To share your flat or not to share your flat, that is the question.
Whether you’re a local or an expatriate living in the booming country of Vietnam, you may have considered sharing a flat with housemates. Like all of life’s decisions there are pros and cons to weigh when choosing what will suit your lifestyle best. Here are points to consider when determining whether to live solo or accompanied:
Pro. Divided costs may be the best benefit of sharing a flat with others. If rent cost is the motivating factor in gaining new housemates, ‘the more the merrier’ is the best philosophy to follow as the cost will be further divvied up. Sharing costs with multiple people will allow you to rent a large house that you may otherwise not have the opportunity to live in alone.
Con. Sharing a large house with multiple other human beings simply means two things – you will have many personalities under one roof that may not always see eye-to-eye and with a large house comes bigger responsibility. Unlike condominiums, houses typically require more maintenance performed by you including yard work and a larger area size to clean.
Pro. Your social life will likely always stay afloat. Residing in a flat with others will force you to communicate with others (like it or not at times) whether it’s simply discussing schedules or planning a game night, you’ll always have someone to talk to. Not to mention, with the growing expatriate population in Vietnam’s major cities, you might score a housemate from somewhere else in the world with interesting stories and culture to learn about.
Con. The flipside is socialising when you don’t want to or even having someone else in the flat when all you really want is some peace and quiet. Your housemates might invite friends over for a late night whilst all you want to do is sleep off a fever or finish an important project for work. And the days of walking around in your ‘birthday suit’ will come to end – you’ll be questioning what the word ‘privacy’ means.
Pro. They say sharing is caring and this rings true with housemates. Living alone you may have had limited household supplies but once you move in with someone else, they seem to have the missing pieces to the overall home puzzle, such as the frying pan you’ve been missing out on or a vacuum with better suction features. Your home will finally be complete with a full set of living room furniture!
Con. Sharing may be caring, but it’s also a burden at times. The really cool flat screen you contributed to the household when you moved in may even be off limits to you whilst your housemate’s favourite television series is playing. It won’t seem fair in the moment, but it comes with the territory.
When it comes to the bottom line, choosing your housemates wisely from the start will produce an overall better flat-sharing experience. There are plenty of online platforms that allow you to search for individuals with the same lifestyle and interests in mind. Seek out housemates with a record of paying their bills on time, high cleanliness standards and with a good attitude – a recipe for way more pros than cons!