Valuable House Share Experience

Mature lodgers and housemates have more experience of life and, of course, of house sharing. That’s why they are usually better people to live with.

On some occasions they’ve lived in flat shares that haven’t worked, and in others they’ve met people who’ve become good friends.

This sharing experience is valuable not only to them, but also to other Cohabitas users when looking for a home. Together with our house share room viewing checklist, their advice and tips can help people think about what they need and want from their home and from their housemates.

House share preferences

When joining Cohabitas to find a house share, housemates complete a listing to outline their sharing preferences. Some listings are brilliant, rich in detail, occasionally humorous, and always personal. At least, the ones that get the most attention are.

If you are looking for a room in a house share we recommend reading through various housemates listings before writing your own.

House share tips for success

Two questions we ask everyone joining as a housemate member, are ‘How much sharing experience do you have’ and ‘My tip for sharing’. Given that many people do have a good amount of house sharing experience, these tips are both fascinating and helpful.

These are 20 directly quoted tips by experienced housemates registered on Cohabitas in the last year. Each person has over 5 years sharing experience.

Being respectful

• Always be prepared to understand others’ needs and viewpoints. Tolerate and forget, and understand that other people see things differently.
• Always aim to leave a shared space better than when you walked in. A paid cleaner can solve 75% of household conflicts.
• Always do slightly more than your ‘fair’ share of tasks around the house
• A well-balanced mixture of politeness, respect, and communication.
• Be respectful, honest, and straight forward and tidy.

Being friendly and communicating

• Be kind. Treat everyone as you would like to be treated. Give each other the space we all need to feel at home.
• Be friendly but keep yourself to yourself.
• Be kind and considerate to others but keep good space for yourself.
• Good communication is essential for smoothing the edges of living together in my experience.
• I love house shares. Lots of best friends have come from previous share. Top tip – treat others as you’d like to be treated. And clean up after yourself!

Being considerate

• Accept that we are not all the same and variety is the spice of life 🙂
• Be patient. Everyone is different!
• Being considerate and having considerate housemates
• Compromise. Respect. Good communication. Deal with issues when they arise and don’t let them fester, you’ll feel better for it. Be considerate. Share some meals. Keep things tidy. Cut each other some slack.
• I think that consideration for others is important and an ability to be accommodating to others. It also helps if you can connect with housemates in some level so that you can chat.

Practical ideas

• Always aim to leave a shared space better than when you walked in. A paid cleaner can solve 75% of household conflicts.
• Agree some common area house rules and respect differing sleep patterns. Doors can close quietly, and headphones save sanity. Find some common ground too, laughing with housemates makes the day a better one!
• Set out the ground rules beforehand, always discuss any issues and socialize from time to time, knowing each other better makes living easier and connection stronger.
• Be respectful of time spent in the bathroom and always do your dishes, be open and clear immediately about any problems that come up.
• Clean and tidy up common areas immediately after use ready for the next person and share a biscuit with a cuppa when suitable! Assuming others are asleep also useful when arriving home.

You can find more Tips for sharing a home on each person’s housemate listing. You can also read about the landlord’s preferences in their detailed room for rent description. We encourage them to outline what sort of lodger they prefer and how they are to live with.

House share research methology

Source: Cohabitas housemate listings Aug 2022 – Jul 2023, with 5+ years sharing experience. Selected Tips for sharing taken from nearly 900 tips submitted by 1,574 housemates (offering a Tip for sharing is not compulsory).