Housemates want to trade rooms - I don't

jc2008

Hi,

I moved in with 3 good friends last September for college accommodation, which we will have up until next May (just under 2 years in total).

There are 4 bedrooms, 2 are large and 2 are small. When moving in, we discussed whether we should weight the rent to allow for room size, or just split it 4 ways. In the end we decided to split it evenly, and decided that myself and another guy were to be given the big rooms (as we did most of the work in finding the house). We all decided this together.

Now, 9 months into living in the house (which I assumed everyone was happy), the two guys in the small rooms have turned around and said they want to swap rooms in the coming months as it's not fair they have to pay the same rent and have smaller rooms. Another alternative is that they start weighting the rent - and even backpaying the difference!

I'm not happy with this at all. As I'm in the bigger room, I'd ideally not like to move into a much smaller room. All of my stuff wouldn't even fit. I do feel sorry for the guys, and didn't know they were unhappy, but they should have said this from the beginning and made it clear. I think it's a very large ask from them.

What should we do? We're good friends which makes it more tricky. If we say no to the swap then it'll put a strain on our friendships for sure.

judgefudge

I moved into a house share with friends where there was a large, medium and small room. The rent was weighted so the person in the large room paid most and the small room paid least. I think that's the only fair way. Regardless of what they agreed to at the start, I think you have been lucky so far to be splitting it 4 ways evenly. I'd suggest saying you'll weight the rent for the remainder of the lease, but don't offer to backpay, because it's not your fault they all agreed to split it evenly.

Either that or swap rooms.

Royale with Cheese

Asking you to move rooms or backpay rent isn't really fair, but I think they're more than entitled to ask you to weigh the rent according to room size from now on. You've had 9 months of underpaying rent really, I'd take it that you've done well out of the deal so far and agree to weigh it from now on.

Gatling

They want to swap rooms and you back pay them for you having a bigger room,
Tell them to go and jump if there not happy let them leave then,
I take it been 4 rooms its a house and not an apartment ,
If its a house I take the have full use of common areas living room and kitchen,
If this is the case a 4 way split is pretty fair,

BerryBlue

Put yourself in their shoes. You're nice & comfy in the big room & happy to pay equal rent and you think that they should be happy to stay in the smaller room paying equal rent - if is fine for them, then why not you? I think if you were in their position you'd be complaining too ?

Your settled into your room so its not fair to ask you to move, but it is reasonable to have a look at the rates you all pay, I think you should pay a bit more for the bigger room. In regard to backdating it, its a bit of tough luck there - they should have been a bit smarter when they originally agreed to it.

Hope it works out, its not worth losing friends over.

Merkin

Paying an extra portion of rent retrospectively is a joke, no reasonable person would be expected to do that. However if you want to stay on in the big room then you should in future payer a larger proportion of rent. As said above, you've had a good deal up until now so your options are either to a. pay extra rent or b. swap rooms.

Backpay for the rooms wouldn't be fair, the past is the past, so definitely don't agree to that.

However I do think you're being a bit selfish here. You're basically complaining about the prospect of being put in the position they've been in for 9 months. Regardless of the fact that you decided not to weight the rent at the beginning, you did discuss weighting it because you all obviously realised that the room sizes were/could be an issue. You can't just deny it now.

Living with people, especially close friends, can cause little issues to become huge stresses, and ignoring this issue or telling your friends to put up with it could be the source of great resentment between you. As you said, you weren't aware that anyone was unhappy. They were probably unhappy for quite a while, and this is probably a far bigger deal to them than you realise.

The only reason you have the bigger room is because you found the house. Surely the brownie points for that have run out by now. You're living in a big room that you're underpaying for, while your friends live in small rooms that they're overpaying for. Would that not make you really angry? Their appreciation for your house-hunting efforts shouldn't have to come out of their pocket. They're not getting as much out of the house as you are, and from the way you've described the rooms, it sounds like these guys are living in slightly cramped conditions.

You're settled in your larger room now and don't want to move. You should be willing to pay for that.

username123

Rent should be weighted by room size.

Dont back pay, but going forward, those in bigger rooms pay more rent.

Dark Phoenix

yup don't switch rooms, don;t back pay anything but weight the rent going forwards (provided the other lad in the big room agrees). when weighting rent I would take into account though that common areas are all shared equally

Koptain Liverpool

The normal situation in any house share I've been in has been for the rent to be weighted by room size or to swap rooms halfway through the rental period. I think they're perfectly entitled to demand you pay a bit more rent. They probably have only come to realize the unfairness of equal rent having lived in the situation up to this point. So either agree to pay a bit more rent or swap rooms.
Regarding the back rent that isn't fair. You can't be expected to pay more for the past months when they had agreed to equal rent. Explain this to them calmly but do agree to pay more going forward. if they're decent guys they should be happy with this

ash23

Agree with everyone else. When I've moved into a share house at the same time with friends the rooms were weighted based on size or if they were en-suite.

It's different in a house share with strangers as it tends to be that the last one gets the small room and then if someone moves out, they can move into the bigger room.

These guys are getting the raw end of the deal really. It'd be fairest to weight the rent but not to backpay as they agreed it at the time.

enda1

The best way to decide on rooms is to bid for them. This finds the fairest market rate for each room. It's the perfect system. You're welcome.

Citycap

Fairest way is to pay as per size. Probably inexperience on behalf of the two who got the small rooms but they are wiser to the ways of the world now and realised that they have been ripped off.

kylith

If I were you I'd agree to weighting the rent of the rooms from the present onward.

I would not back pay them rent because the way of paying rent was agreed when you moved in so if they'd had a problem with it they should have said it then. Ditto with swapping the rooms; it was agreed that you'd have the bigger room at the start, so you are under no obligation to move to a smaller one.

AnonoBoy

Knock a bit off their rent.

To be honest they should have stuck to their guns at the start and got a lower rent - why would you pay the same for a smaller room?

Definitely do not backpay any rent to them.

Morph the Cat

So your housemates want to back out of an agreement they made? Does their word mean nothing to them? Seems like a weasely move; they're refusing to honour an agreement they made and it's only halfway through it.

BerryBlue

jc2008 wrote: »

What should we do? We're good friends which makes it more tricky. If we say no to the swap then it'll put a strain on our friendships for sure.

Well OP - have you come to any conclusions on what to do? Or changed your mind at all on how you feel about the situation? Would love to know if there was any outcome.

jc2008

Hi everyone, it's the OP here. Thanks for the answers.

I haven't yet done anything as some of the housemates are gone home for the weekend, and I think it's better to do it when we are all here.

I'm going to approach them and offer to weight the rent from next month onwards. Me and the other guy in the big room were discussing and are going for 50eur higher for the bigger rooms than currently paying, and 50eur lower for the smaller rooms. I think is pretty generous, and is quite a hike for those of us in the big rooms, but it is the figure that we did bandy about when we moved in (even if it wasn't decided upon).

The other housemates would prefer switching rooms rather than weighting rent, so I hope we can come to some compromise as I really don't want to switch rooms. We definitely will not agree to backpay rent, it just makes no sense.

There were a few comments about me being slightly selfish. I'm not sure selfish is the right word - of course I'll admit I'm happy with the current situation as it benefits me, but the point is when we moved in we all decided between us which rooms we were moving into, and that the rent would be split evenly - it was sprung on me. But I agree that adjusting the rent going forward is the only fair option, I can see why the other guys are unhappy.

I'll let you know after we have the conversation, in the next few days. The most important thing is to preserve the friendships. We were very close friends before moving in, and I don't have many friends at all so really don't want to make things awkward.

BerryBlue

I think that's a fairly good compromise to be honest. I've had the small room in houseshares - and you just have to make the best of it. Your settled into your room and it wasn't an agreement at the start that you would trade rooms, so its not fair for them to demand that now - I hope they're happy with that arrangement, 50 quid less a month to pay is a decent amount - I think it shows you've listened to them & are doing something about it. It wouldn't have been the right thing to do - but you really could have stuck to your guns and said no to everything because it wasn't agreed at the beginning. Really hope it goes well!!

Gannicus

AnonoBoy wrote: »

To be honest they should have stuck to their guns at the start and got a lower rent - why would you pay the same for a smaller room?

Definitely do not backpay any rent to them.

I couldn't agree more. If they felt this way at the start they should have had the stones to say it.

I'd agree to weighting the rent based on the size of your respective room.

Under no circumstances whatsoever would I be back dating the difference in rent.

Measure the rooms and grade the amount of rent against the rooms from biggest to smallest.