Got a new roommate? Train ‘em fast to keep the tears from falling later. Tell ‘em:  1. What you’re bringing/already own No one needs two microwaves. Or two stripper poles. Actually, two stripper poles are better than one, but we stand by the two-microwaves-as-overkill.  2. What they’d bring, ideally Since you’ve got the pole covered, [...]

  It can be a tricky business, dating someone or having friends visit frequently, if your roommate objects to overnight guests. What to do? Think “communication,” and consider the following:  Make a Roommate Agreement  This is a bit like a lease between the people living in your household, a document that you agree upon and [...]

This recent revelation from Apartment Therapy: things you can get at a hardware store in order to divide a room in your apartment, and either save money by splitting rent or save your sanity by not having to look at your roommate all the time. 1. Rope Apparently, you can make walls out of rope. [...]

By MyNewPlace Guest Blogger, Ron Leshnower – About.com’s Apartment Living Expert! 2012 is an election year and, as daily headlines remind us, the country is in the middle of a contentious primary season. If you’re sharing an apartment with another person, this is a time when you may discover that your roommate favors a candidate [...]

By MyNewPlace Guest Blogger, Ron Leshnower – About.com’s Apartment Living Expert! Adorning your apartment with holiday decor can be a fun way to celebrate the holidays or get into the festive mood of the season. Normally, if someone you know doesn’t share your decorative tastes, it’s not a big deal. But when you live in [...]

An apartment landlord will take a deposit from renters for a variety of reasons. The deposit can help cover the cost of rent if a tenant can’t pay one month and it can cover the costs of cleaning that landlords need to front after their tenants move out. While there’s nothing wrong with paying a [...]

There are plenty of Internet scammers out there looking to make a quick buck off someone renting out the extra room in his apartment. Most scammers live overseas and correspond with their marks over email, making it easy for them to get away with a person’s money. Unfortunately, this makes it difficult for people who [...]

Sometimes, life throws us a difficult housemate.  (For examples, see our earlier post.)   Someone who wakes us up in the middle of the night, eats all our food, or just cannot converse openly—someone who drives us crazy.  In many cases, such circumstances are an opportunity to grow, to practice patience and learn to communicate with [...]

If you’ve started college, you’ve already met your new roommate.  Great!  You’re slowly but surely starting to learn how to deal with one kind of crazy.  We hate to break it to you, but it’s not over yet.  You can request a switch, you can wait til next year, but as long as you have [...]

Is renting a studio the right choice for you? Here’s a quick quiz you can take to find out. 1. How often do you like to go out? a) If I had it my way, I’d go out every day! b) I like to spend some of my evenings out with friends and some at [...]