“I want to hear about stories of room-share experiences…”
There might be many people thinking like that.
You can find some room-share stories online. By searching others’ experiences of room-share before you start, you can imagine an actual communal life clearly.
Also, you get to know about common troubles in room-share and how to deal with them from the stories, your room-share life would go smoothly as a result.
So, we introduce 3 common stories of room-share experiences this time.
Moreover, we tell you about pros and cons in room-share as well as the difference between room-share and share house later so please check them out.
#1: Cutting the cost of living
The first story is “I was able to cut the cost of living.”
Ms. A, a female office worker, started room-share in an apartment with her female friend Ms. B (they became friends after they started working). Ms. A utilized the timing of renewing her lease of the apartment to change the content of the lease and re-signed the contract to do room-share with Ms. B.
Although they were a bit nervous because it was the first time for both to do room-share, they were able to live as keeping an appropriate/reasonable distance for each other because they were both attentive.
Moreover, they both liked cooking so naturally they split housework and started cooking a meal for two. Since both Ms. A and B had a strong mindset, which is to manage within limited food expenses, they were able to cut food expenses as a result.
In addition to food expenses, they were able to cut utility expenses, daily necessities and rent by splitting them by two. Consequently, they both succeeded in saving up more than ¥500,000 a year later.
In many cases of room-share, you can cut the cost of living because you split rent and utility expenses.
#2: Sharing housework
The second story is “Sharing housework didn’t go well.”
Mr. C, a student, decided to do room-share with his college friend Mr. D to cut the cost of living.
Both Mr. C and D felt lonely in living alone so room-share life was fun at the beginning.
They didn’t decide who is in charge of which housework in room-share. They thought it wasn’t necessary because they both didn’t cook at home.
However, housework is not all about cooking. It includes many things such as cleaning, buying daily necessities, and taking out the trash. Their house started getting messy and dirty since they didn’t decide how to share housework, and their friendship got awkward (e.g. one started thinking, “Why aren’t you cleaning up?”)
They started to argue often about small things and gave up a room-share life before their graduation as a result. In many cases of room-share, argument/quarrels arise due to a lack of concrete ideas/plans in the allotment of housework.
A recommended way of dealing with it is “to decide rules.”
For example,
- Taking turns once a week for cleaning
- Taking turns once a month for buying daily necessities
By just deciding the allotment would make housework go smooth.
Please read the following article about rules of room-share.
#3: Rent problems
The third story is “There was a trouble about rent with my roommate.”
Mr. E did room-share with a friend from college, Mr. F, in a 2LDK apartment. The rent was ¥80,000 per month so they split the rent and decided to pay ¥40,000 per person. Mr. F was responsible for sending the money to the landlord.
Mr. E gave ¥40,000 to Mr. F every month and was having a good time without any troubles.
But, a half year later, the landlord contacted Mr. E and said, “Please pay the rent.” Mr. E felt weird and asked Mr. F about it, and he replied, “Actually I didn’t pay.”
In fact, he used the money that Mr. E gave to him for living expenses.
Not only Mr. E surely paid the rent but also the contractor of the apartment was Mr. F. So, he was fully responsible for the bill/rent and Mr. E decided to leave the apartment. As a result, Mr. E didn’t have to pay the additional rent.
“My roommate didn’t pay the rent.” Like this, it’s quite possible that troubles related to money arise.
A way of dealing with it is “to think out how to pay rent.” For example,
- Payment by direct deposit through a joint bank account and everyone transfers the money for rent to the joint account every month
- Issuing your roommate/s a receipt as a proof of payment
Payment by direct deposit through a joint bank account cannot be done unless your roommate/s transfer the money for rent to the joint account. Not only rent will be surely withdrawn but also you can find out who didn’t pay rent immediately so that you can avoid the trouble we told above.
Moreover, by Issuing your roommate/s a receipt, you can proof that at least you paid your rent. It is safer since you can avoid being charged later.
The capability of payment for rent is related to a housing contract/lease a lot.
For more details, please check the following article.
We introduced 3 common stories of room-share experiences so far.
It seems pretty hard at a glance, but there are many pros in room-share. We tell you more details next.
Pros in room-share
For example, pros in room-share are:
- Easy to save up money because you can cut the cost of living
- Feel less lonely because you live with other people
- Live in a spacious apartment at a low cost
As we introduced in the article above, you can cut rent by living with multiple people. Moreover, unlike living alone, you would feel less lonely since there is always someone in a house.
Specially if your good friend becomes a roommate, you can live happily without paying attention to him/her too much.
However, there are cons in room-share. Please refer to the below.
Cons in room-share
For example, cons in room-share are:
- Less private space
- Bothered by noises
- Ending up with cancelling room-share when a friendship starts getting awkward
Multiple people live in a house so there is almost no space where you can be completely alone. Even if you are in your private room, you would feel stressed out because sometimes you can hear noise from the next room.
When a trouble arises, there are many people who cancel room-share as a result. A communal life that was supposed to be fun could end up with becoming bitter memories.
Please read the following article about how to avoid these troubles.
You can have a communal life in share house besides room-share. Next, we briefly introduce the difference between share house and room-share.
Difference between share house and room-share
Share house is a way of living with multiple people in a house that is managed by a specialty company. It depends on a house, but a private room with a key is prepared in many cases.
Difference from room-share is as below:
- Living with strangers
- Securing a private space because a private room comes with a key
- Easy to avoid money troubles since rent is paid individually
On the contrary, similarities are the following:
- You can cut the cost of living such as rent compared to living alone
- You can live in a spacious house with decent facilities at a low cost
- Feeling less lonely
If you want to know more about share house, please refer to the article below.
Summary – Be prepared for troubles by knowing stories of room-share experiences
We told the 3 common stories in room-share and how to deal with troubles when they arise.
To sum up, we introduced the following 3 patters:
- Being able to cut the cost of living
- Sharing housework didn’t go well
- Rent was not paid
However, room-share is not all about troubles. We introduced 3 pros as follows:
- Easy to save up money because you can cut the cost of living
- Feeling less lonely because you live with someone
- Living in a spacious house at a low cost
After reading this article, you may feel there are a lot of troubles in room-share. But, you should be able to live happily if you know pros and how to deal with troubles beforehand.
If you do room-share for the first time, we recommend you to research how to make it go well.
Please check the article below about the tips of making room-share life go well.
