Having a roommate can be a fun, exciting experience. It comes with many challenges. You may be living with a person who is completely different than you. You do not have to be best friends with your roommate. Most roommate problems can be resolved through good communication, compromise, and respect.
What happens when that roommate becomes a nightmare?
If you have already signed that lease and it’s too late to back out Here are a few types of roommate problems you might encounter and how you can deal with them.
1- Discuss the cleaning schedule.
You and your roommate probably have different ideas about what is considered clean and neat. This can be a major area of conflict. Make a chore schedule and determine who will do what and how often. For example, you two may designate Sunday afternoons as your cleaning day. Choose a time that works with both of your schedules. Responsibilities you may consider include:
- Taking out the trash
- Sweeping the floor
- Cleaning out the mini fridge
- Washing the sink
- Straightening up the room
- Washing dishes
2- Develop a plan to handle visitors.
Talk about how you will handle friends coming over and intimate visitors. Conflicts are more likely to occur when it involves an intimate partner. Set up a system that both people are comfortable with.
- What is the time limit for guests?
- Can intimate visitors spend the night?
- How will you notify the other person that you need privacy (e.g. rubber band on the door knob, a symbol on your name tag, a certain color of paper on the door)?
3- Discuss your phone policy.
You will probably talk on the phone and video chat with your friends and family while you are away at school. Are these conversations private? Should these conversations take place in the room or outside the room?
- Consider having different rules for daytime talking and nighttime talking.
- You may say talking in the room is fine as long as the other person isn’t studying.
4- Determine a lights-out time.
You and your roommate probably do not go to bed at the same time. You may prefer a 9:30 pm bedtime while your roommate doesn’t go to sleep until 2:00 am. To compromise, set up a time when the lights have to be out. During this time, headphones should be used to watch movies and listen to music and a personal light should be used for reading instead of using the overhead lights. For example, a fair compromise between a 9:30 pm bedtime and a 2:00 am bedtime may be to turn the lights out at 11:00 pm, however, you may set a different time for weekdays and weekends.
5- Sign a roommate agreement.
Once you have developed ground rules for common situations, write them down and sign them. This will keep both of you accountable. If you someone is not holding up their end of the bargain, you can use the agreement as a starting point for the conversation.
You will have to compromise to come to an agreement. Both of you should get some of the things you want, but things may not be exactly how you want them to be. Be sure that both you and your roommate are comfortable with the terms of the agreement and keep in mind that you may have to modify and change some of the agreement as the school year goes on.
