Cleanliness
It's an unavoidable fact of life that unless we pick up the sponge, mop the floor, and vacuum the rugs, a dwelling will get dirty. This is one area when Home-mates really have to see eye to eye in order to maintain the space all want to live in. What do you like? What can you tolerate? What will you maintain?
Sources: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates
Contributors: Annamarie Pluhar
Recommended Books: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates
Cigarettes
For smokers, cigarette smoking is often the first consideration. Non-smokers don't want to live with smokers. Smokers, most likely, don't want to live with non-smokers. If you smoke, don't tell yourself that you will quit if you find the perfect, but non-smoking, situation. That's like buying a shirt that's three sizes too small, promising yourself to lose thirty pounds; it's just not going to happen.
Sources: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates
Contributors: Annamarie Pluhar
Recommended Books: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates
Furniture/ Storage
What requirements do you have for your things? Do you have enough furniture to equip an apartment or room by yourself, or do you have nothing? Do you need space for storage for things you don't use often like luggage, skis camping gear, bikes etc?
Sources: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates
Contributors: Annamarie Pluhar
Recommended Books: Sharing Housing: A Guidebook for Finding and Keeping Good Housemates