Shared housing: another housemate took DD's room

[LostInTheWeeds]

DD is due to return to uni next week into a shared student house. The rooms had been allocated by lottery. However, one of the other students has moved in early and installed herself in DD's room. She is refusing to move to her own room. DD very upset by this. Landlord wont' get involved. Any idea what we should do?

Alternatively, they can make things unpleasant for the cuckoo. Perhaps she doesn't want to be friends with them, so they can exclude her from nights out, shared meals, treats etc. you could start the ball rolling my providing a lovely welcome pack with some treats for your dd and one for each of the other girls, but not the cuckoo.

Normally this wouldn’t sit right but in this case it seems like natural consequences.

Hard and def Cf behaviour- but I would leave it to DD to sort and not get involved - massive life lessons of negotiation and finding a way through difficult situations that are all part of the uni experience! As there is in reality no peril or terrible outcome ( unless it escalated and means she doesn’t want to be at uni) I would downplay the seriousness of it with her.

I agree. It's a life lesson. You always meet people like this. I don't think there's anything your daughter can do. Just go back to uni and settle in. If the room is fine, it'll be ok, she'll get used to it. If not, she can look for another house share, people are always dropping out.

Then she needs to be the next one there, and bags the next best room, and then the others can all whinge. And the one that started the mess can own it.

But yeah she can either be a doormat or she can enlist the others.

@Zwicky @IsleofSkies Generally, even a fixed period tenancy will have a break clause - though yes, 3 months was a guess. If OP’s dd gives the whole group reasonable notice of her intention to leave, and pays rent during that time which allows them time to advertise, recourse against dd/guarantors is unlikely and would be unsuccessful. Multiple occupancy leases - especially for students - don’t operate on the assumption no one will ever leave. And the dd can also give the group the option that she will find a replacement (I’m sure they’d prefer to choose).

OP - is the tenancy fully private or overseen by the university?

Wait until she goes out, move all her stuff, put lock on the door. Have the stand off, “I don’t want to fall out but I’m not putting up with that shit. Hope that’s now clear”

Again, this shows an insight into your mind, not your psychic ability to look into this stranger on the Internet's mind.

So many, many posts now saying "move her stuff out and put a lock on the door", I've lost count.
Is that a solution, really?
Initially, couldn't she talk to the woman about it?

I don't think she should turf the cuckoo's stuff out or even worse kick someone else out of the next best room, that is stooping down to cuckoo's level and not likely to help in negotiations

I agree that they should hold a house meeting, get the other flatmates on board and enlist the Uni pastoral officer - that is what they are for

I really doubt anyone from Uni is going to involve themselves in this 😬

Meh this stuff happens - she needs to take it as a life lesson and move on.

When we shared a house at uni there were four us and there were three rooms - one shared -eg two single beds (my friend and I took this room and paid lower rent as a result), then there was a single and a double. The girls that took those respectively decided to pay the same rent and had an agreement to swap halfway through the year. Which they did honour if I remember.

This exact same thing happened to me when I was a student. I moved her stuff, she moved it back, I moved her stuff, she moved it back. In the end I let her have the room but to make it ok in my mind I also pissed in her shampoo first. Maybe suggest this?

@WeirdBarbie I'm an old hand at this, having had kids at uni for a total of 8 years.

There is usually no 3-month clause .

That can be an informal request between the sharers. As far as the landlord goes, they have signed the lease from Sept to August.

The lease is usually a full year and the students are all co-tenants. The assumption is that although multiple occupancy, it's for an academic year, unlike other MO tenancies where people are employed.

My DCs had people leave. Once they knew, the leaver had to find a replacement. The parents were guarantors (we were for our DCs.)
If they simply walk out and don't pay, their parents sometimes need to foot the bill, but worst case the remaining students do.

I tend to agree that while it might feel very tempting to move the cuckoo's stuff out of the room, that is just setting up for the cuckoo to do the same back to DD, or otherwise interfere with DD's stuff.

To me this is not a workable living arrangement. On the other hand, if she needs to go back to uni next week, she may need to move in temporarily.

My suggestion is that DD say to all the housemates, very clearly, that she cannot live long term in an environment where agreements are made (eg to take rooms by means of lottery) and then broken, and that therefore she will be looking to move out as soon as possible, and they need to be looking for somebody else to take her room. She then needs to scout around and hopefully find another flat share - eg where somebody has dropped out of uni. Even if the room she finds in a new place is significantly worse than the current available room, I think she should take it, unless it is absolutely dire. The issue isn't the room, the issue is that one needs to be able to trust one's flatemates to stick to agreements, and that trust has been broken. That is not an environment in which one can live for a year anymore than if one of the flatmates was harressing her.

I realise the issue is that, at least short term, DD could be liable for two amounts of rent. Hopefully there are people out there also looking for a room who won't mind the room available and so that problem will be short term. I also don't know how tight DDs finances are, and whether you can help, but I can't think of anything worse than trying to live in what will inevitably be a toxic environment. This will unquestionably impact her studies, and she needs to get out of there as soon as she possibly can and to the extent you can help her, you should.

If the others are all in agreement, they simply turn up and your DD starts moving her stuff into HER room. She can politely offer the other girl 20 minutes to remove her things out, or for DD to put them in bin bags in the hall. She should explain to the others what she plans to do beforehand so they can back her up.

@LostInTheWeeds If your DD is on the lease, she is legally obliged to pay. If she doesn't pay, it's an offence and could affect her credit rating or yours if you are guarantors.

Moving out now and actually finding somewhere will be very hard, depending on the location.

-She has a choice of advertising for a replacement for herself.
-Paying that lease and another lease (if she finds somewhere) until a replacement is found.
-Talking to the other girl and trying to get her to see sense.

Why have the other students not rallied to help her and told the other girl to get out of the room?

Hide some prawns inside her curtain pole and let her crack on with her room.

Not in the UK if it is a private rental. It's nothing to do with the university.

Any roommate that doesn't back up your daughter should be happy to take the girls' allocated room, right? I'd hope they all have your daughter's back on this.

are you sure they agreed this is your DD's room. Your DD needs to stick up for herself.

Turn up with your DD and assorted relatives and simply install her in the room. Verbally wipe the floor with the CF girl and start putting her stuff in the hallway. Get a lock put on the door of the room and make sure your DD locks it every time she leaves even if it’s only to make a coffee. Enlist the other house-mates to put pressure on this CF to leave. She’s shown herself to be untrustworthy and underhand. She’s not a good housemate.

If you do this, I bet the CF will leave as soon as she can.

This is what I would do TBF. So much quicker. Put lock on door as soon as she’s out and then move her stuff out once the lock is installed, and then move DD’s stuff in. Not worth getting in a verbal argument over it.

Thing is, people you share houses with as a young person can be dickheads. She needs to learn to navigate this on her own.

I am lucky enough to still be really good friends with my uni housemates 25 years on but by god there was some dick behaviour.

• running up an epic phone bill to her boyfriend and insisting we split it evenly.

• cranking up the heating and sitting there in a tiny vest and shorts set when other housemates were on the bones of their arse financially.

• Coming home pissed at 4am and shagging some random loudly in the living rooom when people had finals the next day.

• Using every pan in the house to cook a Christmas meal and fucking off home for the holidays without doing the washing up.

• subletting their room to a friend no one else knew without asking anyone (that was me 🫣)

Yup, get the others on side and then you as parent go with DD and move her into HER room. If she has you and the other housemates there backing her up, I really do think the CF will back down.