How should we split rent fairly in a four-bedroom student house?

[Kopfkino]

Can anyone give us some ideas of how to split the accommodation costs of a shared uni house.

House, 4 bedrooms;
1 large bedroom with ensuite (20m sq)
1 large bedroom (20m sq)
2 bedrooms (10 m sq each)

Shared kitchen/ diner, garden, bathroom

Rent is £3466 a month

Some differences of opinion of how this should be split including biggest room paying double!

Any ideas?

Check on the local Uni website for accommodation prices, but I would have thought a tenner/week for an ensuite would be fair. When it gets to room size, I would leave it be (or get the kids with the best rooms to provide some of the kitchen/lounge kit). That said, DD was in a Uni-owned house last year and there was about a £15/week rent differential between the single rooms and the spacious doubles.

Perhaps whoever has done the lion’s share of the rental admin should get first dibs of the rooms.

I think my DD ended up with the ‘worst’ room because she didn’t want to use it over the summer (and probably the other hols too) and will spend several weekends away for sports stuff or visiting her boyfriend.

The problem with splitting evenly is there is such a massive difference between the room sizes, plus the addition of the ensuite. Even if they all paid the same last year, it was likely a different scenario.
I would tell your DS the amount you are happy to give him for rent, and let him work it out with his friends. There might be additional bargaining involved- eg one of them has a car and is happy to give lifts, (or like me, my dad worked in the pub industry so I had access to very cheap alcohol!).

They'll all be sharing communal spaces, so maybe halve the rent to reflect that. But you might need to adjust that - maybe a third is communal space - but that is the principle, that you account for both shared and individual spaces.

One half of that 3466/2 = 1733/4 = 434 each (give or take 75p per month!)

Then the 2 larger rooms should be around twice the two smaller rooms. Adjust a bit between the large room with en suite, and large room.

1733/ 6 = 288.84
So large rooms = 577.68
Small rooms (half the size of the large rooms) = 288.85 ea

So totals
Large rooms = 1011 pm ea
You could adjust for the en suite, so maybe en suite is 1100, and the other large room is 920 (or so)
Small rooms = 722 pm ea

Plenty of good ideas here.

Definitely not double, but definitely a premium.

Or you could bid. you agree on a shared amount for communal areas (say 50%) and then you bid on the premium you are prepared to pay for the best room. Whoever bids highest gets it. Then you do the second best room out of remaining share etc.

Hopefully everyone ends up happy.

I would use a multi round bidding system to reveal the value each person places on the spaces. There is one available online.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/science/rent-division-calculator.html

@BillieWiper But the smaller rooms are using the kitchen, garden and bathroom. The en suite could possibly be more but it’s not just about bedroom size.

Yes, draw lots and think about moving around at halfway through the year.

I would suggest;
£1000 for the big room with en suite
£900 for the next biggest room
£785 for the 2 smaller rooms

630, 630, 945, 1260

No one is going to move rooms.

I don’t actually. I actually think that he was stitched up last year, and should get a better room this year, but not at £400 extra. It’s some of the same people from last year, and a new addition.

They’ve agreed that you should pay more for a bigger room, however no one wants to pay for the biggest room, so he is saying he’ll take it and pay more, but I’m not coughing up the £400.

I’ve advised him on an amount someone suggested below. I think it’s £940. He’s happy for someone to take it.

It’s central London

He’s too nice and doesn’t like rocking the boat

3.5k a month? Where is this? Mayfair?

I’m happy to give him a bit more money for a bigger room but there’s no way I’m paying £400 extra than his housemates when they didn’t last year.

Thats your answer right here.

fwiw both my dcs had a ‘pay the same amount’ rule in their houses.
The one who got the shittiest room one year got a better (or the best one) the following one.
No one agreed before hand who was going to take which room

He’s too nice and doesn’t like rocking the boat

They saw him coming. That’s why you now have the ‘pay more for the nicer room’

fwiw on the very first year, dc1 and his room mates decided theyd do paying different rates depending on the size of the room.
They called that paying LESS for having to put up with the smaller room. No one talked about paying more.
I think this made a big difference in how they approached things tbh. No one felt they lost out and paid too much iyswim

He’ll have to go back to them and say he can’t actually afford the bigger room. And maybe one of the people who is saying the bigger room should cost more in rent should take it. Otherwise they all pay the same, like they always have done.

All cost the same. Person with the en suite organises all the bills.

I would do exactly this.

We gave each room a number then everyone drew a number out of a hat and that was your room. I got the biggest but it was on the top floor and freezing whereas the smaller ones were way cosier.

In this situation I'd maybe agree whoever gets the ensuite pays £100 more and if someone can't afford / doesn't want to pay extra for it they draw first without that room number being in the hat.

Are you joking? The cheapest four bed flat I could find on Rightmove in Mayfair is over £13k.

My DS is renting a three bed flat in New Cross for £3.5k. That’s London prices.

Not really as they all share communal spacces.

The rent he paid last year, and this year is cheaper than the halls he was at in London.

@TinyCottageGirl Yes. Not unreasonable. @Kopfkino They will have a floor plan of the whole house. What % extra do the bigger rooms get overall? That’s the exact benefit they get so the amounts can be pro rata. So it should not be double for a bigger room. It’s actually ok for London and 4 beds. Is one bed the lounge?

You could each bid for the best room with the highest bidder winning

Large + ensuite 1200
Large 1140
Small 565
Small 565
(Total 3470)
So that's £4 over - deduct that £4 from whoever has the worst view 😉

Could be Edinburgh too…My DC five years ago was paying £850 per room. Five rooms in a hovel. £4250 per month. They had to move out for August for higher Edinburgh Festival weeks too.

Only shared space was a kitchen, with a two seater sofa. What would have been the living room was a bedroom.

Awful place, but if it had been anywhere near decent it would have been bringing in £100’s per night as a short term holiday let.

I had a similar situation at uni and this was the sort of thing we did. This seems fair.

If you don’t want to pay the extra OP then your child has one of the smaller rooms and doesn’t get the amazing benefit of an en suite. How they decide that is up to them, but it’s not fair for others to pay more for one person to get a huge room and an en suite. Or they agree to share the en suite