What are the advantages of house sharing?

Flexibility is one of the advantages of house sharing. It’s especially useful when unexpected life events intervene; as they tend to do more as you get older.

But having been introduced to house sharing and looking ahead to our later years, the longer-term advantages of house sharing become of interest.

Longer-term can mean a few years; who can plan ahead for longer? Or it can mean much longer, even to the end of life.

Having security, social contact and companionship become even more important outside of the traditional family.

Top 5 advantages of house sharing in later life

1. More financial security. This becomes even more important as we age. Our earnings usually plateau at best and our energy to keep pushing on earning decline somewhat. Finding a sustainable home and cost of accomodation reduces financial stress.
   
2. Companionship. Living alone presents not only financial issues, but also can lead to loneliness. Even if we are comfortable with our own time and have a good network of long-standing friends and family, we do like having someone around. In the absence of people, pets are often chosen. But people are better, as long as you take the time to find the right ones.
   
3. Better accommodation. House sharing is not about saving money, it’s about getting better value for money. This means you can live in a better house or flat than you can afford on your own. It’s related to financial security, but is more about quality of living.
   
4. More personal security. Having someone else in the home you can turn to when things get difficult is a ‘good to know’ advantage of house sharing. You probably never or seldom have to call upon this, but it’s good to know it’s there. So it is good to know that when registering many housemates mention they’d be happy to help out in the shared house or flat.
   
5. Shared housing is more sustainable. Sharing heating and household bills means not only that it costs you less, but also that you are only heating one home. Also, having more people living in a property and not having unused rooms, reduces the need to build more. A few years ago we would not have mentioned this, although it’s always been there. But these days we can feel the relevance of this advantage.

House sharing offers advantages at many stages of life, but as we progress through life, some of those advantages can become more and more important. Flexibility is no longer the main need, but instead stability, sense of home and companionship.

See the stories about helpful housemates and our summary of valuable house share experience to get a feel for what house sharing might offer you now and in later life.

The photo shows Nick and his mum discussing the advantages of house sharing a few years back.