5 Signs You're the Best Roommate Ever

By Kaitlin Hurtado on April 10, 2017

Everyone has heard their fair share of roommate horror stories and many have experienced the roommate horror stories themselves, but if you are lucky, you will find yourself sharing an apartment with your dream roommate and running into little to no problems.

Most of the time, people are unaware of how they are as roommates — especially if they are the notorious “bad roommate” of the apartment/house as they tend to turn a blind eye to their own mistakes. However, to see if you are the best roommate, you can look for the following signs.

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1. You aren’t the focus of complaints and/or roasts by your roommates and housemates

These roasts can happen in person, or in the group chat set up for your housemates. If you’ve lived in a space with other people, complaints are bound to be thrown around and you may just be the target of the complaints. These complaints can be as small as someone not pulling their weight when it comes to housekeeping or fully blown arguments about a roommate throwing a too-wild party without each roommate’s permission.

No one wants to have their mistakes pointed out and become the topic of the group chat, but it does serve as an effective way of getting things done in the living space. However, if you are the best roommate, you will not be the target of such roasts, but you will either be the one making them or the one hearing them being dished out. You will most likely be the one to hear all of the complaints as your other roommates look to you for guidance on the conflict or consider you a good person to spill their troubles to.

2. You get asked to spend time together outside of your living space 

Spending time with your roommate at the kitchen bar when you are both eating your respective meals is one thing, but putting aside time to go somewhere other than your living room together makes you more of a friend to your roommate. Sometimes a roommate is really just a roommate; the extent of your relationship will remain as you share a living space and limited belongings/furnishings.

If you get along with your roommate, you can talk with them about something other than “Did you pay the rent?” or “Have you seen the vacuum?” Conversations can transition into how your days went or something hard they may be going through at the moment. Spending time together outside of your living space means you both feel comfortable enough to spend quality time together without the safety of retreating into your respective spaces when the conversation dies.

3. You have been introduced and have spent time with their circle of friends and family 

While roommates can just be roommates, they can also be friends and even family. You may be able to spend time with them in your living space or elsewhere, but if you find yourself being integrated into their inner circle you know you’re a good roommate in the eyes of your roommate.

You can meet your roommate’s friends and family whenever they visit your living space, but once you begin to tag along to friend and family outings, you are well past the level of being “just a roommate.”

4. You are introduced as a friend rather than being addressed as just a roommate

When your roommate introduces you to outsiders, they can just leave the introduction to “They are my roommate.” However, your roommate can also show that she thinks of you as a friend first and foremost by changing the introduction to “They are my friend and also my roommate.”

When you find yourself being considered a friend and explicitly referred to as your roommate’s friend, you know you’re a good roommate.

5. You have been asked by your roommate(s) to live together again after your lease ends

Regardless of how many friends you have made in college, you may find yourself coming up blank when it comes to figuring out which of those friends would make suitable roommates. If you already like the people you are living with right now, do not hesitate to reach out to them and ask to remain roommates after your current lease ends.

Earlier is better — anyone can easily ask your roommates to live with them next year, causing you to lose your chances at securing good roommates for the next year.

If you are one being asked to be roommates again, you know you’ve done something right as a roommate and that they like you enough to want to live together again.

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