Long Rant about My Now Ex Roommate.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

WARNING: Here’s a big ol’ rant about a guy who wore out my ability to sympathize.

I bought a house last November. My friend wanted to move in and rent from me. I was leery about it because I have never liked the guy that much; we just had a lot of common interests. He’s in his 30’s and on government disability due to having no thyroid anymore. He was living with his parents and was happy to get away from them since they made him do chores and such.

Now, I knew he was not the most responsible guy in the world, but when I asked how much rent he could handle, he said, “Well, with my monthly check, $600.” My mortgage is $1224 a month so I figured that was cool. And he said he’d help me get my 1956 fixer-upper home into shape and maintain it. And he did at first. He worked pretty hard helping me get base boards replaced, plumbing fixed, and the interior painted. And he totally had a job lined up teaching English to kids in China remotely.

Then it was time to live together. First thing was that he backtracked on rent, saying, “No $600 hundred is what I get each month. I can only do $400.” Even though he’d heard me say $600 at the time. Grrr. Then the job never seemed to be getting anywhere. It was always a week away from coming through. This was the pattern for all the jobs he applied for up until last Thursday. He’d do just enough (or say he’d done it) to get me off his back. Oh, and I forgot to specify for him to cover half of utilities so I was stuck on that. My fault, but he sure didn’t volunteer to pay for the power, water, and internet he was sucking up. And in his first month, he single-handedly exceeded my monthly data limit in two weeks. Something I’d never done in 20 years.

I’d asked him about what he was going to be doing during the his days and he’d said that he’d be working on the house when not on the job. But nothing was done until I specifically asked him to. He’d stare all day at a sink full of his dirty dishes because I hadn’t said for him to clean them. I finally got him to understand that the dishes should be done without asking. Mainly because I’ve starting a new habit of always putting dirty dishes in the washer instead of the sink. So all he had to do was throw in a washing pod and put the dishes away after.

All other chores had to be asked for specifically. Vacuuming the few rugs, cleaning the bathroom that he used (and never the half-bath in the master suite), and the occasional sweeping or mopping. These were jobs that I also did from time to time so it wasn’t like I was using him as a maid only. But he’d specified that he’d do the work and goddamit it wasn’t like he was busy getting up before noon. Yeah, I was a little sore about him sleeping in til noon everyday and then surfing the free internet and lounging around with Netflix while I work. And then acting like he has such a hard life.

And all the time he’s been wearing his disability on his sleeve for sympathy. I tried to be sympathetic but after a while, he wears you out with his “Oh poor, pitiful me” schtick. All of our mutual friends ghosted him on social media mainly because of it. That and his barely concealed misogynist Incel way of thinking just pissed folks off. I hated that they were ghosting him instead of ditching him to his face and I hated having to be part of a deception. But I totally understood how the group felt.

Well, one of the last fix-up jobs was to patch a big hole in the master bath ceiling. I did the job of sawing out the rotten section wide enough to access two rafters and screwing in the patch into the space. His job was to Spackle it over for painting. March 11th was when I got the patch into place and on April 25 the job still wasn’t finished. So I banged on his door as I was leaving for work and told him to, “get it done TODAY or I don’t know what I’ll do but you won’t like it.” A pretty lame statement but they can’t all be quote-worthy.

10 minutes later, I get a call from his dad demanding to know why I’m threatening his poor disabled son. Yes, a 30-something man responded to a bit of harsh language by calling daddy to save him. His dad said he’d have him out by the end of the month. I didn’t like being slandered by ol’ roomie and told his dad that all I’d ever asked was that he live like an adult. “But he can’t do that. He’s disabled!” And I remembered all the work he’d do to get away from mommy and daddy or those times it benefitted him. The funny part is that I doubt very strongly that he intended to move out. He just wanted daddy to fix the big bad guy who was expecting him to do inconvenient stuff. And I know for a fact that he does not enjoy being with his folks again or that he’s burned possibly the biggest bridge he had short of his parents. So he unintentionally flipped himself right out of the frying pan.

So when I got home that day, he was already moved out. Again, all of a sudden he had no trouble working hard at moving furniture and heavy boxes when it suited him.

So now I have the place to myself. And I love it. I love it so much that I feel slightly guilty about how happy I am at his departure. And that I know I won’t have to deal with him ever again because he’s such a non-confrontational guy (cowardly is actually more accurate) that he won’t ever contact me again.

Rant/enjoyment over

2

If it walks like a duck and quack likes a duck …

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Mischief managed.

4

Yup. I should have known better.

5

Change the locks.

6

You know, that’s a good idea. And it is funny because he was always trying to get me to shell out hundreds of dollars for bank-vault level locks on a door that is mostly glass. He was always full of ideas on how I could spend my money for his benefit.

7

Wait a minute! He gets an SSI disability check because he doesn’t have a thyroid gland? That’s a sign of BS from the start. (I don’t have any thyroid function myself, due to therapeutic ablation, and I KNOW I wouldn’t qualify for SSI disability. You just take a pill every day.) There’s obviously something more to that story.

Honestly, I’m sympathetic, having had a few bad roomies in my life. Enjoy your freedom!

8

I think you hit the “U” key by mistake. Easy to do since it is right next to the “I” key:p

9

Just more evidence piling up of the dishonesty and manipulation at his core. The more I find out…

10

Definitely change the locks. Change the passwords on your wi-fi or cable and anything else he might have access to as well.

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“qiacks like a duck”?

12

I’m so happy this story ended the way it did. Half way through reading, I had to go back and check the thread title to remind myself, “it’s okay … he does get rid of this moocher…” before I could keep reading. Too painful otherwise.

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It’s actually pretty damn quote-worthy if you ask me. It’s a memorable threat.

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Not to get personal, but what happened to his thyroid? And how did he get disability? I recently had mine removed, along with my vocal chords, and I breath out of a hole in my neck. They also transplanted part of my peck muscle to my neck. Plus chemo and radiation. All in the last year. At a ripe old age of 45.

And I seem to get along fine doing chores around and outside the house (just don’t ask my wife if I wash the dishes often enough). I’m pretty sure my wife would kick me out if I didn’t keep things up and cook every day, at the very least.

But I do get disability since there are so many reasons I can’t work in many places for many reasons. It just sounds like your roommate was a bit lazy.

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His thyroid went crazy in some way and it had to be destroyed with radiation. That’s all I know. And yeah, a bit lazy. My friends and I agreed that his disability status was the best and worst thing that could happen to him for the same reason: it gave him all the reason he needed to never achieve anything and just continue comfortably existing at the lowest possible expectations. He flunked out of art school before the thyroid thing began. I know he must have flunked out because there’s no way he’d have dropped out of a education on his parents dime to live on a campus far away from them.

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We had a cat that had her thyroid destroyed with radiation, I-131 IIRC. She gained a ton of weight and licked her belly all day. Sound familiar?

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While he does sound like someone you’re well rid of, I do think you may have set yourself up for disappointment expecting that he would spend his entire income on rent and then also somehow pay half the utilities. Unless I’m misreading? Anyway, if you decide to get another subletter, it might be a good idea to put the rental agreement in writing, including any agreement regarding utilities, and make sure they understand and can afford the all-in cost. If their income is less than twice the rent, they’re likely to come up short eventually.

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The OP said the renter at first told him he could afford to pay rent of $600 a month; the roommate later said all he got was $600 a month and could only pay $400.

The ex-roomie might indeed be on disability for some mental health issue that keeps him from working. AIUI, it has to be a recognized condition that does not respond to or is not fully controlled by medication. Or it could be his “disability” is infantilization caused by the doting mom and dad, and “on disability” means that mom and dad are paying for whatever he needs.

You dodged a bullet.

Edited to add: If he only got $600 a month and offered $400 for rent, he’d only have $200 a month for food, clothing, personal items, etc. Could he cover all that on only $50 a week?

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Yeah, I have no thyroid and want to know how to get on that disability gravy train.

Seriously - you take a pill once a day and that’s it.

StG

20

Bingo. But Esprise Me is correct in that I was very slack in the run-up to his moving in. I should have nailed down the amount before giving official consent. I should have remembered about utilities. I should have laid down his responsibilities ahead of time. I relied on friendship and trusted him not to be a complete slacker. And I’d had warning signs long before just from being an acquaintance. But when he was helping get the house ready, he certainly showed a lot more get-up-and-go, so that delayed the realization of how slack he is.