There’s a good blog post on “When Sharing Hits the Fan” written by  Emily Doskow, (author of The Sharing Solution: How to Save Money, Simplify Your Life & Build Community) in which Emily describes the how managing expectations, anticipating obstacles, and agreeing on how to resolve problems are essential for a good sharing relationship.  While she is talking about sharing in general and not just for housing, it is worth reading. Read the comments also. The pictures are fabulous.

The key to a successful housemate arrangement is a good match.  Expectations must be talked about in the interview. If you have very different expectations, you are going to be unhappy sharing housing.  One common one: the person who thinks the housemate will be a “best friend” while the other expects to be independent. This can happen to friends who choose to live together. Other kinds of expectations are around how meals happen or the type of television that is watched.

Anticipating obstacles can be done by simply asking the question, “What could go wrong?”  This is a nice way of exploring potential disagreements. The question should also lead into an agreement on how you would communicate if an issue arises.

Once you are living together, if you have an issue – communicate.  Look for common ground, put yourself in your housemate’s shoes. Adapt and be flexible. But that doesn’t mean becoming a doormat. You should be willing to find a solution that is agreeable to all parties. Maybe you can use a third person to help mediate an issue – but first try to do it on your own. After all it’s your relationship and your housemate.

As I have interviewed people for my book and talked to others about the whole world of sharing housing, I have noticed a pattern.  People who had lived with housemates successfully, ended the experience because they had one nightmare housemate. And after that experience they said, “Never again.”

At this point I ask some probing questions. Invariably, I find out that the interview and selection process they used was flawed.  They were either desperate to find housing, ignored warning signs (including their instincts), and/or didn’t even think about the interpersonal aspects of sharing housing. The interview was sloppy, and they didn’t check references.

If you recognize yourself in this description, realize that you are wiser now and that you can have a good home sharing arrangement.  Just choose carefully!

Here is a References Worksheet. Use it as a guide when you call references for your (possible) future housemate.

Also here is longer discussion on how to check references.

It is absolutely essential that you ask your future housemate for references. Someone can be charming and lovely in an interview who changes character after moving in.  Both the person seeking a home and the person who is seeking a housemate have a right to ask for references. And then you must check them. There are two types of reference: income verification, and housemate habits.

Probably before you even interviewed this potential housemate, you learned as much as you could about the person through the ‘Net. Facebook, Twitter, and a Google search can tell you quite a bit. If you didn’t do it before interviewing, do it before checking references.

Reference checking should be done by telephone, not electronically. Make a telephone call. For some it is a bit scary to call someone you don’t know. If it is scary for you, just take a deep breath and do it anyway.

For income verification, you should call the person’s place of work and talk to his or her supervisor. Make it quick. Leave a voice mail. Be direct and clear. “I’m considering _____as a housemate, and I want to verify that she works for you. Please leave me a message at ________.”  A supervisor should be willing to help an employee find housing and would not mind the phone call. If income is coming from another source also, talk to that source, too.

For finding out what the person is like to live with, a different set of questions is appropriate. When you introduce yourself, explain clearly why you are calling and ask the person for 10 minutes. That’s enough for you to get the information you need.

The first thing is to find out how well the referrer knows the person. A good referral is someone who has actually lived with the future housemate. Be wary of a person who claims to have lived in shared housing before but can’t give you a reference of someone he or she has lived with. The next thing is to find out why that relationship ended. Endings tell a great deal about a person. The ending probably had a good reason for it, since this person has agreed to provide a reference.

At this point you might be in a conversation. If you have any particular concerns, this is the time to ask about them. If not, two general questions should lead you into a conversation. Ask, “What did you like about living with _________? What did you dislike about living with _________________?”

Follow up these questions with open-ended questions (requiring more than a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’) that allow the reference to talk. You are there to listen and learn. These questions and your follow-up questions should tell you as much as you need to know about your future housemate.

Do end the call at the ten-minute mark as you promised. Keep the reference’s name and phone number.

The reference checks give you more information with which to make a decision. You can either confidently decide to share housing with the person you checked on, or you can decline. It’s up to you.

If you like you can use this downloadable Worksheet-References to track your reference check.

As I interview people for the book I’m writing, I’m hearing stories about the nightmare housing situations.

What is a nightmare situation? It’s when the comfortable feeling between housemates breaks down because of conflict that is unresolved, and communication stops. It is really awful. Home becomes a battleground. If you have lived a nightmare situation, it’s very, very understandable that you’ve had it with sharing housing and will choose to live alone. It seems so much easier than potentially walking into another bad situation.

In ALL the stories I’ve heard the first mistake was in the interviewing process.  The person telling me the story either didn’t investigate thoroughly what living with person would be like, or they didn’t stand up for themselves in negotiating the use of the house or setting expectations. They ignored a little warning from their own gut – often because they could help the person, or they were desperate to find a place to live.

Avoid nightmare housemates by paying attention to your instincts. Talk to the person about all the different areas of living together: kitchen, furniture, closet space, parking, cleaning, rent, utilities, guests, pets etc. Check references. They should be able to give you the names and phone numbers of two people who can tell you what sort of housemate they are.  If they can’t do that, they probably aren’t a good bet as a housemate. Right?

So what if you are desperate? and do choose to ignore you instincts? Be prepared.  You may not want to establish yourself in that house.  Keep looking. Good luck.

“She seemed nice enough.”  “He was well-spoken and gentle.” “We were friends and both needed a place to live.” These are real quotes from people who ended up being unhappy about their shared housing arrangements. What do they have in common?  Lazy interviewing.  All three neglected to really consider the interview and what they needed in shared housing.

There are two or three levels of interaction before moving in. If the initial contact is by email, that is the first level.  The second level is a telephone conversation. The third level is the personal meeting and seeing the space.

Email contact can weed out the serious from the non-serious potential housing arrangements. You can learn a lot by email but don’t count on it.  You are going to be living with the person and you need a sense of them.  Once you think that this person has potential as a possible housemate, pick up the telephone.

The telephone conversation is the first real interview .  This is the time to find out the basics – why the person is looking (tells you about them), how they will pay their bills (employment current and history), and any specific things they must have in a housing arrangements. It is a two-way conversation. The person looking to move into a space wants to know why the space became available, how the other members of the house pay the bills (additional costs to living there?), and what they must have in a housemate.

Only if the answers indicate a “go” for both parties should a personal interview combined with seeing the home be arranged. This saves everyone a lot of time.

The first thing that happens in the face-to-face interview is to see/show the space.  It could happen that the potential housemate hates it.  No point in continuing the conversation.  But if the space is okay, then sitting down and talking about expectations/agreements about how to share housing is that next step. This is the time to discuss daily routines, kitchen use, preferences for tv/radio/music, guests etc. While you are talking about these things you are assessing whether you want to share a house with this person.

Unless, there is huge competition and everything is really okay, do NOT make a decision on the spot. Give yourself some time to think about it. If you are the house holder check references! But don’t take too long, by this point everyone has invested time in this possibility of sharing a home – if your answer is “no” – communicate that clearly so all parties can move on.  If your answer is “yes” – the confirmation is the exchange of money. At that point everyone is committed to sharing housing.

This is the pattern that has worked for me. Do you have a different one?

Moving long distance presents a challenge.  How do you find a place to live when you aren’t there to see the place and to interview potential housemates? Some people make the trip for a weekend ahead of time and try to jam it all in and maybe they get lucky.  I’m sure some do get lucky. I wonder how many nightmare housemate stories come from panicked decisions?

In addition to using Craigslist and other internet tools to find place to rent, the Internet offers another wonderful tool for interviewing. Skype.  With Skype you can see the person which is a whole lot more than listening to them on the telephone and more than emailing or texting. It is said that a decision is made in the first 30 seconds of a job interview. I don’t know if that’s true for housemate interviews but I do think seeing is a huge help.

This interview is a step in your process. Don’t rent a space without physically seeing it. Use Skype to narrow down your choices and then get on an airplane to check them out.