 20s and in college at the time. I loved living with her there even though my bed was essentially in a closet and she slept on the futon in the main room. However, I hated living with her slacker boyfriend, who started staying over EVERY DAMN NIGHT. After a couple of months of that, they left and got their own place, leaving me to cover our lease. :rolleyes:

She and I are still friends, though, and I’d live with her again should the situation ever come up. She’s over thinking slackers are hotties by now, which helps.

5

I agree with this wholeheartedly. Damn near stabbed my college roommates, but had other friend/roommate arrangements that were fine. So long as all parties are fairly responsible (will pay their portions of the rent on time, do their share chores, etc.), it shouldn’t be much of a problem.

6

I roomed with my closest friend from 1998 until 2001 and it went really well. We irritated each other a lot (especially we had different cleaning habits; mine = clean the dishes after you use them; hers = clean them when they start to smell), but I think it definitely helped us in maintaining our friendship after graduating from college. In fact, I’m certain we would have drifted away had we not roomed together for a while after I graduated.

7

I lived with friends twice each time was for a year.

The first time there were four of us in a house. All in all we all stayed friendly. When one yahoo left a mess or didn’t do the chores the rest of us would bitch at him about it until they did it. At the end of the year we all still liked each other.

The second time was the very next year I moved out with one of the guys from the house. He and I had been friends since 5th grade. After high school we drifted apart and went our own ways but then a year or so before I moved into the house with the other three guys we bumped into each other. In fact he was the one who convinced me to move into the house with him and his other friends.

Well everything was pretty normal roomate stuff but we never got into a fight about anything. The onyl problem was money. A lot of the times he had to borrow money from me to pay for his half of the rent and he usually paid me back within a week. It wasn’t that big of a deal to me except a lot of the times he would go out partying with his girlfriend a couple days before rent was due and I would always mentioned that if he hadn’t gone out he would have enough for rent. That annoyed me.

Well besides that we were still on good friendly terms until the day came when it was time to move out. He wanted to move in with his girlfriend. Things were fine until we had to pay the moving out fees. He was about $150 short for his half. He only had $20. So I told him I would cover it and he could pay me back.

We move out and a couple of weeks later I call him asking for some of the money and of course he didn’t have it. Every couple weeks I would call him asking for money and he never had it. Four months later it was Christmas time and I called him again to ask for some money. It went straight to voice mail like the last couple calls had so I left a message saying he can keep the money as a Christmas present since he apparantly was never intending on paying me back. then I told him to fuck off and to never call me again ( actually he hadn’t called since we moved out) unless he had the $150 in hand.

Three years later he has never called.

I’m in a situation now where I have a friend who had to move back home because of roommate problems and he bugs me to move out with him but after living alone for three years I’m not sure that I want to. I think he would be a good roommate and be responsible it’s just that I have come to enjoy living alone and I can not afford the moving fees anytime soon.

8

Living with friends is a bad idea for me because of the emotional involvement with them. Minor squabbles about dishes and such can turn into hurt feelings way too easily. It’s too easy to take things personally- “If you were really my friend, you would pay your share of the rent on time!”, etc. I find it much easier to live as roommates with someone I’m not emotionally tied to (or I would if I still had to deal with having roommates, which I don’t.) It’s easier for me to look at things rationally, and to deal with problems without emotions becoming involved.

9

Plus, if things go horribly awry and you have to sever the housing agreement prematurely, it’s much, much easier to do that if you’re not friends with them. But that’s me- always thinking ahead as to how things could go wrong and what I will do when and if they do.

10

I posted this somewhere else, but I had an awful experience living with a “friend”.

We rented a 3-bedroom place and sublet the third bedroom. My friend is an insecure gay man and the subletter was a wildly attractive gay bartender. The power dynamic was NOT equal. I found that my friend would often follow along as to what the bartender wanted to do, or thought, but when he was with me, he would have a completely opposite opinion. He tried to be “friends” with both of us, which obviously doesn’t work. Especially when you are subletting, the relationship needs to be all business.

My friend would also nitpick about things like, “you crunch really loudly on cereal at night and it keeps me awake”, that someone who is NOT your friend would just figure is the price of living with a roommate and forget about it. When you’re living with a friend, you think that every petty annoyance is something you can “talk about”. This is not the case. Sometimes you just have to ignore things.

In my case, anyway, the subletter/bartender began to destroy my things, and even wrote a letter to my boss’s family telling them how awful I was. This ruined my reputation and work and eventually got me canned. When I found out about this, I told my friend, “we need to kick out this subletter, he is NUTS, he threw out my shoes and is writing letters to my boss!”. The friend said, “you don’t respect my opinions or thoughts about the apartment. You’re always messy and your computer makes a lot of noise at night. I’m not going to back you up on this.”

MOST. PASSIVE. AGGRESSIVE. RESPONSE. EVER.

The point is, I needed the lease co-signer to help me intervene when a subletter was breaking the rules of the lease. He made it all personal. The reason he wouldn’t kick out the subletter was a personal grudge, NOT what was best for our living situation or the apartment.

I wound up hurriedly gathering up my things, breaking the lease, and taking off within a week.

A “real” roommate, one who isn’t your friend, doesn’t nitpick to that extent- it’s a business deal, renting, and nothing else- no one worries about who “hurt” the other and who “respects the feelings” of the other. I will never, ever live with a friend again, nor will I attempt to be friends with my roommates. It has to be a business deal. Otherwise, it WILL become messy.

11

I’m living in a four-person group house, and one of my close friends from college was a housemate for about a year. She just moved out, but there was no difficulty with her living here - in fact, we rather enjoyed being able to just chill and hang out together as we did in college. Didn’t harm our friendship, we’re still friends, and I’d live with her again in an instant if the circumstances made sense. (She moved out, BTW, because of personality clashes with another housemate, and also because she found much cheaper housing).

On the other hand, I had another friend who was going to move into the house, but she backed out at the last minute, and so we had to scramble to find a new housemate. That wasn’t cool. But that wasn’t really a living-with-friends issue, so much as a flaky-potential-housemate issue, I think.

12

Oops.

13

I would make sure you both know what to expect. I’m a loner for the most part, and I was under the impression that my friend and I would share rent and chores but otherwise live separate lives. He thought we were going to be BFFs who did everything together and live together forever. Right now it’s so bad that I basically have to ignore him half the time to keep my sanity. I feel like a bitch for doing it, but we got started on the wrong foot for a few different reasons and now everything he says and does annoys me (I know I’m being irrational and I’m working on getting over it). Rent and all that are fine, but he will not SHUT UP. Ever. I get his input on everything from how I discipline my daughter to what I was talking about on a personal phone call, which I do not encourage or appreciate. I obviously didn’t know him as well as I thought I did because I never would have signed on for this.

As soon as I start my new job next month, I’m pretty sure one of us is going.

14

I’m still on the fence about it. On the one hand, it would allow me more options since I’d be splitting the cost with someone, and it would be nice to have more space, even if all of it wouldn’t be mine. Just to see I looked on Craig’s list at some two bedroom places, and I found a lot of houses and apartments well within my/our price range that looked great and were in good locations.

On the other hand, I do like my space and privacy. Since we’ve been friends for so long, I know she’d understand. If she had some friends over and I didn’t want to hang out, I’d probably just stay in my room and I doubt she’d get upset about it.

Susie has a good point, though, I don’t know what she expects. Like I said, we were BFF but lost touch a few years ago, I don’t know if she’s expecting us to be joined at the hip again or not.

But really, thinking strictly practically, I could be paying a little more than half of what I’m paying now for rent, which would mean I’d actually have money to, you know, do stuff.

15

I’ve lived with friends, enemies, and total strangers - my inability to settle down and live a reasonably grown-up life has lead to me having almost 30 roomates in the last 11 years, up to 6 at a time. Sometimes living with friends is great, and sometimes it sucks. Sometimes living with strangers is great, and sometimes it sucks. In my experience either situation can be good or bad and it depends on a lot of factors. A lot of people have only had a handful of roomates and that makes comparison difficult.

I think the best way to tell is to just try to imagine the two of you living together. I mean, we all have those friends that we like when we see them, but secretly think ‘damn, I’m glad I don’t have to live your life!’. don’t live with that person. If you are laid back, try to live with someone laid back, if you are anally clean, make sure they are too, etc.

16

In college I lived with my college best friend, and it was a disaster, because we were as different as can be, but the same degree of stubborn. I then lived with an acquaintance-- all business, and I hated it. I missed feeling like I had a “home” instead of a place to sleep.

Then I moved to California. I have lived, in the past 5 years, with all but two of the member of my close friend group.

My BFF and shared and apartment, and then a rented house, and then an owned house (hers). It’s been nothing but good, but we are highly compatible, and have similar attitudes about everything from cleaning to sleep schedules to activities to which way the toilet paper goes (in that neither of us cares). We’d cook & eat dinner together nearly every day, share laundry, clothes, books, movies, purchases, etc. We functioned a lot like a family, and I’ve really loved it. There’s never been any “labeled milk” in our fridge.

Two years ago, after moving into our current house, a third friend moved in (Call him Roomie 1). What he did was have a “trial” month to see if he’d fit in. And he did, so we had a 3 person faux-family.

A couple month after he moved in, another friend (Roomie 2) had a run of bad luck and we offered him our couch in our den. He did not mesh with the living style of the rest of us. He was far messier, kept crazy hours, and was just. . . not compatible. All little petty stuff, like holding loud conversations with people who were trying to read (you know how non-readers seem to want to “rescue you” from your book?), leaving bottle caps in the sink, turning the thermostat too high/low, not cleaning the toilet (generally not being careful with the house, bad idea when you live with your landlord). He wanted labeled milk. He felt like just some dude renting a room, which I think made us more intolerant of his petty annoyances than we were of each others. It’s easier to tolerate people when everyone is invested in making the relationships and living environments work.

Him, we had to evict.

Roomie 1 eventually got his own place, because he wanted more space and to be closer to work. We were all a little sad when he moved out.

This summer another good friend, Roomie 3, moved into Roomie 1’s old room. So far it’s been absolutely fabulous, no bumps at all. I’m getting married in the spring and moving out, and I can only hope living with my fiance goes as well as living with my BFF and other friends have. I’m going to be bit sad to go-- we have a wonderful, genuine “home” here. It’s been the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

It doesn’t have to be bad-- but it depends a lot on how compatible you and your friend are, and how much compromise you’re both willing to make.

17

How well do you know your friend? Do you have similar lifestyles or are you both willing to compromise? Can you both communicate easily on sensitive issues (such as asking them to do things, or financial matters)? Further, I wouldn’t ever agree to live with someone that I thought was not a fully responsible and gainfully employed (and likely to stay that way) adult. Are they respectful and considerate of you and others - or are they the type that foists the responsibility to tip at a restaurant on you by undertipping, or who shows up habitually late to social engagements? Do they take responsibility for their actions? I don’t want to end up holding the bag for someone who decides that rent is not a priority, or who suddenly wants to move out, so my biggest concern is finding a flake.

I’m living with a sibling, and I’ve lived with friends in the past. Other than one college roommate, who I hadn’t known that long before agreeing to live with him, I never encountered significant issues. I’m messier than most people, but I try really hard never to take it personally when people ask me to do something, and try to be proactive about contributing to the household. It’s working for me right now, and I get to stay in a nicer place, have a pet and have someone to talk to sometimes. It’d worked out pretty well for me.

18

My roommate from freshman year is my best friend. Three years later we still live together. What can I say? We clicked.

We work well together; if one of us has a problem, we’re not the type to sit and stew over it. If she says “Hey, your dishes are piled so high I can’t see out the window” I respond with “Oh, sorry. Didn’t notice I had so many, I’ll take care of them tonight.” Then I do. Same vice versa. If we agree to clean house on Thursday, but I have a paper due and wait to clean until Friday, no harm no foul. Neither of us are neat freaks or total slobs, we don’t mind each other’s SO’s and we’re both financially responsible students with jobs and other commitments. More importantly, we understand how it is to get too busy and forget things, as long as it doesn’t become a habit.

19

This is my best analysis of the situation- we used to be best friends. Over the past several years we drifted apart. She had shitty friends and boyfriends I didn’t like, she got into drugs, while I was trying to go to school and do better. So, we haven’t seen much of each other in a while. She moved out of state, moved back, moved out of state, moved back.

From what I gather, she’s had her share of partying and shitty boyfriends and is done. She’s actually looking for a roommate because she wants to end her current relationship and be on her own (not a shitty boyfriend, just not the one she wants). She’s working and going to school.

It’s sort of an odd situation for me, because even though she’s someone I’d consider a very good friend of mine, I don’t feel like I know her very well because we haven’t seen each other much for a few years and people can change a lot, especially at our age. In her case, I can’t see it being anything but a change for the better, but it’s odd still.

20

It might be easier then. One of the reasons I like living with my current roommate is that we knew enough about each other to know we’d more or less get along, but we weren’t close enough that we’d have issues talking about money or dishes or what have you. I think if you live with close friends there’s always the potential for resentment to stew because both parties are reluctant to bring up things that could cause conflict. (Plus there could be other issues if your current lives are too closely intertwined - for example, one of my best friends from grad school absolutely despises one of my other close friends, and we’re all part of the same social group. If I’d lived with her there would have been major issues.)

Have you seen her place? It might give you a better idea of whether your living styles are compatible or not.