Questions to Ask Potential Roommates College
For a suite, a house or an apartment where three or more of you will share the common rooms. Group living fails differently from a two-person dorm: chores spread unevenly, one person's guests affect everyone, and problems get discussed with everybody except the person involved. These questions cover all three. For a room shared with one other person, the pre move-in conversation is the better fit.
The questions
Open any question for the note
How should the shared rooms be cleaned when there are several of us?
Why ask it
A rota, a paid cleaner or doing it as you go all work, but only if everyone agrees to the same one. Groups usually default to nothing.
What happens if one person does not do their share?
Why ask it
Every group faces this and almost none discuss it in advance. Agreeing the response now stops one person becoming the enforcer.
Who buys the shared things, and how do we all pay them back?
Why ask it
In a pair this is simple, in a group of five it is a job. Pick a person and an app before anyone spends anything.
How do we split costs that not everyone uses equally?
Why ask it
Heating, the internet and cleaning supplies are used unevenly. Deciding to split evenly anyway is fine as long as it is a decision.
How do we make a decision that not everyone agrees on?
Why ask it
A group needs a method, whether that is a vote or whoever cares most. It saves the same argument happening about every issue.
How do you feel about guests in the shared rooms rather than someone's bedroom?
Why ask it
One person's friends in the living room affect everyone else's evening. It is the most common source of friction in a shared house.
How many nights a week would a partner staying feel like too many to you?
Why ask it
In a group this becomes a resident nobody agreed to. Getting each person's number now makes the conversation possible later.
If several of us want people over on the same night, how do we handle it?
Why ask it
The room can only take so much and the calendar is shared. A simple heads-up rule is usually enough.
How do we handle it when one of us needs quiet for an exam?
Why ask it
In a group of four, someone is always in an exam period. Agreeing what to do makes it a request rather than a favour.
What is your position on noise late at night in the shared space?
Why ask it
Neighbours and landlords make this bigger than a dorm version of the same question. Ask what everyone considers late.
What should happen if one person is much messier than everyone else?
Why ask it
Ask the group to answer as a group, not the individual. It is far easier to agree a response before you know whose problem it will be.
How do we raise something with one person without discussing it behind their back?
Why ask it
Group houses drift into private complaining, which is what actually breaks them. Agree that things get said to the person.
How would you feel about a house meeting once a month?
Why ask it
It sounds excessive until the first unpaid bill. Fifteen minutes with a list clears most of what would otherwise fester.
Would we share food, or does everyone keep their own?
Why ask it
In a group, shared food almost always ends up uneven. Whichever way you go, label it clearly from the start.
Who deals with the landlord or the housing office when something breaks?
Why ask it
One named person makes this work and no named person makes it drag on. Ask whether anyone is willing.
How do we split shared spaces like the fridge and the bathroom?
Why ask it
Shelves, cupboards and a shower schedule need allocating before anyone arrives. It is easier when nobody has moved in yet.
Do any of you already know each other well?
Why ask it
A pair inside a group of four changes how decisions get made. It is not a problem, but it is worth knowing.
What would you do if two of us fell out with each other?
Why ask it
In a group, everyone else becomes an audience. Agreeing not to take sides is worth saying out loud early.
If one person left, would everyone want a say in the replacement?
Why ask it
This is a real question in a shared house and it is best answered while everyone is friendly. It also affects the lease.
What has gone wrong in a shared house you have lived in before?
Why ask it
Each person's answer tells you what they will be watching for. Going around the group makes everyone else more honest.
Turning the conversation into an arrangement
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
How to have the conversation
- Ask about last week rather than in general. What time did you get up on Wednesday is answerable; are you a morning person is not.
- Give your own answer to everything you ask, including the unflattering version. One-sided questions make people perform.
- Watch what they ask you. Someone who asks nothing back has either decided already or has not thought about whether it suits them.
- Do it on a call rather than only by text. A reluctant yes is audible and completely invisible in writing.
- Notice which questions they deflect. The deflected one is usually the one that matters most.
Write these five things down
- 1Quiet hours on weeknights, and whether they change at weekends.
- 2The guest rule, including how much notice and whether overnight is case by case.
- 3What is shared, what is not, and the borrowing default in one sentence.
- 4Who cleans what, and by which day. Naming a day works better than naming a standard.
- 5How you will raise a problem, plus a standing fortnightly check-in so nobody has to invent an occasion for it.
Signals worth taking seriously
- Every previous roommate was unreasonable and none of it was theirs. The pattern is the point, not any one story.
- The practical questions are dismissed as too intense. Someone who will not discuss cleaning in August will not discuss it in October either.
- Answers that change between conversations, particularly about guests, smoking, or money.
- Pressure to commit before you have properly talked, especially with a housing deadline attached.
- Lots of enthusiasm about how much fun it will be, and nothing at all about living arrangements.
The first few weeks
- 1Assume the first version of the arrangement is wrong. Almost every roommate agreement needs revising once real schedules arrive in week two.
- 2Say the small thing the first time it happens. After a month of silence, a minor habit has become a grievance too large for the fix it needs.
- 3Respond to patterns rather than incidents. One late night is nothing; three in a week is a conversation.
- 4If two direct conversations have not changed anything, bring in your resident assistant. Mediating this is part of their job and they have seen your exact situation before.
- 5Expect a fortnight of awkwardness. Most pairs who end the year comfortably started out unsure it would work.