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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Awful Lodgers

5 replies

EnglishRose13 · 27/02/2019 09:16

Inspired by the current thread, AIBU to ask for your awful lodger stories?

We had a lodger for 9 months. It's put me off for life.

As posted on the other thread, on the first day he moved in he went into our study (we used this from instead of the living room; it was very much "our" room and not a communal space) to ring a gambling hotline. He said it was due to erroneous charges. That was a lie. He had a gambling addiction. He ran up charges of £50-£100 every month until we hid the phone.

He had his own bathroom but would use the downstairs toilet and block it. This happened frequently, not just once or twice.

He'd help himself to our food, and never replace it.

He had a child who he let run riot. He's often be up late (10-11) and he'd be screaming and running outside our room.

We lent him a tablet as his computer broke. He left porn open on it and there were videos of his kid jumping on our bed filming himself in the mirror.

Rent was late every month. No exaggeration! We agreed a date in line with his pay day and it was always bloody late.

In his room there was a bed, a built-in wardrobe, a chest of drawers, a bedside cabinet and a bin. Everything but the wardrobe was damaged. The carpet was ruined as he'd spilt a drink and left it.

No more lodgers for us!

OP posts:
LimitIsUp · 27/02/2019 09:23

Can't beat that. Hated my lodger (20 years ago) but now think she was quite vanilla in comparison to yours.

She changed the outgoing message on the Answerphone ("What a liberty!"), always moaned and whinged about the house not being on a bus route and kept begging for lifts, and most memorably stormed into my bedroom one night after I had gone to bed to yell at me Banshee style for removing her clean, wet washing from the machine and depositing it in a laundry basket so that I could wash mine. I threw her out

Firgoodnesssake · 27/02/2019 09:24

I cannot understand why you put up with him for 9 months, seems crazy - so why did you?

EnglishRose13 · 27/02/2019 09:28

@Firgoodnesssake

Honestly, because I felt sorry for him. He hadn't had the easiest life and he really didn't have anywhere else to go. Whenever we tried to talk to him, he cried, which then made me agree another chance.

I can't remember the straw that broke the camels back now. Even after we'd given him notice, the day before he was due to leave he asked my husband if he could stay a few more days. We did say no.

OP posts:
RChick · 27/02/2019 10:13

I had a guy move in on a Sunday morning. I went for a nap in the afternoon (had been out the previous evening). Woke up to him stood next to my bed, shaking my shoulder, asking if i wanted to go to the pub with him. He moved out the same day!

He left a tea stain on the bedroom carpet and two lumps out of the stairway wall.

MojoMoon · 27/02/2019 10:13

Mine have been fine.
Clear list of house rules provided in the advert and reiterated when they came to view (stuff like their food must be stored in a specific kitchen cupboard, no access to certain rooms in the house, no smoking, front door to be locked at all times, only overnight guests twice a week etc)
Deposit taken.
References checked (employer confirms job).
Contract signed.
Would recommend having a weekly cleaner for communal areas, saves faffing with a rota etc.

The problem is when they are a friend or someone you clearly feel in some way responsible for and so you don't set boundaries at the start.

But I wouldn't want to put people off having lodgers just because of that. Some of mine became good friends.

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