Cousin's daughter has ended up with the box room at her university shared house

[mrsjavierbardem]

She's paying the same rent and her mates won't budge on anything: Won't rotate the room, won't pay more.

She did agree to have the room a year ago - but now sees that it is almost impossibly small and feels she should at the very least, pay less rent.

I guess that's that but I do think they are being vile to her and so aggressive in their refusal to discuss it at all.. Oh well you see people's true colours over this kind of thing, a life lesson for sure.

I shared a four bedroom flat as a student - the rent for the tiny bedroom complete with high bed (desk and wardrobe went underneath, it really was tiny...) was less than the other 3 rooms.

While I agree that it's a PITA, the thing is she did agree to the rent sadly - I'm guessing that the others will have budgets to stick to, and it's not fair to expect them to pay more simply because she's changed her mind. As others have said, I think it's one of those things she has to chalk down to experience.

I shared a house with friends after uni and we agreed to rotate the box room - I had the second "go" of it and couldn't be bothered to move after that - my boyfriend then moved in and one of the others moved out but we stayed in the box room - sometimes it's the nod (of your cousin's daughters flatmates) to fairness that matters.

If they reduce the rent for the box room, what's to stop the others then saying "now that room is cheaper, I want it" and she ends up in the biggest room but paying more than initially planned? Would that be fair on her? And rotating rooms through a year? That's just way too much hassle for anyone to really contemplate as they'd have to move all of their things into the box room, then back out again a couple of months later to let the next person in. What if someone has a stereo, a wardrobe full of clothes, drawers full of clothes, a desktop PC, a TV and a games console? That becomes a big move for the sake of 2 months. I'm afraid its her own fault for agreeing to it without thinking about the impact.

What if someone has a stereo, a wardrobe full of clothes, drawers full of clothes, a desktop PC, a TV and a games console?

Then they will realise how restrictive the box room is and perhaps discover some empathy.

Not a big deal, we've all been there. In my uni years I had the small room twice and the big room twice. It evens out in the wash.

She will soon learn. This is an important lesson in assertiveness for her.

Perhaps karma will help out and one of the (apparently) more desirable bedrooms will turn out to be the one with damp/mould.

sleepyhead has mentioned this upthread but surely this should be a HMO and not a joint tenancy.

Is this housing on the university accommodation list?

Each room for students should be rented as a single room, not all lumped together on a joint tenancy. It is a HMO (house of multi-occupation) dodge of extra responsibilities that the landlord should be fulfilling because he/she needs a HMO license.

Taken from CAB website

"What is an HMO?

There is a complex legal definition setting out what an HMO is. However, in general terms, it is a building where more than one household lives and shares facilities.

A single household is where members of the same family live together, including unmarried couples. For example, if you lived with a friend and a couple that is three households"

HMO makes it fair as rooms are usually different sizes and are rented according to their size. Your niece's first port of call needs to be the accommodation officer.

Basically if everyone ran off owing rent on a joint tenancy then one person can be held accountable for everyone. So a house share of 8, 1 person could be liable for all 8 people's rent.

As students, each student should hold a separate tenancy agreement for that one room. A decent landlord would do this. That way if someone drops out of uni but remains in the house, council tax becomes chargeable to the landlord. He can evict just one tenant from their one room and the landlord doesn't lose the income on the other rooms. Harsh, but they are "student" lets. Council tax is exempted for students. So if you stop being a student the landlord gets charged council tax in an HMO.

Brilliant advice here, there's a lot to think about and I will pass it on to her.
I think she has put it down to experience and is getting on with it.

Most student accommodation beyond the first year is private rented accommodation and nothing to do with the Uni. Groups of friends go and look round and find a house, with one agreement which they all sign and are all liable for the rent.
Most houses don't have equal sized rooms so someone gets the smaller room and often there is one very small room. Some one has to have it. Students work this out at the time amongst themselves. Sometimes they draw lots for the rooms, sometimes they adjust the rent according to rooms amongst themselves, sometimes so done voluneteers for the small room.

It sounds like an agreement was made a year ago and she agreed to take the small room, however the decision was reached. All 4 students will have been working out their finances based on a quarter of the rent. If that was the agreement, it is not reasonable at this point to ask to pay less, which means others will pay more. I can understand why they have resisted that idea. it doesn't seem especially mean to me.

I agree with others that she just needs to put up with it now and make sure she avoids this happening in future. Perhaps she will spend more time in the living areas than the others as her room is small. Perhaps she will sometimes work at the dining table if it gives more space. It would be reasonable to use the communal spaces more. perhaps she can ask one of the others if she can keep a few bits in their rooms.

With these things, it is all to do with how you approach them. If she has demanded a rent reduction, having previously accepted the situation, that is never going to go down well with the others. Asking nicely and in friendly way to store stuff in the others rooms or in the communal area is more likely to met with cheery acceptances.

And if these guys are truly unreasonable, even if she hasn't been, then perhaps they are not really her friends and she should live with others next year. But perhaps they actually are decent people and are good friends and she just needs to learn to assert herself at the crucial moments when rooms are being divvied up and bills decided. It is too late now.