My life is weird, as have been my living situations. I dropped out of high school at the end of my junior year in high school. I was 16 and found myself as a sophomore in college. I lived at home my first year, with a bloody 40 minute each way commute when I wasn’t allowed to drive. Had a licence. Had a car I paid for, but wasn’t allowed to drive. Moved into the dorms at the beginning of my junior year, and through the vagueries of fate, got the best roommate I could ask for. Had to spend my 5 week winter break at my parents, suffered from horrid insomnia, got screamed at constantly by my mother, missed Lowell, which to anyone who has ever been there, it’s saying a lot. Went back to school. Had my best friend, who is at school in Pittsburgh tell me that I wasn’t going to live with my parents this summer and if I couldn’t come up with enough money for rent, she would pay it.
That hit me like a ton of bricks. Decided to live with one of the girls I met at school. That was all fine and dandy until her boyfriend tried to seduce me and nearly won me over before several of my other friends intervined. Somehow, I still thought it was a good idea to live with her, which was more often than not, them, in a rented room. Living with her made me realize what a psycho bitch she was. Screamed at me for an hour because she hated my new boyfriend on my 19th birthday, which led me to have a panic attack after the first time said new, but now ex, boyfriend kissed me. Oh that was fun. She moved out three days later. One of my male friends moved in with me. Loved living with him. Still haven’t told my parents. As one of my friends put it, it’s not because I was sharing an apartment with a member of the oposite gender, or even a room with him, it was that I was sharing a one bed apartment with him (he slept on the floor, we aren’t an item, just friends). At current, for the next three days, I’m stuck at my parents’, as my lease ended on the 31st and I can’t move into my dorm until Sunday. I plan to live in campus housing for the, bum around with my friends during winter break and then become finacially indepentant. I am moving, most likely, to Cali for grad school, with my friend that I lived with this summer. We were sitting in traffic yesterday, when it hit us we would actually live comfortably while I was in grad school. Between us, we’ll make 40,000 plus or minus 5000, depending on where I chose to go. I have no intention of living with my parents after I get my BS. If there is even a them to live with, as my father has threatened to leave my mother on a daily basis since I got home.
I turn 26 in 6 weeks, so I guess I count for this. I’m probably something of an anomaly in that I made it through 7 years of post-secondary education without ever living with a roommate. I’m currently living by myself in a nice 1-bedroom apartment with an ocean view, paid for by my first real job. I first moved out from my parents’ house almost exactly 8 years ago, shortly before my 18th birthday, to go halfway across the country to attend university. I had one year in residence, thankfully in a single corner room, though the walls were so thin I could hear every single sound my neighbour made. After that, I got a 1-bedroom apartment by myself for the remaining three years of my degree, returning home to my parents during the summers. I had a really well-paying summer job plus a couple of scholarships, so paying rent wasn’t generally a problem, and the couple of times it was my parents helped out. After getting my BSc, I spent 6 months living with my parents, then managed to find a bachelor basement suite close to UBC, where I was doing grad studies. I moved in there shortly after my 22nd birthday and stayed for 3 1/2 years, mostly supported by the stipend I received as a grad student. After I got my MSc, my parents helped out with rent for a few months, then we all decided it would be easier if I just moved back in with them for the duration of my job search. I thankfully wound up just being back there for about 3-4 months, which was plenty for everyone involved! I moved in to my current place 2 months ago, so that brings us up to the present.
I had five years at university living independently but financially supported by my family (read: rent-free). Once I graduated, I had 15 month working full-time. Due to an (ahem) oversight, I was still living rent-free during this time, which helped me save.
Then five months ago, I packed it all up and moved <looks at location> nearly 9000 miles away, to live in Ye Olde London Town. Now I live with my boyfriend and pay enough rent to support a small African nation.
I’m almost 26, and I’ve been living in college dorms for the past three years, with short intervals of staying at home for a week or two between semesters. I graduate this semester, and I’m looking for an apartment already. I hope to be able to have an apartment by myself, as living with slobs is really starting to drive me crazy.
I lived at home until I finished highschool, then I lived in a dorm room at college for a year and a half (home during the summer and on breaks), and then I transferred to community college in my hometown, so I’m living at home again.
There are lots of times I’d rather have my own place, but I can’t beat what I’ve got here. I don’t pay rent and my parents put food on the table, so I get to save up for when I do finally move out. I realize I’m very lucky.
I’m 20. I moved out of my mother’s house the day after graduation from high school and lived on my own for a year in a small apartment across town. Then, a year ago, my dad moved in with me.
We live together now, more as roomies/best buds than father-and-son, and we split the bills down the middle. It’s a lot easier and a lot cheaper this way (no more 16-hour workdays for yours truly). Now I’m just saving up to finish school, and keepin’ on keepin’ on.
I lived at home until college, then did college housing for the four years of college [3 dorm rooms, one shared apartment on campus]. The first summer of college I lived mostly at the camp I worked at. The second I lived in Oak Ridge, TN through a physics program. The third summer I lived at Indiana University doing an REU. The summer between undergrad and grad I lived at home [3 months was a long time to live with my parents.] I moved into a 1 bedroom apartment when I left for graduate school, and now am in a studio apartment, both by myself [where I’m now headed into a 3rd year of grad school].
24 and live with my parents. Got my masters’ degree this spring but the job market has been bleak. The moment, the very moment I get a job (the best one so far just told me they’re taking another week to deliberate, AARGH) I’m looking at houses. I want a real house that’s mine all mine all mine from which to put down roots.
I’m 23 and just graduated from college. While in school, I lived in university housing. Currently, I’m living at home with my parents. The plan is that I’ll stay here for a year before heading off to grad school (knock on wood). This allows me to save some money and whatnot, as mom and dad refuse to let me pay rent (although I am, as always, expected to contribute to the household in other ways). I’ve been home for almost a month now, and it really isn’t so bad. I get along well with my parents; they’re respectful of my privacy and independence. I sometimes feel a little pathetic for living at home at an “adult age,” but it seems like that’s becoming more common and, even if it wasn’t, it’s what’s right for me at the moment.
I’m 25, and have lived in many, many places since leaving the parental house. I left home to go to college just after I turned 17 (skipped a grade). Had to live in the dorms for the first year. The summer after my first year in college I moved back home, but I was miserable and decided I wouldn’t do it again (I no longer had a room, just a bed and two drawers. Most of my stuff was kept in the garage). When sophomore year started, I lived in a co-op with 27 other people. Berkeley has a really good student-run co-op housing system, and I stayed at that house for two years (four semesters, one summer). While I lived in the house, I lived in four different rooms, some with other people and some by myself. Mostly, though, I stayed where my boyfriend at the time lived, in a big house near the ghetto on the Oakland-Berkeley border. The summer after junior year I officially moved into the house where BF lived. He went to China for most of the summer so we weren’t in each other’s hair.
When he came back from China, we broke up and I moved into a co-op apartment with 3 people I hadn’t met. I hated the situation and found a room to rent in another apartment with total strangers at the end of the fall semester. I lived in that rooming apartment for over a year (it was really, really cheap) and then moved into another apartment with good friends. Lived there until I moved to Denver. I got to live on my own for the first time in a 1-bedroom apartment in Denver when I moved here, and my now-BF moved in with me just over a year ago.
I’m 29 now, but I still remember 26 so I’ll kick in my experiences.
When I was 23 and my wife and I moved into in our first apartment, which was smallish 1 bedroom apartment with a total of 3 rooms. Kitchen, bedroom and living room.
We stayed there for a year, and then we moved to a 2 bedroom apartment for the next 2 years. At that point I lucked out with some stock options during the high-tech boom which allowed us to put a good sized downpayment on our first house.
I left my parents’ house when I was 18 to go away to college, and lived in the dorms for two years. Happiest times of my life, probably. Then I moved to an apartment with two roommates for my third year of college, and a different apartment with three roommates for my senior year. After that, I moved back home because I had a job there, and I wanted to save up money so I could eventually leave again and go to law school.
After nine months of working, saving, and living with the parents again, I moved back to the same college town to go to law school, where I got an apartment on my own for the first time. Less than a year later, my brother moved to that town to start college, so the two of us got an apartment together and stayed there for over two years. When I graduated, I didn’t have a job lined up and I was studying for the Bar Exam, so I moved back home AGAIN. That was last summer, so I’ve been living with my parents just over a year now. None of us are thrilled with the situation, but the wheels are in motion–I have some job prospects FINALLY, so hopefully I’ll be back out on my own soon enough.
I went to college right out of high school, spending the first three years living in on-campus housing. I lived off campus my senior year. After college I didn’t know what to do, so I ended up moving back in with my mom and dad. After a couple years there, I decided to make a break for it. My parents live in the Bay Area, which is a hugely expensive place to live. I was young, didn’t have a lot of work experience, and couldn’t command a very good salary. I decided I wanted to go to the University of Michigan for grad school, so I moved to Ann Arbor. Didn’t know anyone, had never been there, I just up and moved. I had a microscopic studio. My plan to go back to school didn’t work out, so I moved to Chicago with a friend. We lived in a shared apartment until a couple months ago. Now I have my own little place. I liked having a roommate, but I didn’t want to live with a stranger. I’d prefer living alone to living with some random person listed in the Reader.
