Missed this. Ditto. Been there. It sucks, but really…she’s being incredibly selfish right now. It’s not worth it staying friends with selfish people, because it tends to come down to them just being friendly with you when it works out for them. Doesn’t sound like she deserves your friendship, but it always hurts when you feel like you’ve been betrayed like that.
A thought–you said her family was helping here with expenses before. Maybe they got tired of paying her rent and refused to pony up so she’s trying to get out of it some other way?
Ugh, I hate this. Even the most solid peeps can turn into total scum when it comes to leases and paying rent on places where they don’t sleep anymore.
Does she have any stuff you can sell? Me and a bud rented a classic student house during my grad school years, with two spare bedroom that we were perpetually renting out to anyone we could find. As soon as it looked like someone was going to flake out, blam. We’d bust in when they were out and start taking shit hostage. Where’d your speakers go, dude? Aha, where’d our rent go, more like. Some of the things we did were kind of underhanded but it only took us being betrayed a couple of times before we became completely merciless.
I’m feeling the same way. While I am looking for roommates I am also looking for ways to increase my income. If I can find a way to earn a few hundred dollars more a month I am dropping the roommate search completely.
“If you loan a friend $20 and never see either of them again, it was probably worth it.” Who said that?
Sorry to hear of this dilemma. I would never shortchange anybody, and certainly not a friend—they’re too hard to come by. Unfortunately others take the easy road in the short-term.
You mention not wanting to sever the friendship completely…I’m not sure why. People who burn you on the relatively small things will burn you on the big things as well. Good riddance, I say.
Heh. No. And even if she did, I couldn’t do that. She’d have to kill my cat or something for me to become that ruthless.
I think that’s it, although there are other issues at play as well. I think she paid her boyfriend’s rent for him a few months ago. This was back when she didn’t have a job. So basically she borrowed hundreds of dollars from her parents to lend her boyfriend so he wouldn’t have to ask his parents for money. :dubious:
I just can’t fathom her mindset. If she had asked me to borrow the money and promised to pay it off later, I would’ve found a way, even if it meant asking MY parents.
I suppose I should just give up on our friendship, since obviously she didn’t value it as much as I thought she did. The icing on the cake is that she ended her email to me saying something like, “I hope this doesn’t affect our friendship, because that would be stupid.” I felt like she was implying that it would be petty of me to let such a little thing as several hundred dollars get in the way of our friendship. :dubious: Grumble.
You may have her name on a lease but it’s not really very effective leverage. If the rent doesn’t get paid, she’s in New York and you’re the one who gets evicted.
The bottom line is your roommate screwed you over and she’s trying to make herself feel better by claiming it’s your fault. Seperate yourself from her and move on.
Several years ago, I had a roommate who was “unofficial” inasmuch as he wasn’t on the lease. When the lease was up, we discussed and decided to re-sign together. In order to get him on the new lease, he had to fill out a credit application. The process wasn’t ready in time for the first day of the new month but the rental company said not to worry about it, they’d draft up the lease when the credit app came back. They did mention somewhere around the third that roommate hadn’t paid his half of the rent so I mentioned it and he said he was going to do it that day.
On the fifth, I got home to find his stuff gone. All of it. His rent was never paid and I never saw him again, literally. I still don’t know where the asshole went.
I’m doing that. I can’t wait for her to move out. (I realize you’re probably talking about marrying, which is totally different from being forced to live with one’s sister, but still) Living with family does have the advantage of knowing she probably won’t kill me in my sleep. Or her sleep considering how much she does while asleep.
It’s also annoying to get calls for ‘Ms. Girl’ and having to answer ‘Yeah, but probably not the one you want.’ And getting people asking me if I’m her mother. (she’s older than me) :eek:
It’s sometimes amazing the rationalizations people will come up with for not recognizing that the “emergency” they’ve been saving for is HERE! I’ve said before that I work for the PA Department of Welfare. We’ve had people apply for cash assistance and food stamps who had thousands of dollars in their savings account. They were INDIGNANT when we told them they were rejected because their assets were too high to qualify. That money was for EMERGENCIES! Yeah, like buying food, paying rent, that kind of thing?
If you get your deposit back and keep it yourself, would that in anyway make up for your financial loss? Or did you pay the whole deposit to begin with? (Sorry if you answered that already and I somehow missed it.)
I’d first call her instead of writing her. Such rationalizations as she fabricates are harder to maintain when somebody confronts you “live” about them and you can hear the “you gotta be kidding me” tone in their voice. The weird thing about rationalizations is that they keep looking better and better to the person writing them down on paper.
Didn’t you have a previous thread about your roommate inviting drug dealers into your apartment?
Friendships are like any relationship that’s worth maintaining. You put energy into it because it provides you with something. Someone to trust, laugh with, depend upon, and generally be there for you against the chills of life. That kind of person is a friend.
Your roommate no longer seems to be maintaining that kind of a relationship with you. In fact, despite her saying that she hopes it doesn’t hurt your friendship, she’s already prepared herself to become little more than an acquaintance of yours. She knows she’s doing you wrong, and she is well aware that you are all the way in Chicago (and due for Korea) while she has escaped to New York. If she burns you now, to help herself, she doesn’t have to deal with any consequences.
Wouldn’t it have been nice to have had the hindsight in the first place to read a warning sign like this? As someone who had a string of shitty roommates (who fortunately at least didn’t stick me with something financial I couldn’t afford), I really and truly feel for you. I’m glad it’s just one month, and that you don’t have to take out a loan to keep your head above water. But really, being careless with finances when it affects other people always says something about a person.
Oh, and you didn’t describe your situation fully, so I’m sure you had a good reason for it, but that totally sucks for having to pay to have it cleaned. I’ve gone through apt hunting where nothing seems to be a decent place to live, and it got so wearing after awhile that I was ready to just take the next place that seemed halfway decent. I’m so glad I held out for the last place I eventually got, though.
Uncommon Sense, I don’t get it. Habitable and inhabitable are synonyms, right?
Money usually trumps friendship (in my experience, anyway). This is the downside of the whole roommate thing. She’s feeling trapped by her bad decision so she’s lashing out. If you feel the friendship is worth salvaging, figure out a way to do that. She has kept up her part of the agreement except for the last month’s rent. She IS responsible for it, and you ARE in the right, but only you can determine if her bailing out is a deal breaker, friendship-wise.
If it was a “good” friend, I’d eat it. If it was really more of a roommates-who-get-along vs. a friendship, I’d probably try to get that last month out of her.
Actually, my roommate did let drug dealers into our apartment. I posted about it in a “telling stories” kind of thread in MPSIMS. It’s actually something we laugh about now, because in hindsight it was pretty hilarious and everything turned out well, but at the time I was not laughing, I assure you.
I guess “inhabitable” is okay, then? OED says the word means both (“livable” AND “unliveable”) but that the latter meaning is now considered obscure. English is a weird language.
Anyway, I need to talk to the landlord, but if he proves reasonable I think he’ll just keep her deposit, give my half back, and everyone will be happy. (Of course, I was reading the lease and it seems that he would also be within his rights to evict me for not paying the full rent. :eek: But she’s only skipping out on a month, so hopefully he won’t be a bastard.)
I was talking about the situation yesterday with The Guy (he knows her too; we all went to grad school together) and his advice was just to let it go and forget about our friendship in a civil manner. It would be different if she were part of my intimate circle of friends, but she’s always been on the fringes and losing her as a friend wouldn’t affect my other relationships in any way.
I’m terrible at talking over the phone. Plus right now I’m so disgusted by the whole thing that I’d rather just not talk to her. I just want to get this whole thing over with.
Yesterday I contemplated a few petty things I could do; throw her stuff out on the porch and set it on fire, write up my story and send it to everyone we know from grad school. I’m much calmer about it today. Thanks for the sympathies and stories, everyone. I’ll keep you posted on whether I end up flying out to NY and murdering her or not (or getting a Doper to do it for me ).
OED says the word means both (“livable” AND “unliveable”) but that the latter meaning is now considered obscure. English is a weird language.
Plus right now I’m so disgusted by the whole thing that I’d rather just not talk to her. I just want to get this whole thing over with.
I’m much calmer about it today. Thanks for the sympathies and stories, everyone. I’ll keep you posted on whether I end up flying out to NY and murdering her or not (or getting a Doper to do it for me