A friend and I have been planning on splitting a 2-bedroom apartment come September, as roommates.
But recently, I talked with another friend, and he said that rooming with friends really changes the relationship with them. He said that it’s hard to enjoy their company anymore and any sense of freshness kind of gets lost.
What are your experiences? What do you think? I haven’t got a clue about this, but I’m beginning to have my doubts. I’m worrying that we’ll basically start hating each other because we’ll start pissing over who should clean the bathroom, etc.
I think it can work but you really need to work out a roommate agreement, in writing, well in advance. Who can stay over? How long can they stay? What bill gets paid by who? How long can dishes sit in the sink? Do you take turns cleaning the toilet? etc.
I think if you hammer all these bits and pieces out you can be OK - if you try to fly by the seat of your pants it will be a disaster.
It’s too late to stop it. Then, you’re going to look like a flake and a douche. Now, you’re stuck with him. Try and see if there’s things you clash on. Like are you a neat freak and your friend a pig? Try and make sure you both pull your own weight.
You could either strengthen your relationship or hurt it, living with people works both ways.
If you have the money and like living alone do it. If you don’t have the money or don’t like living alone you need to find someone to live with regardless. Starting with a friend is better then a stranger.
I’ve shared apartments with friend’s and it always worked out well. For me it generally worked out I didn’t talk or hang out with them much then I usually did before living together. We just did our own things.
Some people can get along fine as roommates, and some can’t. Friends are no more likely than anyone else to make good roommates, but you are more likely to be able to tell in advance whether they’ll be good roommates.
As with most things in life, the key is communication.
I’ve lived with friends and had it go down in flames, and I’ve lived with a friend and we became even closer. Communicate. Talk. And for God’s sake hammer shit out in advance. When it worked out well, it was because we had talked about things before, very frankly–what cleaning schedule was expected, what constituted cleaning, who was responsible for buying cleaning products and household stuff (bath tissue, paper towels, Lysol), whether or not we would split some food items, overnight guests allowances, noise restrictions, clutter expectations, you name it. Because we both had a very clear idea of what was going to happen going into it, things were a dream.
In the other case, when it didn’t work out, it was because I was too shy to say anything about it. And when I said “Hey, I’ve been thinking, maybe we should split cleaning–I’ll clean one week, you clean the next?” my roommate said “It sounds like you’re telling me to do something I don’t want to do.” And that was pretty much the end of civil conversations on the topic.
I have twin sons. They roomed with friends in college, then they roomed with each other for two years. IMHO, it’s a bad, bad idea.
Everything you and your roommate should talk about civilly and sensibly suddenly becomes a contest over who’s the better friend, who’s more loyal, who owes the other person more, ad infinitum ad nauseum.
My sons moved in with different roommates at the beginning of the month. We saw them last week. They were the most relaxed, most friendly, least tense that we had seen them since – well, since they first moved in together two years earlier.
Lil bro and I each became roommates with good friends from high school. I haven’t spoken to Heather in years, nor has he spoken to Craig. I think it’s theoretically possible that rooming with a friend won’t destroy a friendship, but I haven’t seen it play out that way in real life.
Yes, if you split the apartment. NO- if one of you has the house/apt and the other rooms with him. In other words, as partners it could work, as landlord/tenant- never.
It could be a good idea or it could be a bad one. I’ll just echo the other posters who suggest that you lay out the ground rules for bills, cleaning, and guests before you move in together.
I had a good experience rooming with a friend during college, but it only worked because we were both laid-back, responsible, and had fairly similar thresholds for cleaniness. We still got on each other’s nerves once in a while, but neither one of us held grudges and we’re still friends today.
Back in the day, I only ever had roommates whom I’d already been personal friends with, and it largely worked out fine. Of course, I knew which friends I would not have made good roommates with. Seems like I’ve always heard bad stories about roommates who had answered ads.
For instance, I new one guy who did answer an ad for a roommate somewhere else, and the person who had placed the ad was later arrested for murder. Killing his wife. He wasn’t married yet at the time, but after a few months living there, my friend got creeped out and asked me to help him move. He could have moved himself easily, but the guy whose apartment it was was so creepy that my friend wanted someone there with him while he collected his stuff. Two or three years later, we read in the paper that the guy had gotten married and they found his wife buried in the backyard garden of their residence.
Another vote for “it can go either way”. I lived with a friend for a couple of years and we got along famously and are still good friends - the only reason we moved out is because I was leaving town. So a few years after that, when the opportunity came up to live with a different friend I jumped at it. That ended disastrously - it seemed like we disagreed about everything and within a few months we were barely on speaking terms. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Looking back, I can see that the fundamental issue was that we had *vastly *differing ideas about noise (among other things, she felt that I should never watch TV while she was sleeping, no matter how low the volume was), but the tension spread into other areas. This whole experience pretty much destroyed a previously pleasant friendship, which was really too bad.
Thinking about my earlier roommate (the one I’m still friends with), it seems to me that what really made it work was her incredibly laid-back nature. I’m fairly laid-back myself, but everything with her was just water off a ducks back. Of course, good communication helps too. My best advice is that you go into this situation planning to be open and communicate your thoughts without letting anything fester into resentment. But unfortunately I think there are some people who are just never going to be a good match in terms of living together, and you can’t always predict that.
Laying out the ground rules doesn’t always work, either. I moved in with two friends and we spelled out who would do what chores, etc. One of my roommates was happy to do whatever needed to be done, as long as I reminded him (which worked fine for us). I’m pretty sure the other guy never did any housework at all, the entire time we lived together. AND he tried to get in my pants immediately after Sept. 11, some kind of sympathy “glad you didn’t die” fuck. I moved out as soon as I could find an approved replacement.
In my experience larger numbers are better. I happily and successfully roomed with people in college who I could never have suffered had we lived together as a pair. However, living with 4 or 5 other people gave a huge buffer. In fact, junior year I lived with 5 other people, 4 of whom I could never have lived with alone. However, as a large group, we got along wonderfully and are all still close friends.
Christ, you guys have had some bad experiences. I’ve lived with 3 sets of friends, and they are still all friends of mine. I am a pretty bad housemate to boot.
Considering that most marriages end in divorce, the chances of your friendship surviving living together doesn’t look to great. But there is a chance…go for it.
I lived with my best friend for two years after we graduated college, and it was fine, and we’re still very close friends 10 years later. You just have to get business details (like rent, chores, who may eat what food, etc.) down first, and make sure you give each other space. Our relationship got a little strained when my friend started treating me like a girlfriend (we’re both straight women, btw) and wanted me to do everything with her and pouted when I wanted to (say) go shopping by myself, but that was straightened out after a good conversation.
The problem with rooming with friends is, whether you see it now, or not, you’re both bringing expectations of each other. Expectations which may not play out. When you live with a stranger you don’t have expectations and are, as a result, more open. Because you’re not going to be taken aback if they’re this way or that.
Since you’re already committed, I’d highly recommend talking exit strategy and conflict resolution before you move in together. If it all goes south, who gets what?, how much notice is required to move? phone bill? cable bill? for how many months? Put it in writing. Also be prepared, going in, to let a lot of things slide. This, more than anything, will save you a lot of grief.
Also set down some rules to start, who cleans the toilet? how often? how late is the tv/stereo in play? can his girlfriend stay over? how many nights of the week? parties?
Avoid, ‘you pay the electric, I’ll pay the food’, it’s a disaster waiting to happen. You’ll be angry when it seems he never shuts the lights off, and he’ll be pissed when you eat all the good cereal. It’s too easy to think you’re being taken advantage of if you’re not seeing the amounts for the others thing. Split every cost 50/50, buy your own food and eat separately if either is unhappy, without getting angry.
When you buy ‘things’ for your place, don’t split the cost. It will mean big problems when you go your separate ways. He can buy the table, you can buy the couch. If a break up happens at least it’s one less thing to fight about. I know, the reverse of the above, but it makes sense if you think about it.