What to look for a potential flatmate or roommate

Roommates or flatmates have many benefits, especially for singles and students. It is common for singles and students to get together and rent a shared property. However, there are many other situations where you may own a house, have a spare room which can be rented out to somebody else. This is a basic requirement needed for the opportunity to get a roommate.

There are many other benefits for getting a roommate. The obvious ones are that you can share all the utility bills, like gas, electricity, TV and Internet. The other main benefits are widening your social circle, as you will both have unique friends with a wide variety of interests, thus expanding your outlook on life.Roommates are basically like any other person in that they have their own careers and social lives. This means that they have to fit in and be compatible with yourself if they are going to live in the same house as you. A good idea is for you to both sign something that outlines all the house rules and that you both agree on them. Like anybody else who lives in the same house as you, you essentially need to get on and be tolerant of each other.

Roommates have many criteria for why they are looking for a spare room in the first place. They may be a student wanting to find another place to stay, a professional looking for cheap accommodation or someone who just wishes to live in a shared house as living on their own can be quite lonely. You need to identify why they want to rent a room in the first place. This will help you evaluate them better.

Flatmates can come from varied mix of backgrounds. There are just as many people as there are cultures and histories to people, so the addition of an extra person in the house will expand your outlook on life and give you access to a social group you may not have had before.

Finding the right person to share your property can be quite time-consuming. So you need to make criteria the type of people you are looking for. If you have a full-time job, then you may want somebody who is also a professional and works the same hours as you and has the same lifestyle. Even if you get on with someone really well at first and they have a completely different lifestyle to you, you may not be compatible. Make sure you ask all these questions when you first meet as it will save you both a lot of time.

Rules that you may draw up for your flatmate usually centre around the agreement of the split of paying your bills, what time is usually go to bed and who is allowed round in the house. This mainly centres around if you have similar lifestyles and if you can respect each other’s ways of living. If you are both conscious and respectful of each other’s lifestyles and it is possible for a few people to live together, but these rules need to be put in place first.

An ideal is to really get to know your potential flatmate before they moved in. This however is not always feasible as it takes a bit of time to get to know someone, their likes and dislikes. You don’t want to be in a position where someone moves into your house and suddenly you have a few more unofficial guests staying there, even if the original flatmate says it’s only for a few days. Make sure these ground rules put in place from the off. A respectful flatmate will agree to the original conditions and stick to them.

It is also an idea to draw up an agreement for process that needs to be followed for any disagreements. Most disagreements can be solved amicably, but if for any reason they cannot, you need to agree upon a procedure that needs to be followed each time this happens. This will save headaches in the future.

You may have many things that you wish to document for both what you are looking for in a flatmate and the criteria for your house and lifestyle. One trip made a list of these things and found some potential roommates, you can then start to discuss and agree on the rules and guidelines for the house. These mostly come down to having a mutual respect for each other as well as the obvious things as the share payment of bills and such. If all goes well when you find someone who is compatible, then you can benefit from shared social life, shared interests and a shared way forward in life.