[Owen]

Unless you are living at home whilst at university, you will be living in shared quarters for most of the time (starting with halls). When it comes to sharing a kitchen, bathroom and being faced with general household chores, it's important to figure out a way of dividing responsibility. This step will make it easier to live together, and probably more fun too!

Here are some key points to consider with your house mates:

1.How to organise cooking?

• Cook as a group - cheapest but demands similar tastes and an agreed group budget.
  
• Cook independently - do what you want, when you want. Expensive due to waste.
  
• Have a cooking rota - get varied meals though needs commitment and initial planning.

2.How to organise shopping?

• Shop as a group - not very practical and need similar tastes. Should be cheaper.
  
• Group shop essentials (eg. washing up liquid) - more practical and allows for personal food preferences.
  
• Independent essentials shopping - makes little sense, and leads to waste and arguments.

3.How to organise washing up?

• Do your own as it comes - ok as long as you do it straight away. Stacked dishes blocking the sink won't make you too popular.
  
• Whoever does the cooking that night - makes sense and shares it out, though maybe stagger the rota so someone else washes up when they don't cook.
  
• Have a rota - doesn't have to be rigid, but can be tricky as the level of washing up to do may vary.

4.How to organise house hold cleaning and chores?

• 
  
• Do it as a group when it gets too bad - there will always be a slacker this way, and house mates probably have different tolerances.
  
• Have another rota - same issues with washing up
  
• Clean up your own stuff - unlikely to work out as well or happen at all!

5.Dealing with the slacker (as a group)

• Don't involve them in communal activities (eg. Dinners)
  
• Everyone get on their back about it
  
• Put there dirty dishes outside their room
  
• Threaten to throw them out (if it gets that bad)

[jakal]

I thought about living with mates in a house (not including halls)

One tip i thought of for bills!
It is a good idea to split each person to one bill rather than just do a joint bank account! The joint account can cause problems and its simpler if each person takes on responsibility! the things you need to think about are
. electric
. gas
. T.V. liscence
. Water
. Internet
. Phone and broadband
.Sky t.v. (if you have it)

When choosing rooms

You can do this a few ways
1. just sit down and discuss and choose that way between you (however this can cause friction and disagreement).
2. draw the rooms out of a hat and whichever room you draw you get (you are able to swap with people after if they wish to.
3. Draw an order out of the hat! whoever is first gets first choice and so on! (i believe that this is the best way to decide).

Setting an alarm

You may have an alarm in your house and with the increasing number of students without insurance i would suggest that it is a good idea to set the alarm if you leave. however my housemates and i had this problem where we didnt know who was in etc. so we got a white board and a rub off pen and write our names and whether we were in or out! This means the last person out sets the alarm and the first person in turns it off! it is a pretty effecient system!

If you can think of anything else for living out of halls do not hesitate to add anything!