Important Qualities in a Roommate

A good roommate can be the difference between making your home life heaven or hell. Making the commitment to live with someone is a big deal that’s not easy to get out of. While hanging out with your best friend on the weekends may be fun, you might find that living together may not have been the best idea. Sometimes it’s better to live with someone you haven’t known for as long, which means you might now know them as well either. If you are looking for a roommate, you don’t have to learn everything about them. Just make sure they are responsible, respectful, and honest.

You want a roommate who is responsible. Signing a lease agreement with someone means that both of you are equally liable for paying rent, utilities, and damages. Rent is due at the beginning of the month and that means the total amount of it has to be paid no matter who it comes from. If you have a roommate who gets angry at his boss and quits his job on a whim, you could end up getting in trouble for the rent he can’t afford to pay. And unless you want to study by candle light, you need to have a roommate who understands that the light bill needs to be paid on time.

You want a roommate who is respectful. When you live in close quarters, it is important that you are respectful of one another’s cleaning standards and personal choices. With roommates sharing common areas like the kitchen and living room, they need to be considerate and clean up after themselves. Just because having a sink full of dirty dishes doesn’t bother your roommate, it doesn’t mean it’s not a problem for you. Being respectful of someone’s personal habits is also important as well. Just because your roommate hates smoking doesn’t mean she has the right to tell you to stop, but it also doesn’t mean that you should do it in the house.

You want a roommate who is honest. If you are the type of person who works hard to buy your own stuff, it can be a problem when your food keeps disappearing and your roommate won’t fess up. Usually issues like this won’t be a big deal if the person would just confess that they were hungry and didn’t have time to grab some fast food before class. Having a roommate who tells the truth can not only help disputes be solved faster, but it can also make sure they don’t happen in the first place.