By Marie
Hartwell-Walker, Ed.D.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. Four
friends who have known each other since freshman year decide to share an
apartment or house or to all take rooms in a local rooming house. They already
know they like to hang out together. They already like each other’s friends.
They already have weathered some storms in their relationships. What could
possibly go wrong?
Plenty.
Being friends and being housemates are two
entirely different things. If you are stressed or upset about what a friend
does when you live separately, you can retreat to your own space and decide
whether to let it go or deal. When you live in the same 1000 square feet (or
less), it’s another story. It’s deal or let the relationship start to fall
apart.
The key to living together successfully is
spending time talking about assumptions and ground rules before you move in and
revisiting them on a regular basis. The people who get into the most trouble
are those who somehow assume that just because they are friends, they share the
same taste in music, the same ability to handle money, the same tolerance for noise, the same standards for neatness, and the same ideas about who
should do what. It rarely works out that way. Yes, it may seem silly to
formally meet about things you think are just common sense. Yes, there will be
people who don’t want to be bothered with a lengthy discussion of who will
clean the bathroom and whether dishes get left in the sink to soak or get done
right away. But it’s those seemingly little things that can cause major
tension.
Here are the top 5 complaints that make roommates
start to seriously consider murder:
1. Bills.
Sharing a household means sharing bills. The
rent and utility bills have to be paid and paid on time. Your landlord and the
electric company don’t have a sense of humor or an ounce of compassion for
those who don’t.
It’s unfair to ask housemates to front your
share because you spent your rent money at the bar or on a pair of shoes. It
feels terrible to be the “responsible one” in a group and to be always hounding
the others to cough up the cash. Keep it clean. Create a system for getting all
the money together and for paying each bill so no one is left feeling guilty or
exploited.
2. Chores.
Having been bugged by your parents for years
to take out the trash or to clean your room, you may be delighted to be on your
own. Funny thing. If you want your place to look decent and to be attractive to
those you date, you still have to take out the trash and clean your room. What
you do in your own bedroom is your business, of course. But living together
successfully means coming up with some agreed-upon standards for how the common
spaces will be kept up and for who will do what to keep them that way. Take the
time to come to agreement about how clean is clean enough and for getting the
chores done.
3. Borrowing.
It may come as new information to some of the
people in your group that not everyone has a “what’s mine is yours” policy. Not
everyone is comfortable sharing their clothes, their CDs or their toothbrush.
People often have different expectations for when it’s important to ask and
when it’s okay to just go and borrow something out of a roommate’s room or to
use the last of a roommate’s coffee creamer. Be clear about it.
4. Overnight guests.
It’s a common problem. Four people agree to
share a four-bedroom place. A boyfriend or girlfriend of one of the group
starts staying over. Everyone likes him or her. Everyone kind of agrees that
romance requires time together at each other’s place. But it gets dicey when
the significant other starts staying over more and more often. Now there are
five people sharing space that only four people pay for. Now there’s an extra
person wanting time in the shower and competing for the coffee maker.
The same issues apply to that guy on the
couch. Unless everyone is into giving him a free place to crash, it’s a major
imposition on the household. It’s a good idea to talk about some ground rules
for guests well ahead of when anyone is into a new romance and before someone
takes pity on their old friend from home who needs a place to stay. Otherwise,
it can become a very uncomfortable situation.
5. Noise.
You may not think your music is too loud or
that your friends are too rowdy but your housemate may find it intolerable.
Especially if some of you are students and need quiet to study, it’s important
to set up some ground rules for how loud is too loud. The same is true when a
housemate’s job requires doing paperwork at home. Some tasks just require a
little bit of peace and quiet. And, please, try to keep the sounds of your
private sex life private. What you think of as acceptable passionate abandon
may make your housemates cringe.
Don’t let differences about the sounds of each
other’s lifestyles and taste in music become one of those issues that goes from
slow boil to boiling over. Find a way to talk about what people need and when
and try to make appropriate compromises.
Poster's
comments:
I've
got my own top four list about aggravations:
1) The position to leave the toilet seat in.
2) Hair
clogging up the drains.
3) Some
personal privacy time.
4) Many
in the USA don't have much experience with what crowding can mean. Ever heard
of love hotels, for example. Most have heard of diarrhea.
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