Pregnant and wondering what to do about housemate

[AbigailLovesCheese]

Hello,

I've been going over and over this in my head for past couple of weeks, and if anyone has ever been in a similar scenario, I'd love to hear their take/advice/words of caution.

My DH and I currently rent a 2 bed house, our housemate joined us in August. The house itself is owned by one of DH's best friends, who was keen to have people he knew move in and take care of it. We love the house, and we've maintained it and made it our home (it's also got a garden). DH and i do the lions' share of ensuring its clean, addressing any things that need fixing etc.

I'm currently 10+6 weeks pregnant, which came as a surprise to both me and my husband and something that's happened a lot sooner than we anticipated. That said, our shock aside, we are also super chuffed and quietly getting excited (it's still early days).

The dilemma is we love the house, it would be perfect as somewhere to start raising our family. Although there's still a while (all being well) till baby arrives, the thought of looking for somewhere else and then moving has even less appeal than usual.

We also like our housemate, who happens to work for the same company as me, but in a different team. She's friendly, considerate and we all get along well. She is also a sensitive soul, and we've noticed she has a habit of taking things personally, and doesn't yet know I'm pregnant (we work very different hours so the slight changes I'm having are easy to hide).

I appreciate I may get flack for sounding heartless and self-serving, but there's no sugar-coated way of putting this; we would love to stay and have this as our home for when the baby arrives, and having a housemate doesn't seem feasible - not least because a crying baby/tonnes of baby gear lying around would also be a pain for them.

As for having this sort of conservation though, theres no guidebook, so if anyone has ever been in a similar scenario, then I'd be really keen to hear their advice.

Sorry, I should have mentioned. The landlord knows as he's a close friend, and has left it up to us to sort out.

She moved in because another housemate moved out.

Why not tell her you are pregnant and planning to stay, but not that you want her to leave. I’ll bet she starts making her own alternative arrangements pretty quickly. Alternatively if you don’t think she’ll take the hint and do want to be more direct (and you were in the house first) tell her you’re really excited about the baby but sad that you’ll need her room as a nursery as she’s been a great housemate. It’s up to her if she wants to take this as a personal slight- it’s not like you are asking her to leave to move a different friend in! What kind of contract does she have?

It's not really your decision. You currently rent half the house, your housemate rents the other half. Legally you don't have 'dibs' or any standing whatsoever to ask her to leave. Assuming she has a contract, even your landlord potentially can't ask her to leave until the end of it.

The only thing you can do is speak to your landlord and say you would be willing to take over the whole house, including 100% of the rent, and see if they are open to it. But if you are essentially asking one friend to evict another friend, don't expect it to create good feelings all round.

Did the landlord say what would happen with the rent? I.e. will you or housemate have to pay double the rent that you pay now?

Congratulations on your pregnancy! I agree it’s pretty unlikely you’ll all be able to live with each other once the baby is born, the noise and the mess and sheer amount of stuff that you’ll end up with will take over the house and make her life quite difficult. However, worst case scenario if she doesn’t choose to leave herself (I assume that she most likely will choose to go) you can’t ask her to go. I presume as you aren’t the landlords her contract isn’t with you so you have no control whether she lives there or not? I know you guys love the house and have lived there a while but it doesn’t automatically follow that you have to be the ones to stay and she has to be the one to leave. Might be worth looking at other rental options in the close area.

It's up to your housemate if she's happy to put up with the baby stuff or not.

It's up to you whether you want to share with your housemate, but don't make assumptions on her behalf.

We had a lodger when DC2 was born. She chose to stay and stayed until DD was about 4 months when she moved for a new job.

I loved her being there. She adored the baby and was a great extra pair of hands.

We already had DC though so it wasn't a huge shock for her!

Friends of mine have continued sharing, eldest child is 11 now! They were best mates who lived together - the husband and kids were a later addition and the best friend just stayed as they all get on so well.

Both these circumstances are unique to the individuals involved thought. Lots of people find it hard to imagine sharing their family home but there's no right or wrong way to do this.

I think you sound quite entitled to be honest. It’s a shared house, I don’t think it’s right to put pressure on her to move out.

If you want to live on your own, you should start looking elsewhere.

You are 10 weeks pregnant, usually babies share their parents room for at least the first few months, so technically could be nearly a year before you would really need the second bedroom. A lot can happen in a year. I would tell the flat mate ASAP about the pregnancy , explain that you want her to stay as long as she wants. [No one in their right mind would want to stay on long in that situation] That way she has plenty of time to find alternative accomodation.

Congratulations on your pregnancy.

I suspect she will move out before long once the reality of living with a crying newborn kicks in, which will save you any awkward conversation.

I see the landlord has “left it to you to sort out” well you can’t really, if she has a proper contract it’swith him, and she has legal rights that are beyond you guys asking her to go. Again, it’s likely she’ll just decide to move but should it get more complicated then he can’t pass it on to you guys to sort, when you are powerless to do it!

You won't need an extra room for the baby for a while. The SIDS guidance is to have the baby in the same room as you until at least 6 months. (2 years in our case haha!)

An aside - if you're considering BFing (and even if not) please can I recommend a three sided cot that attaches to your bed? I wish I'd known about them first time round - simply put, they mean more sleep for you (and you will probably really, really want more sleep!) as It's so much easier to settle a wakeful / hungry baby if they're right next to you.

I would tell the flat mate ASAP about the pregnancy , explain that you want her to stay as long as she wants.

I would not put it this way, because it's not even slightly up to OP whether the housemate stays or not. You can express that you would be happy to continue to share... Except you're not - that's the point of your post, right?

If she doesn't want to move (and she's under no obligation to) then you'll have to move yourself.

Does she have a contract? Will you have to pay double rent if she moves out?

It’d be massively unfair to ask her to move out but I would tell her in plenty of time just in case she wants to. It’d be unfair to put any pressure on.

I’d be a bit miffed if I was living in a shared house and a housemate decided to have a baby and make it a ‘family home’ as I’d feel forced to move out and pay £££ for someone else’s choice.

You need to decide - are you happy to live with the housemate and the baby?

If so no problem, just tell her, then It's up to her.

If not then you need to decide - do you want to bring the baby home to a house with no flatmate or are you happy to wait a bit to you need the room? Then you need to start house hunting.

If you really want the flat you're in then let the flatmate you'll be happy to take over the room if she wants to leave - but don't make her feel she has to go, that's shitty.

Or you could just carry on living together and see how it goes. It might work better than you think.

What is the arrangement? Does she have a contract with the landlord or did you arrange something informally with her yourselves with the landlord's consent? Is she technically a lodger? In which case, maybe you can give her notice.

It's not outrageous to give her notice. Do you think she sees it as long term though?

The landlord knows as he's a close friend, and has left it up to us to sort out.

Your LL really can’t do this. S/he has a responsibility to provide a home for his/her tenants and needs to abide by the terms of your tenancy agreements (which I really hope that you have).

As fellow tenants, all you can really do is either make an offer to your LL to buy the property yourselves or offer to buy your roommate out of her contract. She doesn’t have to agree and you will have to accept that if she refuses it could make for an unpleasant atmosphere.

More generally, I’m a bit concerned by what you describe that your tenancy might be an informal arrangement with your LL friend. You owe it to yourselves to secure your home as far as possible with a proper tenancy agreement.

Will your rent be increasing?

Thanks everyone. Having had a read and a think, I'll tell her after my scan and will leave it at that. I don't want to put any pressure on her and if it comes to it, having thought about it, the onus is probably on us to look for somewhere else.

Halie, don't think I mentioned any turfing out? Oh, and writing "just because you didn't use protection and got yourself pregnant" is a needlessly cheap shot, not to mention quite nasty. It's Friday night, be happy.