College Room-Mates Off-Campus: What Works, What Doesn't - Keeping the Peace

You've moved off-campus with some room-mates. You've planned ahead and avoided serious pitfalls. Now it's time to work out how to routinely run your life jointly with several room-mates in the same house. Some issues could fester and ruin a perfectly good off-campus home life. Following the suggestions below on a routine basis can minimize friction.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #1 with Room-Mates - Tidy vs. Neat

Nobody enjoys living with a room-mate who is much more of a slob than they are. On the other hand, a neat-freak can really get irritating too. Find a workable compromise where even if nobody is happy, at least none of the room-mates is pushed into a murderous rage.

Have the slob wash his dishes (or put them in the dishwasher if your kitchen has one). Have a bin where the neat-freak is allowed to dump any stuff left in the joint spaces for more than a couple of days. Once the slob has to dig through everybody's stuff in the "lost-and-found" bin two or three times for his textbooks he may start leaving his mess in his own room.

Set up a rotation for cleaning the joint spaces, or set up a schedule when everyone works together until the house is clean enough for all the room-mates. You can probably get away with far less cleaning than mom required back home, but try to keep things a notch or two above "nasty."

Off-Campus Routine Issue #2 with Room-Mates - Personal Hygiene

This is a tough one. If one of your room-mates tends to take showers only during a full moon, you may need to have a delicate discussion. It isn't cool for one room-mate (or two) to stink up the place for everyone else. This is one aspect of personal behavior where poor manners simply cannot be tolerated in the close confines of your off-campus house.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #3 with Room-Mates - Scheduling Laundry

If all your room-mates want to run a couple of loads of laundry at the same time you do, most of you will have a long wait. Instead, set up a schedule based on which room-mates are in the house when. If one room-mate has no morning classes, a week-day morning may be a good time for her laundry. If another room-mate has no afternoon classes on a certain day, he should be able to run his laundry then.

Most room-mates may prefer the weekend for their laundry. If that's the case pick straws to decide who gets first pick on the prime slot, be it Saturday noon, or Sunday night. Just make sure none of the room-mates is kept awake by your washer and dryer.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #4 with Room-Mates - Shared Utilities

Is one of your room-mates upset with another for taking showers worthy of the Guinness Book of World Records? Have a talk with him to calm things down. Unless said showers cause him to run late to class, the likely impact on water and electricity bills is small relative to your other expenses.

An extra $5-$10/month per room-mate is no reason to go on the warpath. If he pushes that room-mate into leaving you might each have to pay an extra $100/month to cover her rent until a replacement room-mate is found.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #5 with Room-Mates - Shared Groceries & Carry-Out Food

Some room-mates may prefer to each buy their own food. If your group prefers that, make sure to have an easy-to-implement way to identify what food belongs to whom, and respect it. Other groups of room-mates may prefer to shop together, cook together, and order in together. If that describes your bunch, set up guidelines.

If you don't want to pay for another room-mate's super-expensive health drinks and energy supplements, ask him to pay for that separately, but make sure nobody but him touches the stuff. The daily staples and cleaning supplies however belong on the joint shopping list. You may need to set up a joint account with everyone pitching in if you want to avoid chasing those room-mates who happened to miss the most recent trip to Safeway to get them to pay their share.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #6 with Room-Mates - Parties and Other Noise-Makers

All room-mates have a share in your off-campus place. This means if one room-mate wants to have a party, the others should do their best to accommodate it, but the party-thrower should accept reasonable limitations. It isn't cool to keep your room-mates up with your party at full blast at 2 AM when they have a final at 8 AM the next day. Also, if you throw a party, don't expect your room-mates to pick up after your friends.

If you play a musical instrument or sing, your room-mates may enjoy your impromptu recitals. Nonetheless, set up reasonable "quiet hours" when all room-mates can expect peace and quiet, be it for their class-work, or for a good night's sleep. Any music, TV, or video gaming should also be limited to headphones during these quiet hours.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #7 with Room-Mates - Guests and Visitors

It's a given that your room-mates will have visitors, and almost guaranteed that every once in a while one or more will crash for the night. This is to be expected, and should be respected (as long as these visitors respect the rules-of-the-house including quiet hours).

On the other hand, none of the room-mates should expect to have his girlfriend (or her boyfriend) move in to his/her room long-term. This is likely to breach your rental lease, and is not fair to all the other room-mates.

Off-Campus Routine Issue #8 with Room-Mates - Dude, Can I Borrow Your Car?

Some room-mates may settle into the shared spirit of shared off-campus living so much that they start to lose sight of boundaries. Just because you live in the same house doesn't mean each room-mate has to let other room-mates use his/her stuff at will. If only one room-mate has a car, it may be ok to ask if the car can be used for grocery runs, but make sure to treat that room-mate extra-nice or she might say no next time. Otherwise, take it easy on borrowing stuff.

Bottom Line of Routine Issues with Room-Mates

Most issues between room-mates can be avoided using common-sense and decency. Other issues might creep up on the unwary and poison the atmosphere of your off-campus house. Use the above guidelines and avoid some of the nastier traps of living inside each other's space.