Sharing with other students?

Your guide to choosing the right flatmates, living together and sorting out problems.

How to…choose the right flatmates

Planning your great escape into the world of renting? Then beware. Lurking in the depths of your very own sitting room, ready to finish the milk, hog the phone and wake you up with drunken antics in the middle of the night is a phenomenon commonly known as the ‘flatmate from hell’. This creature, adept in the art of disguise, will make your life a living nightmare.

Tips:

• Think about you want to live with. Would you be ready to live with a smoker? Would you be ready to live with male only or female only flatmates?
• What are your flatmates doing? Do you share the same interests? It is usually easier to share with somebody in the same age bracket, with the same interests.
• Are you compatible? Can you live with somebody you enjoys going out every night, when you like quiet nights in? (and vice versa)
• Can you put up with somebody being really messy… or over tidy?

Where to find flatmates

Many websites offer facilities to find a flatmate. If you are looking for a flatshare, browse the web, read the local paper and visit your local students’ union.

Now you’ve found a house!

Make sure you meet all of the flatmates before agreeing to move in. Even if you have met 2 out of 3 and get on really well with them, you don’t want to find out you hate the 3rd person AFTER you have moved in!

Find out about any house rules and regulations and be honest with yourself about whether you will be able to stick with them. Most households will have at least some written or unwritten rules and expectations. If you don’t like any of the rules on the list or are unsure you can stick to them all, it’s probably better that you don’t move in.

Bunch of mates moving in together

Congratulations! You’ve just found a place. Freedom at last!

But beware, reality will soon kick in…It is important you know that problems WILL occur. Soon enough, your flatmate drinks your beer and never replaces it, his girlfriend keeps staying over and spends hours in the bathroom, and insist on watching DVDs of sex and the city all night long in your sitting room!

Generally, current tenancy laws fail to deal with share housing arrangements, which is all the more reason why you should put effort into making things work.

The best way to avoid problems later is to solve potential problems before they exist. Set up some rules at the beginning… it will save you a world of hassle later on.

The main causes of problems are:

Bills

A major point of conflict in a share house is often about paying bills (electricity, water, gas, council tax, TV licensing). It is vital to decide when you move in who is to be responsible for paying bills and how the bills are to be divided.

Generally, bills such as gas, electricity and water are divided equally between all members of the household. However, if one person has an appliance which uses a lot of electricity, water or gas, then maybe they should pay extra.

If you are having services connected, it's important to think carefully about whose name the account will be in. The person who has their name on the account will be held liable by the service provider for payment of the bill and may have trouble getting access to future services if the bill is unpaid for any reason. It's a good idea for different flatmates to organise different services in order to spread the financial responsibility around. In this way no one person will be left with responsibility for all the bills if things should go wrong in the house.

It is usually easier to choose a property where the rent is all inclusive (the landlord makes you pay a set amount whatever the level of your utility bills are).

Phone and internet bills

Bills for phone and internet usually arrive either every month or three months and are usually the tenants’ responsibility (they are not covered in the rent). Often these can be quite large and flatmates on tight budgets can sometimes have difficulties paying their share all in one hit - which is why these bills cause so many problems. There are ways to reduce the problem. For example, you could all decide to put some money away every week for bills, so that when one arrives you have some money saved to cover it. Alternatively, you could arrange a pre-payment plan with these services.

What do I do if a flatmate won’t pay a bill, or disappear without a trace?

If you have a joint tenancy agreement, the landlord wants a fixed rent for the whole house irrespective of how many students are living there. This means that if a student drops out of his/her course and goes home, the remaining students in the house will have to cover the rent of the student who has left. In this situation the remaining students would have to take legal action against the student who has left to try to recover their money if the student refused to continue to pay rent after he/she had vacated the property.

Chores

Like it or not there are certain tasks which have to be done for a household to continue functioning. The toilet is not self-cleaning, the garbage has to go out eventually and disposable plates are not the answer to washing-up. Floors, bathrooms and lawns also need looking after.

Many households find that a roster for certain tasks, especially cooking and washing-up, is the best way to ensure that chores are completed fairly. Others find that a more flexible honour system is sufficient. Some households employ a system where people put down a tick every time they do the washing-up or some other chore.

Personal belongings

Be clear about what is communal property and what is not, You may be happy to share your T.V, washing machine, stereo, pots and pans, furniture etc, but you may not wish to share your computer, food, shampoo and gym equipment, be clear up front, rather that annoyed because your flatmate didn't realise.

Personal Space

A closed bedroom door means "Stay out" Never enter your flatmates bedroom if they are not at home and always knock if they are.

Issues with a flatmate

After a while, a flatmate becomes like a boyfriend at the end of a relationship. All the endearing little things you didn't mind at the beginning - the inability to close the front door quietly, the shoes that you trip over whenever you get home - become enough to send you into the most violent and irrational rage. At which point, it's time to have a serious face to face discussion.

Are you scapegoating your flatmate?

It's surprisingly easy to blame one person for problems that everyone's jointly responsible for. So be sure it really is that one person who's the problem. A group of friends can sometimes round on someone unfairly, just because they are shy, or don't share the same interests or religion.

Tips for dealing with conflict

If the problems have already started, your options will usually depend on what the problem is and whose name the agreement is in. If you have separate tenancies, you may be able to ask the landlord to sort things out. But if you have a joint tenancy, each tenant's actions affect all of you. If one person isn't paying their rent, you could end up having to pay her/his share. And if they cause problems, the landlord may decide to evict you all.

In some cases, the only options may be to put up with the situation or move out. If this is the case, be sure to end your tenancy properly before you go.

See: http://england.shelter.org.uk for more information.

In extreme cases (eg if your flatmate is violent or causes a serious nuisance) the council, or even the police, may be able to help you. Just because you live with someone this doesn't mean they have any right to subject you to emotional violence, physical violence, sexual harassment or sexual abuse.

Talk

If you're in conflict with a flatmate, and assuming there is no threat of physical violence, deal with them face-to-face if possible. This is always better than sending letters and messages, banging on walls, throwing things, or talking to other flatmates about them.

Plan to talk to your flatmate at an appropriate time and allow enough time to do it.

Think beforehand about what you want to say. It's important to state clearly what the problem is and how you feel about it.

Don't blame your flatmate for everything or begin with your opinion of what should be done.

Give your flatmate a chance to tell their side of the story and what they think has been happening to cause the trouble.

When you've reached this point, try working on the dispute together. Work out what you both have to do to resolve the problem.

E-mail us your story

Have you experienced a bad student house?

Fed up with sharing one toilet between eight people?

Is the rising damp getting you down?

A licensing scheme has recently been introduced by the Government in England and Wales to improve the standard of large shared houses. We are looking for tenants in private sector housing who are willing to talk to the media about their experiences and views of poor quality accommodation. To be eligible you need to have lived in a house of three or more storeys with at least five people sharing.

Please email your name, telephone number and a short summary of your story (about 5 lines) to: kate@amazonpr.co.uk Please note there is no guarantee Amazon PR will use your story, you will be contacted if your story is selected. Amazon PR is independent from NUS.