Personal Space and Quiet time: When living with friends you will not have any privacy or quiet time, and the closer the friends you are the worse it will be. You may not realize it now but you are not always in the mood to be with your friends sometimes you may want to just sit in your room and relax, and if a friend called you up you could say you were busy but if you live with a friend they will be knocking on the door and bothering you all the time, and good friends will often borrow things of yours without asking you. Where as someone you found online will usually leave you alone when your door is closed except for something important.
I can not begin to count how many times my roommates ate something I had been saving or went into my room to borrow my things without asking, and the worst part is when I asked them to not touch my things they took it as a insult like I don't trust them with my things, or I am cheap for not letting them eat my food.
Money: When living with a roommate you found in the news paper or on the internet, the person will be more considerate to you then a friend may be when it comes to paying the bill. A friend may ask you to pay it and they will pay you back in ?just a few days?, but a stranger will not burden you with this. They will make sure they have the money to pay the bills.
One of my friends would always spend his rent or bill money in online casinos playing blackjack, or in poker rooms online. I like to play some poker online just as much as anyone else but I always made sure to not gamble in an online casino with my rent money. If I was short on money I would not gamble, but I would never allow myself to not have the money to pay my share of the bills.
Chores: When sharing a place to live it is usually best to divide the chores around the house such as cleaning the bathroom and taking out the garbage. This is another example of something a stranger will stick to more then a friend will, sure a stranger from time to time may have something come up and they did not clean the shower on the ay he was supposed to, but he will usually let you know that he will do it the next day or as soon as he can. Friends will put things off with no explanations at all.
The girl I used to share a place with was a neat freak if I cooked something and left a pot soaking in the sink for 8 hrs she would complain to me until I started cleaning them immediately after cooking, but she would always leave pots and dishes in the sink. When I confronted her about this she said that she can not stand to see my stuff in the sink when she comes home from work but her dishes in the sink do not bother her so I have to clean them immediately but she does not.
Utilities: Friends will take liberties with electrical usage that strangers usually will not take. When I lived with strangers if we ha an agreement to only use the AC for an hr before bed then they would usually stick to the agreement, but friends will break the agreement because you are friends and you will understand.
My friends used to leave their Air conditionings on all day long and would often leave their rooms and even the apartment without turning them off, and instead of being more responsible for their actions they would make up excuses like "oops I forgot".
This article just points out the most common problems I hade when I tried to live with my friends. This is no way means that you can not get a friend who will respect you enough not to do these things or that you will not find a stranger that won't do all the same things.
When you are just starting out on your own, you may decide that it would be more beneficial to have a roommate. If you decide from the very beginning that you want a roommate, then you will have a lot of options on the place you can rent. By pooling your resources together from the start, you will find that it can be fun to hunt for an apartment to rent as well as make it easier to make a decision on what rent range you want.
Apartment hunting can be very stressful?especially when you are doing it by yourself. You may find yourself always second-guessing your decisions. But, when you are with a roommate, you can ask each other about feelings on an apartment making it much easier to make decisions. And knowing that you will have a roommate from the very beginning can make the whole process a lot easier. Aside from it being stressful, apartment hunting can be extremely overwhelming. But when you and your roommate sit down together and make a list of what you each want out of the apartment, then you can be sure that you will both be happy with the apartment that is chosen.
From a monetary point of view, when roommates are shopping around for their apartment together, they can easily decide to get a bigger place than they normally would if they were looking for an apartment to live in alone. Because the rent will be shared, it is also feasible to pay a little more in rent and still keep the shared costs down, giving each roommate a little more personal space in the apartment.
When you and a roommate are looking for an apartment together, you can be assured that you will both get something that you like and will be happy with. This can go a long way to making your roommate relationship last. It can also be less stressing and overwhelming when the apartment hunting is done jointly because you can discuss options and weigh the differences of apartments that you are looking at. Money can also play a major role when it comes to choosing an apartment. But when you and a roommate are pooling your resources together at the very beginning, it may be feasible to get a bigger place than you had first thought, and still keep the rent at a manageable cost for the two of you.
Both Edward Curtis & Zack Fair are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Edward Curtis has sinced written about articles on various topics from Acne, Football and computers and the internet. Max Bindenal is a father of 2 young children. He is a stay at home dad who writes about games like craps and. Edward Curtis's top article generates over 60500 views. to your Favourites.
Zack Fair has sinced written about articles on various topics from Music, Architecture and Family Travel. Zack Fair writes for a community website Getaroomie.com that serves as a