Most students share with a roommate (or even a few roommates) during their time at university. If you live off campus, you’ll even be able to choose who you have as a roommate. This can make your life much more comfortable — but only if you choose well. Here are a few things to consider when searching for the perfect match.
Budget
The last thing you want is to settle for housing that’s lower quality than you would have liked or to feel pressured to stretch your budget to the max. Your roommate needs to be looking for housing within the same price range as you. This will not only ensure that you choose an apartment you both like, but it will also mean that neither of you struggles to make rent payments or pay bills.
Best Friends vs Friends vs Acquaintances
You may want a roommate purely to share your apartment. Alternatively, you may want your roommates to be your closest friends — you’ll be able to hang out together, head out to parties and events as a group, and perhaps eat meals together. Something in the middle is also possible. What’s important is that you decide if you want your roommates to be your friends or if remaining acquaintances is fine.
Things in Common
Unless you decide to live completely independently from your roommate, it will make sense to have some shared interests. This is unlikely to be a difficult criteria to fulfill: you may both like playing video games, watching a particular genre of movies, or listening to the same music.
Matching Lifestyles
It’s also crucial that your lifestyles are not too dissimilar. You should want to socialize the same amount and have similar ideas about how often to have guests over. If you like to stay in most evenings to study, your roommate should be happy to keep the apartment quiet.
Similar Standards for Cleanliness
Think carefully about how clean you want your apartment. It’s easy to exaggerate and say that you want your housing spotless when actually you don’t mind a bit of mess. It’s important to be honest, as this will ensure you share with people who have similar standards to you — and you won’t have arguments about the state of the apartment.
A Good Communicator
You must be able to feel that you can talk to your roommate when problems do arise. When you move in, you’ll set some ground rules that you’re both happy with, but it’s always possible that you’ll experience some minor conflicts. Good communication will resolve issues and keep your living situation comfortable.
It can be a challenge to find the right number of roommates for the number of bedrooms in apartments you may like to rent. The solution is to decide how many roommates you want first and then look for student rentals. Kingston students can choose between suites with two, three, four, or five bedrooms when they live at Foundry Princess. Plus, if you can’t find enough roommates, we’ll pair you with other students. Apply now to secure the floor plan you want before all the units are taken.
