I’m not really comfortable with the term boarder here, unless the guy renting the room is also eating his meals with the family.
I had the same reaction as threemae. If it was habitual I would certainly understand, but Antinor said that the washer/dryer was lent out ONCE. I’d say it’s more akin to his friend chilling a 12-pack on the tenants shelf in the fridge than the tenant lending out the owner’s bed. I’m going to assume the lease allows the tenant the use of appliances in the house. In this case the cost of maintaining those appliances could be worked into the rent.
Having said that, I totally understand the OP’s frustration. One generally doesn’t want to find strangers doing laundry in one’s house. I suspect the OP wouldn’t have been as upset if it was a mutual aquaintance or if she was asked permission beforehand. My advice would be to air these grievances asap, in a non-confrontational way. As others have said it’s likely that a simple 5-minute conversation will do wonders for the situation.
I am renting from someone in an identical situation to yours, OP. Except I rarely leave my room and wouldn’t have any guests to invite over (nor would I want to if I knew anyone who could visit). You can easily find another tenant who would agree not to have guests at all during the week. Charge slightly less for rent if you must to attract someone. But I spend 90+% of my time alone in my bedroom when I’m home and it’s no hardship (only times I leave are to cook or eat, use the bathroom, smoke a cig outside, or entering/leaving the house). I just want my own little room to myself, no common areas for me, thanks. It’s not impossible to find someone else who wants the same.
Just put a clause in the lease next time you go to sign it stating no weekday/overnight visitors, period. And in the meantime, have a talk with him about the fact that you’re being really stressed out by his new visitors. I would hope he’d be willing to accommodate you, since you’d almost be on the order of friends after this much time living together.
Has anyone really rented out a room in their house where the person didn’t have living room/dining room/kitchen privileges? It seems like you might attract unsavory characters that way.
That occurred to me. Nonetheless, I still think boarder is closer than roommate. Roommates have equal levels of responsibility, authority, and liability; that’s not the situation here.
Yeah, people do that, especially if the room has a separate entrance. I think the market is more about cheap students that are used to dorms.
Anyway, the real question here is “how do I transition from a friendship-based situation where people live as equals to a money-based relationship of unequals without pissing people off/messing up the friendship/feeling bad.” The answer is that you can’t.
You can’t tell someone “Hey man, we’re still friends and everything is the same, it’s just that now my needs automatically take precedence over yours” without building up resentments. Nobody wants to be downgraded.
So if you want the control of the house, you are probably going to have to sacrifice the friendship and vice versa.
I agree. I think my post 33 is trying to get at the same issue.
We have four individuals living in our house keeping different arrangements with different social needs. My, the husband and two children old enough to have friends over.
The public areas of the house are public - (not as in ‘strangers can walk in’ but in 'if anyone who lives there is entertaining, those areas are free to use to do so). The private areas are private. In my house, the expectations would be that I’d retire to a private area of our house (our bedroom) if someone wanted to entertain in a public area - that’s what those rooms are for. We don’t have formal “quiet hours” - but informal ones - my kids friends need to be out the door by 8pm on a school night, 9 on a weekend unless there is a sleepover involved. My husbands friends get to hang until around ten - a small subset gets to stay over after I’m in my jammies, but I’m not really comfortable with company after I’m in my jammies (and most of them have sense enough to take that as a hint that its time to leave).
Your case seems to be somewhat different in that you expect what I would consider the public areas of the house to be reserved for your use - or at least “household use.”
I think the aforementioned suggestion of quiet hours (although I’d do “visiting hours”) is appropriate if you all need to share the space. You don’t like walking into company from work - that’s understandable. So when can your friend/tenant have company? And its completely understandable that his company might be people you don’t know. However, its also reasonable to expect that they will not be left alone in your house, not eat your food, and not use your washing machine.
If that answer is “never” - then I think he needs to find somewhere else to live.
I don’t think its really a situation any different than any other roommate situation - a negotiation for shared space. You do OWN the space, but unless you are only renting him the square feet of his bedroom, he is renting the use of the space. The real difference is that you define the terms, he defines whether he continues to rent space from you under those terms. (Alternatively, you could get out the masking tape to define what he is renting - remember to leave a path to the bathroom for him).