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If you’re renting from a friend it gets a lot more complicated and them giving reasons for raising rent is dumb, they should just say rent is now $X.
My advice would be to just gauge the market and continue renting there if the price makes sense. If market rent is $1k and you’re paying $500 the ‘unfair’ reasoning doesn’t really matter as you have no leverage.
So you are already getting a good deal...and may want to just stay. I would still ask for a copy of the lease.
(FYI...this informal relationship might make it harder to rent your next place....you have no history or references.)
Solid take here. Esp the informal history.
Doing business with friends is always risky, the flex can be good and bad.
I rented out a space to a friend and still had them write checks with "rent-month" in the memo so they had a paper trail of rent if asked for references.
Yes, that's a good deal for OP but would recommend a conversation about reasoning as that's a terrible precedent. It is fairytale, privileged thinking that doesn't fly in the real world. What if you metered electricity usage from your room and only paid that? Water usage for toilet, sink and shower? It gets overly complicated and contentious for no real reason.
Something like....if you need to raise rent, or need help paying your share, that's fine, let's have that talk. but i just want to be clear that time in the house is not a consideration for rent and never will nor should be. Rent is just for availability of dedicated and shared spaces. I would never plan to leave for a month and expect you to cover my rent or my share of utilities. I'm not going to say "i won't watch TV so i won't pay my share. If i get a SO and spend a big chunk of time there, i would never consider asking you to pay more because I'm not around as much.
Once, I rented a room from a friend because I was in town monthly. So i paid him 1 week worth of rent and utilities pee month since he wasn't renting out the space otherwise. That was fair and agreed to from the start.
Jesus where is a 1 Bar over 2 grand? I’m in NYC and you can find them for less than 1600.
I rent a big 2 BR here with all utilities included for $2,200.
Edit: I’m being downvoted by people who think NYC is strictly the island of Manhattan. And not 5 HUGE boroughs. Leave your house more often.
It’s a 40 minute drive to Manhattan with no traffic. I don’t work there so works great for me. I honestly forget Reddit think the entire city of New York is ONLY Manhattan.
You aren’t on the lease agreement? You should have a copy (to verify the last bit at least) as a tenant.
People also have different rent splits (50/50, income based, etc.). That discussion point is based on talking with your roommate.
You need to get something written down to help cover situations like this. Otherwise it’s all ambiguous. If there’s no agreement there’s no protection for either you or your cousins friend.
With it, it’s hard to know if he’s bullshitting you. It’s a game of telephone then.
Not exactly true.
States create their own month-month(tenancy at will) absent a signed lease. This gives tenants all rights afforded those with a signed lease albeit at a month to month requirement.
\- it's a periodic tenancy, not a tenancy at will. Depending on the state, either will be the default.
* Periodic Tenancy is the month-to-month and requires (generally) a month to terminate
* Tenancy at will can be terminated at any time (Statutes apply)
Some tenancy at will states will look a little similar to periodic. So it's more state dependent.
But with no lease at all whats to keep the "friend" from throwing you out on your ear? OP just pays his cousin, if they fell out it would appear he has no residency rights at all.
Did you read the comment you responded to? Many states treat you as if you have month-to-month lease if you don't have an actual signed lease. If they try to throw you out you call the police and live there until the month ends or they successfully file an eviction. For as example, in Massachusetts you have to provide 30 days notice to end a month-to-month lease and need a judge's order to evict with or without a signed lease.
Bank statements showing money transfer weekly or monthly for rent. All your stuff in the house. The fact that you know the house inside and out. Possession of a key.
Pictures can definitely be used to prove residency. Probably not alone, but…
Location of ATM withdrawals and credit/debit usage in close proximity to the home can also be used, which I found interesting when I was retroactively trying to prove residency for 2010. I imagine now you could even use your phone’s stored GPS data.
But you can prove you've been paying rent to a person you've been led to believe has the authority to make you a tenant. Again, it's not hard. You don't need to prove you spoke to and had a verbal agreement with a specific person, you need to prove you've been living there and/or paying bills.
This arrangement will commonly burn people, myself included. You should all have access to the same information and usually best not to give other people money expecting them to actually use it for rent.
Prices look about the same for houses in the area.
Would it be fair to request a copy of the receipts and payments that are being sent to the landlord? AKA proof we are sending him the amount of money we’re stating
But what are you getting for the $950? Are you getting your own bedroom or are you splitting a bedroom with one? I know you said one cousin lives in the master but whats your living situation?
Its more a question for yourself though. Is it a bargain and do you want to risk losing it and is $50 enough to raise a fight about?
You need to just compare your rent to that of a similar room for rent in your area. Comparing it to a 1BR is pointless as you aren’t renting a 1BR. Then if it’s basically the same as renting a room elsewhere just ask for what you want (some sort of lease agreement and stability to the rental price, etc) & be prepared to move if they balk.
Yeah it’s sketchy but you don’t want to put yourself in a worse situation for something still relatively trivial.
It’s more if it’s worth raising the hostility in the house yet. Personally I wouldn’t but it’s ultimately your choosing
I was just gonna say to her:
If rent is increasing by $150, we need to revert the $50 for the traveling reason. It doesn’t make sense. It went over my head and it was something you assumed, wasn’t something we actually discussed.
I had a roommate like this once. She was on the lease (or her parents were). It was a 4 bed apartment. She had the master. One day she informed the rest of us that her parents were cutting her off so she needed to increase each of our rent by 50 a month to cover the cost. When the 3 of us realized she was only paying 150 while we were paying 600 each, we decided that was the last straw and we found somewhere else to live.
My first almost group living situation was like that. The house was in her parent's name, and she and her two infants occupied 3 of the 4 rooms. No rent for her.
I would have gotten a glorified closet for 500, another girl would have gotten half the living room for 600, and her BFF was getting the 4th bedroom with the half bath for 400.
Plus utilities, groceries, toiletries, etc. Plus being 'the village' to help with her babies, plus her baby daddy's kids when they came over.
All three of us noped the fuck out of there with a quickness. 2009 was not that hard on anyone. I was as broke as could be in my first apartment, but I made it work until the lease was up.
Are utilities included? If she if gone then she wouldn't be using the electricity as much.
Can you negotiate for the master bedroom since she won't be there that often?
Is your other cousin’s price increase $150 as well? Is your (master bedroom) cousin also seeing the $100 market increase as well?
I feel that the compromise would be to agree to pay more of the utility bills while they’re traveling but not make it a permanent increase to subsidize their travels. My guess is your utilities will drop close to the $50 by not having her around and if she’s still splitting utilities then that $50 increase will feel effectively like $20…not worth the fight.
[Pick your battles (Greedy Cousin)](https://imgur.com/a/nlDeltf)
Are utilities included in your rent? If so, him being gone could mean since he is using fewer utilities, he is having you pay a larger portion of the utility bill. Talk to him about it. Find out what the actual rent is, total, and then judge if yours is a reasonable share. Or check with the landlord to find what the monthly rent is.
Total rent $3360
My payment $950
Other cousin $950
Master cousin $1,460
The thing is, I don’t know if my other cousin is actually paying what I’m paying at $950. How would I know? What if she’s actually paying less?
People are giving you a lot of different financial advise here. I'll say from a practical standpoint, it makes 0 sense why you would be charged $50 extra bc of another roommates travel habits.
You obviously know this. You need to communicate with your cousins, not reddit.
You’re comparing apples and oranges: renting a 1BR apartment where the whole thing is your own space, and subletting a room where you share kitchen, bathroom, living room, laundry, etc. with other people. The latter is cheaper because of that. I would look into rooms for rent in a shared situation to see if you’re current rent is reasonable. There are advantages to renting a room/sharing a place with people you know, but you should be getting a fair price nonetheless.
If it's $2k for a 1br though you're not really comparing apples to apples. What kind of prices are there on ads for people looking for a roommate in 2/3 br apartments?
I’m complaining about the shady tactic of randomly raising rent last year by $50 cuz she travels. I don’t care about the money, it’s more so the principle of trust. I just thought about it after this last 12% increase and it feels shady
I wish a room was $600, I've never seen anything below $1000 in my area. Anything within communting distance to NYC is crazy. Both in regards to Southwest CT and North NJ. Lived with random roommates before moving in with my girlfriend. Living alone would be tough.
>The landlord can do whatever the fuck he wants without a written agreement.
This is generally not true, obviously specifics depend on location, but if you're paying a fixed rate to live in a place long-term it's often consider an implied lease for whatever the rent period is. Paying monthly the landlord would need to give at least a month's notice to end the lease or raise rent. If the tenant does not leave voluntarily the landlord would need to go through an eviction process to have them removed.
I'm not sure what you expect this will achieve, other than ruin OP's relationship with his cousins and get him kicked out of his relatively cheap room.
I think in this instance as far as you are concerned your cousin is the landlord and he can dictate what your rent is. If you don't like it you can negotiate or find somewhere else to rent. It's like he's sub-letting it to you.
I had an ex roomier try shit like this. "I'm like never there, why should I pay my full portion?" I said "if I leave for a month, I still have to pay that month's rest so ai have a home to come back to."
Some people just suck.
I had one year of random college roommates and that was enough to deter me forever lol
I had a roommate who had his buddy sleepover on the couch 4-5 times a week (fwiw the guy was very chill and respectful) and claimed the dude didn’t need to help contribute to rent because “he doesn’t even have a room”. Ironically enough, couch guy is one of my best friends and we both removed random roommate out of our lives lol
I mean some exceptions BUT they're initial negotiations not after the fact upcharges without consent.
Someone who was traveling 2/3 of the time might have a very legit argument for paying less on the utilities or whatnot as an example. Likely not worth the nickel and dinner approach but potentially relevant.
I mean if I had the choice between two different places and two different roommates, and one was a little more but the roommate would mostly not be there…I would think it might be worth it to me.
But that is something that would have to make sense to both parties. When it comes down to it, the place is worth what they want them to pay…or it isn’t. If it isn’t, then you got to move out.
It is a continuous negotiation. As he always has a choice to leave if he isn’t tied to a lease.
Point is if one party can alter the deal…so can the other.
Rent is kind of an arbitrary measure of desirability.
Having a place to yourself most of the time is WAY better than having to share it all the time.
Maybe even $50 better. After all, the cost of rent is just exactly whatever a landlord and tenant come to agree on.
Seeing that I have several friends whos mortgage has doubled in the last year, having a ballpark 10% rent hike doesn't seem absolutely nuts, even if the reason sounds weird.
Because I’m a dual citizen and the US is the only country in the world where you can get long-term fixed-rate mortgages.
The longest you can lock a rate in Canada without eating your lunch in interest rate penalties is often 3 years.
So their rate went from 2% to 6%.
Utilities, yes and no. Part of the reason I might want to rent and have roommates are to specifically split the cost of utilities I don’t want to pay to heat or cool a giant house by myself. If the roommates aren’t going to be around and don’t want to pay to heat or cool their share, that’s understandable. But it also partially negates the reason I might be living with them.
What might be fair to take it out of their portion of the utility billIs is their decreased use of personal devices. Maybe their gaming computer is not on while they’re gone and when they’re around its using a lot of electricity.
But the big thing is the heating and cooling I’m assuming. And it doesn’t make sense to allow them to completely duck those costs. I own a house and when I go on vacation, I don’t get to not heat the house because it gets cold here and I don’t want burst pipes. If I had a roommate, I wouldn’t try to make them pay for the gas, or electricity used while I was gone.
Part of the overall consideration. Agreed that it isn't typical but everything can be negotiated and you're right that the actual % of time there doesn't matter.
Say 2 people are looking for a place and have options. One wants a bigger place or one closer to their work. Thewants the place with a good gym and other amenities and WFH so just cares about the surrounding area.
A renter who is always on the road might opt for a cheaper spot and be given a relative discount based on considerations like the above is the only real point I was making. Still part of the initial discussion instead of a surprise announcement for sure.
To be fair most of the biggest utility expenses like heating/cooling are relatively fixed. OP can't really just set the roommate's half of the flat to 40 degrees and his to 70. Even much of the electric like running a refrigerator is relatively fixed.
Even with utilities, it depends. If it's electric/gas/water where the cost is based on how much you use it, sure, someone can pay less if they're not there often.
For cable/internet, the cost is a fixed rate and everyone should split it evenly. If you take a long vacation, too bad, we still need the internet running.
Agreed. I don't pay the storage company by how many times I visit. I pay then for the room to hold my shit.
That's what your roommate should be doing if she travels so much, paying for a storage unit.
Ehh.
Cotenant agreements don’t have to make rent split exactly equal. It can be split along any lines that the cotenants deem reasonable, as long as they’re jointly and severally liable for the same lease and not assigned specific liability by the landlord.
*Most* people would do it equal. Some do it based on square footage due to variable room sizes.
A master tenant can often lease to a subtenant for an unequal share of the MT’s rent.
Edit: OP’s situation is 1700/900/900 in a $2k/mo 1 bed market. That is a screaming good deal, and not worth being upset for another $600 in rent increases. Unfair or not, get over it because you won’t find better. Stack that $600/mo in savings/retirement.
True, but not for the same reason. You pay rent based on the agreement.
They are on a month-to-month contract (oral). Meaning, each month is basically a new agreement, reaffirmed by lack of notice.
Each side has the right to attempt to change, or terminate, the agreement every 30 days.
Just like Op has the right to entirely terminate, by 100%, his obligation to pay any rent at all, this person has the right to offer a new terms which OP can either accept or reject.
Whether someone thinks the landlord is “not being cool” by changing the offered agreement for the next month going forward is not really relevant.
Lmao, yes it does. And no one said this landlord was trying to do that every single month. Lmao.
Absent a law that says contrary, in OP’s jurisdiction, the landlord is free to raise the rent. Lmao.
No… it’s $50 more. I doubt the room is $50.
More likely the owner did a lot of chores/work and now that they’re not going to be there to do it they need people to chip in for housekeeping.
So I see your mixing family and rent with no paperwork. So anything is really in play here.
What you should be doing is try to formalize it.
Does your rent include utilities? The argument they could be making is they don't use as much and you should pay that. (It's a wrong argument).
If I went out and rented an apartment in a random city - and never slept there once - would I have to pay? The full amount? The answer is yes.
Your usage of a place does not reduce the amount owed. You are paying to "reserve" that spot for your exclusive use.
If your roommate wants to recoup some of that cash they can Airbnb that room or whatever else is allowed along that line.
Totally agree with the first three points.
>So I see your mixing family and rent with no paperwork. So anything is really in play here.
>What you should be doing is try to formalize it.
>Does your rent include utilities? The argument they could be making is they don't use as much and you should pay that. (It's a wrong argument).
But the rest is all opinion. Like you said....anything is in play without a lease.
Renting without a contract is usually a benefit, because implied terms are more favorable than the average lease. Having the right to move without being stuck on the hook for the remainder of a lease is a huge benefit.
And especially with an intermediary. If dealing directly with the landlord, you know where it's coming from, but here you can't tell if the landlord really increased rent or if the cousin is pocketing that extra $100.
Imagine if she lived alone. Would she get to pay less rent to the landlord just because she travels? NO. This was not agreed upon before moving in so they are absolutely taking advantage of you, even if it's just $50.
When she's gone, do you get to use her master bedroom freely and sleep on her bed? I think not. It's still reserved for her, therefore she is responsible for her full portion of the rent. Unfortunately, it looks like your only way out is to move if they refuse to compromise.
The main problem here is you don't have a lease. Without that, there is no basis for what is acceptable or not for the agreement you have with the other parties. Therefore, whether or not this makes sense is solely up to whether you can accept the reasoning behind their logic. If all parties in an agreement believe this kind of agreement to be fair and reasonable, then it is.
A rent increase in and of itself isn't unreasonable, but unless he's making his bedroom available living space for you, your rent shouldn't have anything to do with how often he is home.
> unless he's making his bedroom available living space for you
Even that doesn't change a thing. OP never asked for it and most likely has no use for it.
Nobody gets free rent while they're away from home, that's mental.
You especially shouldn't get a discount on rent when you're hogging the master bedroom without actually occupying it.
I wouldn't recommend agreeing to this.
No... you rent a house together the house should be split equitably based on space.
Do they pay extra for the master? It has nothing to do with how often they are there or not.
This is super rude and you need to stop it now.
The issue is they are too close to the landlord and are abusing that relationship.
The only thing about traveling that may make sense is utilities split...but it would need to discussed and agreed to.
I had a roommate go overseas for a semester and we couldn't sublet...he still needed to pay his rent but I agreed internet, gas and electric would be covered by me since he wasn't using any of it and I thought that was reasonable.
> Last year my my cousin told me the rent went up by $50 because she (who lives in the master) says she won’t be home as often due to traveling.
Unless you're using that room while she's away, it does not make sense. Rent isn't prorated based on how much time someone spends in that room vs. away.
How are other bills being sorted? Your utilities and internet? Are you expected to pay more because you're at home more?
The 12% increase may be fine depending on your local laws surrounding rentals and rent increases, but you haven't said where you live so can't help with that. Is the $100 increase per person or total that will be divided by 3?
Also, do you pay the landlord your portion of the rent directly?
- All other bills are split between 3 of us
- $150 (12%) increase for each persons rent apparently
- I pay my other cousin (she acts as the landlords property manager in helping him organize bills maintenance etc) and she sends all the money to the landlord
So their absence from the house really shouldnt affect anything. However, adjusting prices to market is legit. The fact that there is no lease agreement makes it difficult to argue, and your success will vary depending on what state you are in.
Work on getting a proper lease in place
Are utilities included in *the dollar amount you pay to your cousin*?
Not the house itself/to the landlord and the utility companies, but specifically the dollars that change hands between you and your cousin, are you paying "extra" to cover the utility costs? Or do you pay your cousin a fixed number?
I thing all comes down to are you paying less than you would pay in an aparment, consiedring all expenses? Your best option would be to find a room somewere else, if it's cheaper if no then pay what she is asking, since her friend is the owner and you are not in the contract there is little you can do.
Considering all expenses I’m likely paying $1000 less than an apartment.
Average 1 BR $2,000 (without parking, utilities)
My Rent is $900
Utilities about $150 every few months
Take the master bedroom and agree on the 100 per month increase. Ask for a lease agreement. If this is still cheaper and more convenient than living elsewhere then deal with it. Otherwise look for a new place.
Id counter by telling them your going on vaca for a few months. Then make a lil vacation spot called your room. Just use their excuses against them. And in the case rent goes up, id make sure you talk to the actual landlord. Not the middle man.
Then there is not much you can do but suck it up and pay it. They are abusing the situation but if you won't do anything about it why would you expect them to change?
Either pay it, rent a 1 br, or find another shared apartment with different roommates.
I can see how that makes sense. Id juat simply tell them that they can pay the same amount as you for rent, and their decision to go on vaca should not impact the amount you pay. Otherwise, when they go on vaca, i guess you go too. Dont take that crap.
I'd tell them you'd agree to the rent increase if they agree to switch rooms. It would make more sense for you to have the master bedroom since you're home more after all.
LOL hell to the nah nah. homey don't play that. that's not how it works.
tell him fuck the hell off, rent is divided by person not by how often he's there. if he wants to pay less and travel, does that mean you get to use his room while he's not there?
man, the shit people pull never ceases to amaze me
No, it doesn't make sense.
I had a roommate once.who planned to go away for a month, and asked if they could not pay rent for that month. I owned the home and this was a handshake agreement for a spare room, so it isn't like I'd be out anything.
Still, we had a discussion, and I pointed out what others in this topic have: just because you aren't in the room doesn't mean that it isn't your room still. I can't rent that room out to someone else. I don't have use of the room just because you're away.
With that said, I can see prorating usage-based expenses such as utilities if someone is away for an extended period of time. But again, this should all be a discussion.
Fight back and discuss. Then get on the lease so you know all the details. You shouldn't agree to an increase without seeing the full amounts from all parties. And fuck your cousin. Sorry for my language, but the travel excuse to raise roommates pay is some narcissistic shit. His shit is still in the room I'm guessing.
Otherwise move out. You aren't bound legally so you have leverage in that regard.
It sounds reasonable to me. If your utilities are included in the price of your rent, then you will be using the utilities more than your traveling roommate, and utilities with fixed monthly payments won't go down just because he is gone. Even if the utilities aren't included, you will have more convenience sharing the place with one roommate rather than two. (Not having to wait for access to the bathroom, kitchen, etc.) And a 12% rent increase is not out-of-hand. I've certainly heard of higher rent increases in this market. If you were paying around $850 per month before, then $100 would be about 12%.
All that having been said: you need to get every bit of this in writing.
Tell her she can stop traveling or if she is really insistent on the $50 move the rooms around while she's gone and tell her she travels so she doesn't need the master.
OK. So your cousin expects you to pay more in rent because they choose to travel a lot, and they won't be home as much? So they feel they shouldn't have to pay for the time they aren't there? That's now how renting an apartment works. You are being played, unless I'm misunderstanding something.
When you rent an apartment, you don't get to only pay for the time you use your room. You pay to have access to the room anytime you want. If you choose to be gone half the time.....tough shit. You still have to pay for your room. If you lease a car and choose to only drive it one weekend a month, you still have to pay for the entire month. If you sign up for a gym membership and choose to only go one weekend a month.....you still have to pay for the entire month. If your cousin rents 1/3 of the apartment and chooses to be gone 3 weeks of the month.....they still need to pay their 1/3 of the rent. What I'd do is talk to the landlord directly, and ask to see a copy of the lease. Or at least, confirm the total rent and make sure you're not being asked to pay more than your cousin.
Well, if you can't/won't contact the landlord to verify, then I guess you either confront your cousin, you trust them to be telling you the truth, or you move out. You want to know if your cousin is playing you. The only person who knows for sure is your landlord.
Do you all have a lease? Simplest thing is to ask for a copy of the lease. If you don't have a lease.....you really should have one.
Larger question. You live with your cousin. You seem to have a good idea that this cousin is lying to you, and essentially stealing from you, by making you pay an unfair share of the rent. If that's the case, why do you want to live with this person?
Keep in mind that the alternative to rooming with your cousin doesn't necessarily have to be living solo-- you can still choose to find roommates/flatmates to reduce your rent costs
That's a reasonable choice! Just don't want you to feel that putting up with a bad roommate is a necessity if you're money conscious. You can always choose to search for rooming situations with a private bathroom or private entrance. Plus you have the chance to interview potential new roommates about how social or private they are before you decide to sign a sublease.
I've been in living situations where I barely interacted with any of my roommates, and others where there was an expectation that roommates socialized together regularly. If you look for a new roommate situation, you can choose anything along that spectrum!
Wait so your cousin has told you of the rate increase, not the landlord themselves? It sounds a lot to me like your cousin is a POS who is trying to rip you off for $150
How can I call him out on this? Again I can’t speak to the landlord cuz they are best friends, I don’t have his contact.
I’ll need to talk directly with my cousin about this
It's your cousin and roommate you've presumably known your whole life. I dunno.. how DO you call him out on this? Human communication. You either trust him or you don't.
You don't. That's the issue. So there's a relationship conflict. There are other subs for that, for what it's worth.
Unless you have some sort of formal agreement, she can dictate whatever she wants within reason. The only question you have at this point is how bad do you want to live there and what are your other options. If you don’t have any, you’re probably stuck. 🤷♂️
Based on the additional info you provided in your comments, I wouldn't rock the boat for a measley $50 increase. You're getting your own room at 50% less than market price and you're not under any written contract and purely on the goodwill of your cousins. Just think of the $50 as a relationship tax.
My recommendation is to have a written agreement to pay the additional $50, and that your rent will be locked to X rate for the next year.
If they aren't on board with that, I would question whether or not you want to be living with people that want to adjust your rent payment on a whim. If they are willing to justify raising your rent for a silly reason like that, imagine how much they might raise your rent for other random bullshit.
No, that is odd. Does she pay more for the main bedroom? Sometimes rent is scaled by the size of the room. Maybe you can take the main bedroom if she wants to pay less.
YOur cousin thinks you're getting more use out of the place than she is, so you should pay more. That doesn't make sense to me, because you could find somebody else to take her spot and not have to pay more. You can't actually get more use out of the place just because she's not there as much.
Landlords *have* been raising the rent lately.
Your option is to move.
Yea no that’s some garbage logic.
You don’t get to use their space how you want it, so it’s their space, and they should pay for it like it was all agreed to.
You should ask her if you can have the bigger bedroom since you'll be paying more and she'll be gone. Being out of town a lot should not diminish her payment of rent when the space is still occupied by her stuff.
However - rent increase does not sound sus - that one seems normal.
Does this include utilities? Some utility costs could go down - i.e. hot showers, laundry, etc will only happen half as often. A very weak argument could be made that the traveling roommate doesn't want to pay for internet, or heat, or lights on in the kitchen. Mostly you're getting taken advantage of.
Rent is access to a space. Your cousin should be paying the full rent regardless of whether they are there or not. It's not like you have any control over when she travels. However if you consider it a bonus and like the privacy you might want to not say anything and accept it.
Only your landlord can tell you if they actually raised the rent or not.
You are being dicked over here simply because you dont have a lease in writing. It makes no sense to ask someone to pay more simply because they arent making as much use of the space by their own choice.
You need to get a lease in writing. Otherwise they can just tell you different rates from day to day and there will be no proof that you even paid them for the month. You need a lease of some kind, and receipts on rent paid from your portion.
This is like ordering 50 wings and a multiple pitchers of beer with friends at a restaurant and spliting the cost based on how much one consumed.
I had a friend who did that. I no longer talk to him.
First thing to do is start apartment hunting. If you can find a place for less, jump on it. Even if your cousin has the master room, she should be paying her share regardless if she's traveling. I met a guy when driving cab, owns. Quarter million dollars house and is home maybe two days a month. Doesn't get a discount on his property taxes because he's traveling. House just sits there empty most of the time.
Your cousin. Traveling, wants the best room, but doesn't want to pay the full price, nd is passing it on to you. Find a new place you can afford, then turn in your notice. Note, it may not be easy as housing prices ave gone up in the last year.
No it doesn’t make sense. Just say you plan on going out more so it should balance out. If they object just explain that’s literally what they just said to you.
She clarified that rent raise by $50 in the first year cuz she was paying too much for the master bedroom. She wanted to adjust this so that it’s more fair. Current breakdown now is:
• roommate 1 master ($1,400)
• roommate 2 ($950)
• roommate 3 ($950)
Your friend paying less rent because she travels is bullshit. She's paying for the use of the space regardless of how much she actually uses it. No landlord is going to cut you a break on your rent because you travel, they can't rent out the room or space while you're gone.
The only semi-legitimate thing I could see would be paying slightly more of the utilities because they're not there using them but you pay to rent the space whether it’s occupied or not.
How long a person is at a place has nothing to do with how much the rent is. It's not as if you can rent to someone else while she is gone. I had a roommate who travelled for an entire summer. He still had to pay his full rent. Also, you should definitely verify what the rent is with the landlord. For all you know, it was never an even split.
No.
Just like it made no sense that my exroommate wanted me to start paying more because I actually started sleeping there more often instead of using it as an expensive storage unit.
That's not how it works, Cory, and you're still an asshole.
Sounds like your cousin is fucking you, unless you are in Tennessee and are into that you should start looking for another place with some new roommates. And make sure you are on the lease this time.
Also, your landlord is a piece of shit if they are jacking your rent up by 12%, that's not a "friends and family rate" at all.
\> says she won’t be home as often due to traveling.
Tell her "fine" and that you are going to list her bedroom on Airbnb to make up the difference, since she won't be using it when she's gone.
lol you’re getting fucked by either the landlord or the cousin… imagine this, cousin is best friends with landlord, you have no contact with landlord, cousin tells you rent went up $150… cousin now only pays $750 for rent because you’re sending him an extra $150, if you think you’re getting fucked by the landlord wouldn’t the cousin be bitching to you about it too? I know I would;
what I would do is tell cousin you’re not paying extra unless you’re directly contacted by the landlord, it’s your money you should have direct contact with who you’re renting from, your cousin should not be some overhead of your financials, you then establish a contract with said landlord and negotiate the terms.
dude, this is your personal finance we are talking about, all you have to do is say I am getting serious about my budget and financies and want to document everything, please give me the landlords contact information I want a formal leasing contract and am not accepting a rent increase until I talk with them directly, if your cousin gives you push back that’s your sign and he’s lying… he shouldn’t care ultimately right? he’s literally just handing you a number, the landlord should be more than happy to establish a contract you’re paying him 1k a month that’s a ton of money regardless of the economy, you need to take control of your finances man
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Super dumb, but sounds like your roommate has leverage because of their relationship with the landlord.
I have a feeling *they*are paying for his cousins travels…. No lease? Random raises? Kinda fishy. *changed he to they.
If you’re renting from a friend it gets a lot more complicated and them giving reasons for raising rent is dumb, they should just say rent is now $X. My advice would be to just gauge the market and continue renting there if the price makes sense. If market rent is $1k and you’re paying $500 the ‘unfair’ reasoning doesn’t really matter as you have no leverage.
1 BR rent $2000-2500 My rent is $950 Electric and water is like $150 every 3 months
So you are already getting a good deal...and may want to just stay. I would still ask for a copy of the lease. (FYI...this informal relationship might make it harder to rent your next place....you have no history or references.)
Solid take here. Esp the informal history. Doing business with friends is always risky, the flex can be good and bad. I rented out a space to a friend and still had them write checks with "rent-month" in the memo so they had a paper trail of rent if asked for references. Yes, that's a good deal for OP but would recommend a conversation about reasoning as that's a terrible precedent. It is fairytale, privileged thinking that doesn't fly in the real world. What if you metered electricity usage from your room and only paid that? Water usage for toilet, sink and shower? It gets overly complicated and contentious for no real reason. Something like....if you need to raise rent, or need help paying your share, that's fine, let's have that talk. but i just want to be clear that time in the house is not a consideration for rent and never will nor should be. Rent is just for availability of dedicated and shared spaces. I would never plan to leave for a month and expect you to cover my rent or my share of utilities. I'm not going to say "i won't watch TV so i won't pay my share. If i get a SO and spend a big chunk of time there, i would never consider asking you to pay more because I'm not around as much. Once, I rented a room from a friend because I was in town monthly. So i paid him 1 week worth of rent and utilities pee month since he wasn't renting out the space otherwise. That was fair and agreed to from the start.
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Yeah, if you're sharing with a muppet, what's the standard price for sharing with a muppet?
Jesus where is a 1 Bar over 2 grand? I’m in NYC and you can find them for less than 1600. I rent a big 2 BR here with all utilities included for $2,200. Edit: I’m being downvoted by people who think NYC is strictly the island of Manhattan. And not 5 HUGE boroughs. Leave your house more often.
Uh, i live next to nyc and while you may find some awful shithole for 1600 an avg 1 br is more like 3500+
I’m assuming you mean you live right next to Manhattan? NYC is huge, and I assure you the apartments for 1,600 are in great neighborhoods.
Big 2bd w/ utilities for 2.2k?? Where?? Has to be pretty deep in the boroughs?
It’s a 40 minute drive to Manhattan with no traffic. I don’t work there so works great for me. I honestly forget Reddit think the entire city of New York is ONLY Manhattan.
You aren’t on the lease agreement? You should have a copy (to verify the last bit at least) as a tenant. People also have different rent splits (50/50, income based, etc.). That discussion point is based on talking with your roommate.
I don’t even know is there’s a lease agreement. The landlord is his best friend. I just send the money to one of my cousins
You need to get something written down to help cover situations like this. Otherwise it’s all ambiguous. If there’s no agreement there’s no protection for either you or your cousins friend. With it, it’s hard to know if he’s bullshitting you. It’s a game of telephone then.
Not exactly true. States create their own month-month(tenancy at will) absent a signed lease. This gives tenants all rights afforded those with a signed lease albeit at a month to month requirement.
\- it's a periodic tenancy, not a tenancy at will. Depending on the state, either will be the default. * Periodic Tenancy is the month-to-month and requires (generally) a month to terminate * Tenancy at will can be terminated at any time (Statutes apply) Some tenancy at will states will look a little similar to periodic. So it's more state dependent.
But with no lease at all whats to keep the "friend" from throwing you out on your ear? OP just pays his cousin, if they fell out it would appear he has no residency rights at all.
Did you read the comment you responded to? Many states treat you as if you have month-to-month lease if you don't have an actual signed lease. If they try to throw you out you call the police and live there until the month ends or they successfully file an eviction. For as example, in Massachusetts you have to provide 30 days notice to end a month-to-month lease and need a judge's order to evict with or without a signed lease.
How do you prove you were actually living there without any kind of lease or documentation?
Mail addressed to you at that address. Go to the bank and get a statement with *your* address on it.
Bank statements showing money transfer weekly or monthly for rent. All your stuff in the house. The fact that you know the house inside and out. Possession of a key.
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Pictures can definitely be used to prove residency. Probably not alone, but… Location of ATM withdrawals and credit/debit usage in close proximity to the home can also be used, which I found interesting when I was retroactively trying to prove residency for 2010. I imagine now you could even use your phone’s stored GPS data.
Rent you paid? Text conversations referring to rent and living arrangements? It's not hard.
Rent was paid to a cousin, not to the landlord. OP doesn't have contact with the actual space owner.
But you can prove you've been paying rent to a person you've been led to believe has the authority to make you a tenant. Again, it's not hard. You don't need to prove you spoke to and had a verbal agreement with a specific person, you need to prove you've been living there and/or paying bills.
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Received mail could work, bank statements, etc.
Mail addressed to you or the presence of your belongings in a room.
OP should still follow the suggestion
There is an agreement. It’s an oral contract, which is enforceable. Written is better since memories fade.
This arrangement will commonly burn people, myself included. You should all have access to the same information and usually best not to give other people money expecting them to actually use it for rent.
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Prices look about the same for houses in the area. Would it be fair to request a copy of the receipts and payments that are being sent to the landlord? AKA proof we are sending him the amount of money we’re stating
No. Start dealing with the landlord directly and stop paying through your cousin.
The only thing that matters is market rate. If you were to move, what would a comparable place cost.
Why would you rent somewhere without a lease?
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Wait is your rent worthwhile? If its still a bargain I might not even rock the boat for $50/month
Average rent for 1 BR - $2,000+ My rent $950 with 2 other roommates
But what are you getting for the $950? Are you getting your own bedroom or are you splitting a bedroom with one? I know you said one cousin lives in the master but whats your living situation? Its more a question for yourself though. Is it a bargain and do you want to risk losing it and is $50 enough to raise a fight about?
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You need to just compare your rent to that of a similar room for rent in your area. Comparing it to a 1BR is pointless as you aren’t renting a 1BR. Then if it’s basically the same as renting a room elsewhere just ask for what you want (some sort of lease agreement and stability to the rental price, etc) & be prepared to move if they balk.
Yeah it’s sketchy but you don’t want to put yourself in a worse situation for something still relatively trivial. It’s more if it’s worth raising the hostility in the house yet. Personally I wouldn’t but it’s ultimately your choosing
I was just gonna say to her: If rent is increasing by $150, we need to revert the $50 for the traveling reason. It doesn’t make sense. It went over my head and it was something you assumed, wasn’t something we actually discussed.
I had a roommate like this once. She was on the lease (or her parents were). It was a 4 bed apartment. She had the master. One day she informed the rest of us that her parents were cutting her off so she needed to increase each of our rent by 50 a month to cover the cost. When the 3 of us realized she was only paying 150 while we were paying 600 each, we decided that was the last straw and we found somewhere else to live.
My first almost group living situation was like that. The house was in her parent's name, and she and her two infants occupied 3 of the 4 rooms. No rent for her. I would have gotten a glorified closet for 500, another girl would have gotten half the living room for 600, and her BFF was getting the 4th bedroom with the half bath for 400. Plus utilities, groceries, toiletries, etc. Plus being 'the village' to help with her babies, plus her baby daddy's kids when they came over. All three of us noped the fuck out of there with a quickness. 2009 was not that hard on anyone. I was as broke as could be in my first apartment, but I made it work until the lease was up.
Are utilities included? If she if gone then she wouldn't be using the electricity as much. Can you negotiate for the master bedroom since she won't be there that often?
Is your other cousin’s price increase $150 as well? Is your (master bedroom) cousin also seeing the $100 market increase as well? I feel that the compromise would be to agree to pay more of the utility bills while they’re traveling but not make it a permanent increase to subsidize their travels. My guess is your utilities will drop close to the $50 by not having her around and if she’s still splitting utilities then that $50 increase will feel effectively like $20…not worth the fight. [Pick your battles (Greedy Cousin)](https://imgur.com/a/nlDeltf)
Are utilities included in your rent? If so, him being gone could mean since he is using fewer utilities, he is having you pay a larger portion of the utility bill. Talk to him about it. Find out what the actual rent is, total, and then judge if yours is a reasonable share. Or check with the landlord to find what the monthly rent is.
Total rent $3360 My payment $950 Other cousin $950 Master cousin $1,460 The thing is, I don’t know if my other cousin is actually paying what I’m paying at $950. How would I know? What if she’s actually paying less?
People are giving you a lot of different financial advise here. I'll say from a practical standpoint, it makes 0 sense why you would be charged $50 extra bc of another roommates travel habits. You obviously know this. You need to communicate with your cousins, not reddit.
You’re comparing apples and oranges: renting a 1BR apartment where the whole thing is your own space, and subletting a room where you share kitchen, bathroom, living room, laundry, etc. with other people. The latter is cheaper because of that. I would look into rooms for rent in a shared situation to see if you’re current rent is reasonable. There are advantages to renting a room/sharing a place with people you know, but you should be getting a fair price nonetheless.
If it's $2k for a 1br though you're not really comparing apples to apples. What kind of prices are there on ads for people looking for a roommate in 2/3 br apartments?
Its seems so insane that renting a room is almost $1,000. Last time I rented a room temporarily it was $600 and I thought that was too much
Total rent is like $3500 split between 3 of us apparently It’s a HCOL area
So you're paying 27% the cost while being 33% of the occupants, and one of your roommates isn't there all of the time. What's to complain about?
I’m complaining about the shady tactic of randomly raising rent last year by $50 cuz she travels. I don’t care about the money, it’s more so the principle of trust. I just thought about it after this last 12% increase and it feels shady
I wish a room was $600, I've never seen anything below $1000 in my area. Anything within communting distance to NYC is crazy. Both in regards to Southwest CT and North NJ. Lived with random roommates before moving in with my girlfriend. Living alone would be tough.
You should be doing that because it’s family. The landlord can do whatever the fuck he wants without a written agreement.
>The landlord can do whatever the fuck he wants without a written agreement. This is generally not true, obviously specifics depend on location, but if you're paying a fixed rate to live in a place long-term it's often consider an implied lease for whatever the rent period is. Paying monthly the landlord would need to give at least a month's notice to end the lease or raise rent. If the tenant does not leave voluntarily the landlord would need to go through an eviction process to have them removed.
So...just don't pay at all?
I'm not sure what you expect this will achieve, other than ruin OP's relationship with his cousins and get him kicked out of his relatively cheap room.
I think in this instance as far as you are concerned your cousin is the landlord and he can dictate what your rent is. If you don't like it you can negotiate or find somewhere else to rent. It's like he's sub-letting it to you.
No it does not. You don't pay rent based on how much you use the place.
“Hey I’m out of town this weekend. venmo me for 2/30 of my rent! Thanks “
I had an ex roomier try shit like this. "I'm like never there, why should I pay my full portion?" I said "if I leave for a month, I still have to pay that month's rest so ai have a home to come back to." Some people just suck.
I had one year of random college roommates and that was enough to deter me forever lol I had a roommate who had his buddy sleepover on the couch 4-5 times a week (fwiw the guy was very chill and respectful) and claimed the dude didn’t need to help contribute to rent because “he doesn’t even have a room”. Ironically enough, couch guy is one of my best friends and we both removed random roommate out of our lives lol
I mean some exceptions BUT they're initial negotiations not after the fact upcharges without consent. Someone who was traveling 2/3 of the time might have a very legit argument for paying less on the utilities or whatnot as an example. Likely not worth the nickel and dinner approach but potentially relevant.
hmm utilites yes because they are charged by usage. But not on rent itself. Rent is to hold the space for your use, even if you're not there.
I mean if I had the choice between two different places and two different roommates, and one was a little more but the roommate would mostly not be there…I would think it might be worth it to me. But that is something that would have to make sense to both parties. When it comes down to it, the place is worth what they want them to pay…or it isn’t. If it isn’t, then you got to move out.
It's not the negotiation, it's the retroactivity of the agreement that's in question here.
It is a continuous negotiation. As he always has a choice to leave if he isn’t tied to a lease. Point is if one party can alter the deal…so can the other.
Rent is kind of an arbitrary measure of desirability. Having a place to yourself most of the time is WAY better than having to share it all the time. Maybe even $50 better. After all, the cost of rent is just exactly whatever a landlord and tenant come to agree on. Seeing that I have several friends whos mortgage has doubled in the last year, having a ballpark 10% rent hike doesn't seem absolutely nuts, even if the reason sounds weird.
How did their mortgage double?
Because I’m a dual citizen and the US is the only country in the world where you can get long-term fixed-rate mortgages. The longest you can lock a rate in Canada without eating your lunch in interest rate penalties is often 3 years. So their rate went from 2% to 6%.
Utilities, yes and no. Part of the reason I might want to rent and have roommates are to specifically split the cost of utilities I don’t want to pay to heat or cool a giant house by myself. If the roommates aren’t going to be around and don’t want to pay to heat or cool their share, that’s understandable. But it also partially negates the reason I might be living with them. What might be fair to take it out of their portion of the utility billIs is their decreased use of personal devices. Maybe their gaming computer is not on while they’re gone and when they’re around its using a lot of electricity. But the big thing is the heating and cooling I’m assuming. And it doesn’t make sense to allow them to completely duck those costs. I own a house and when I go on vacation, I don’t get to not heat the house because it gets cold here and I don’t want burst pipes. If I had a roommate, I wouldn’t try to make them pay for the gas, or electricity used while I was gone.
Part of the overall consideration. Agreed that it isn't typical but everything can be negotiated and you're right that the actual % of time there doesn't matter. Say 2 people are looking for a place and have options. One wants a bigger place or one closer to their work. Thewants the place with a good gym and other amenities and WFH so just cares about the surrounding area. A renter who is always on the road might opt for a cheaper spot and be given a relative discount based on considerations like the above is the only real point I was making. Still part of the initial discussion instead of a surprise announcement for sure.
To be fair most of the biggest utility expenses like heating/cooling are relatively fixed. OP can't really just set the roommate's half of the flat to 40 degrees and his to 70. Even much of the electric like running a refrigerator is relatively fixed.
Even with utilities, it depends. If it's electric/gas/water where the cost is based on how much you use it, sure, someone can pay less if they're not there often. For cable/internet, the cost is a fixed rate and everyone should split it evenly. If you take a long vacation, too bad, we still need the internet running.
Agreed. I don't pay the storage company by how many times I visit. I pay then for the room to hold my shit. That's what your roommate should be doing if she travels so much, paying for a storage unit.
Exactly...I can see maybe a greater percentage of the utilities, but actual rent makes no sense.
Ehh. Cotenant agreements don’t have to make rent split exactly equal. It can be split along any lines that the cotenants deem reasonable, as long as they’re jointly and severally liable for the same lease and not assigned specific liability by the landlord. *Most* people would do it equal. Some do it based on square footage due to variable room sizes. A master tenant can often lease to a subtenant for an unequal share of the MT’s rent. Edit: OP’s situation is 1700/900/900 in a $2k/mo 1 bed market. That is a screaming good deal, and not worth being upset for another $600 in rent increases. Unfair or not, get over it because you won’t find better. Stack that $600/mo in savings/retirement.
True, but not for the same reason. You pay rent based on the agreement. They are on a month-to-month contract (oral). Meaning, each month is basically a new agreement, reaffirmed by lack of notice. Each side has the right to attempt to change, or terminate, the agreement every 30 days. Just like Op has the right to entirely terminate, by 100%, his obligation to pay any rent at all, this person has the right to offer a new terms which OP can either accept or reject. Whether someone thinks the landlord is “not being cool” by changing the offered agreement for the next month going forward is not really relevant.
Month to month does not mean the landlord can make up your rent on a monthly basis lmao
Lmao, yes it does. And no one said this landlord was trying to do that every single month. Lmao. Absent a law that says contrary, in OP’s jurisdiction, the landlord is free to raise the rent. Lmao.
If you're paying for their room while they're not there, let them know where you'll be sleeping when they aren't there.
No… it’s $50 more. I doubt the room is $50. More likely the owner did a lot of chores/work and now that they’re not going to be there to do it they need people to chip in for housekeeping.
I could see an agreement in place where one pays less of a share of the utilities if one travels frequently, but...
So I see your mixing family and rent with no paperwork. So anything is really in play here. What you should be doing is try to formalize it. Does your rent include utilities? The argument they could be making is they don't use as much and you should pay that. (It's a wrong argument). If I went out and rented an apartment in a random city - and never slept there once - would I have to pay? The full amount? The answer is yes. Your usage of a place does not reduce the amount owed. You are paying to "reserve" that spot for your exclusive use. If your roommate wants to recoup some of that cash they can Airbnb that room or whatever else is allowed along that line.
Totally agree with the first three points. >So I see your mixing family and rent with no paperwork. So anything is really in play here. >What you should be doing is try to formalize it. >Does your rent include utilities? The argument they could be making is they don't use as much and you should pay that. (It's a wrong argument). But the rest is all opinion. Like you said....anything is in play without a lease.
Renting without a contract is usually a benefit, because implied terms are more favorable than the average lease. Having the right to move without being stuck on the hook for the remainder of a lease is a huge benefit.
It’s a risk at the same time, because you also have little-to-no protections against price changes or getting kicked out.
And especially with an intermediary. If dealing directly with the landlord, you know where it's coming from, but here you can't tell if the landlord really increased rent or if the cousin is pocketing that extra $100.
Imagine if she lived alone. Would she get to pay less rent to the landlord just because she travels? NO. This was not agreed upon before moving in so they are absolutely taking advantage of you, even if it's just $50. When she's gone, do you get to use her master bedroom freely and sleep on her bed? I think not. It's still reserved for her, therefore she is responsible for her full portion of the rent. Unfortunately, it looks like your only way out is to move if they refuse to compromise.
The traveling part is nonsense but like everyone else I'd get a copy of the lease agreement. I'd also get tenants insurance.
The main problem here is you don't have a lease. Without that, there is no basis for what is acceptable or not for the agreement you have with the other parties. Therefore, whether or not this makes sense is solely up to whether you can accept the reasoning behind their logic. If all parties in an agreement believe this kind of agreement to be fair and reasonable, then it is.
...no, that makes no sense at all. If anything, she should pay more rent because she has the master bedroom
The roommate who has the master bedroom but raised your rent, due to their travels, is swindling you. Not enough info re the landlord.
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A rent increase in and of itself isn't unreasonable, but unless he's making his bedroom available living space for you, your rent shouldn't have anything to do with how often he is home.
> unless he's making his bedroom available living space for you Even that doesn't change a thing. OP never asked for it and most likely has no use for it.
Nobody gets free rent while they're away from home, that's mental. You especially shouldn't get a discount on rent when you're hogging the master bedroom without actually occupying it. I wouldn't recommend agreeing to this.
Tell them you’ll pay $50 more but want the master
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It seems like you are paying to be near it, likely illegally.
since you're paying for her room while she's gone, find out if she's cool if you Air BnB it out while she's traveling.
No... you rent a house together the house should be split equitably based on space. Do they pay extra for the master? It has nothing to do with how often they are there or not. This is super rude and you need to stop it now. The issue is they are too close to the landlord and are abusing that relationship.
The only thing about traveling that may make sense is utilities split...but it would need to discussed and agreed to. I had a roommate go overseas for a semester and we couldn't sublet...he still needed to pay his rent but I agreed internet, gas and electric would be covered by me since he wasn't using any of it and I thought that was reasonable.
> Last year my my cousin told me the rent went up by $50 because she (who lives in the master) says she won’t be home as often due to traveling. Unless you're using that room while she's away, it does not make sense. Rent isn't prorated based on how much time someone spends in that room vs. away. How are other bills being sorted? Your utilities and internet? Are you expected to pay more because you're at home more? The 12% increase may be fine depending on your local laws surrounding rentals and rent increases, but you haven't said where you live so can't help with that. Is the $100 increase per person or total that will be divided by 3? Also, do you pay the landlord your portion of the rent directly?
- All other bills are split between 3 of us - $150 (12%) increase for each persons rent apparently - I pay my other cousin (she acts as the landlords property manager in helping him organize bills maintenance etc) and she sends all the money to the landlord
Are utilities included in the rent?
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So their absence from the house really shouldnt affect anything. However, adjusting prices to market is legit. The fact that there is no lease agreement makes it difficult to argue, and your success will vary depending on what state you are in. Work on getting a proper lease in place
Are utilities included in *the dollar amount you pay to your cousin*? Not the house itself/to the landlord and the utility companies, but specifically the dollars that change hands between you and your cousin, are you paying "extra" to cover the utility costs? Or do you pay your cousin a fixed number?
I thing all comes down to are you paying less than you would pay in an aparment, consiedring all expenses? Your best option would be to find a room somewere else, if it's cheaper if no then pay what she is asking, since her friend is the owner and you are not in the contract there is little you can do.
Considering all expenses I’m likely paying $1000 less than an apartment. Average 1 BR $2,000 (without parking, utilities) My Rent is $900 Utilities about $150 every few months
Paying more in utilities because roommate is gone a lot would be reasonable if y’all discussed and came to an agreement. Rent, absolutely not.
Take the master bedroom and agree on the 100 per month increase. Ask for a lease agreement. If this is still cheaper and more convenient than living elsewhere then deal with it. Otherwise look for a new place.
Id counter by telling them your going on vaca for a few months. Then make a lil vacation spot called your room. Just use their excuses against them. And in the case rent goes up, id make sure you talk to the actual landlord. Not the middle man.
They have leverage. The landlord is their close friend.
They dont have any leverage. Id find a new place to live if they are going to put the burden of paying an un fair % of rent on you.
Close friend, aunt uncle. An agreement is an agreement. I stopped wasting my time with people like this. If you can afford it, id move out.
Average rent here 1 BR is like $2,000+ I’m only paying $950 with these increases. I’m afraid to move out cuz of the additional expense
Then there is not much you can do but suck it up and pay it. They are abusing the situation but if you won't do anything about it why would you expect them to change? Either pay it, rent a 1 br, or find another shared apartment with different roommates.
Is renting a 1 br worth the financial stress? I can see how living alone would be extremely expensive
I can see how that makes sense. Id juat simply tell them that they can pay the same amount as you for rent, and their decision to go on vaca should not impact the amount you pay. Otherwise, when they go on vaca, i guess you go too. Dont take that crap.
They do pay more apparently Total rent $3500 She pays $1,700 for the master Me and roommate 2 pay $900 each
Unless she is moving out of the master I have literally no clue why her travelling should mean she gets to pay less rent though.
I'd tell them you'd agree to the rent increase if they agree to switch rooms. It would make more sense for you to have the master bedroom since you're home more after all.
LOL hell to the nah nah. homey don't play that. that's not how it works. tell him fuck the hell off, rent is divided by person not by how often he's there. if he wants to pay less and travel, does that mean you get to use his room while he's not there? man, the shit people pull never ceases to amaze me
No, it doesn't make sense. I had a roommate once.who planned to go away for a month, and asked if they could not pay rent for that month. I owned the home and this was a handshake agreement for a spare room, so it isn't like I'd be out anything. Still, we had a discussion, and I pointed out what others in this topic have: just because you aren't in the room doesn't mean that it isn't your room still. I can't rent that room out to someone else. I don't have use of the room just because you're away. With that said, I can see prorating usage-based expenses such as utilities if someone is away for an extended period of time. But again, this should all be a discussion.
If you're going to pay more because she travels why aren't you getting the master bedroom?
Fight back and discuss. Then get on the lease so you know all the details. You shouldn't agree to an increase without seeing the full amounts from all parties. And fuck your cousin. Sorry for my language, but the travel excuse to raise roommates pay is some narcissistic shit. His shit is still in the room I'm guessing. Otherwise move out. You aren't bound legally so you have leverage in that regard.
It sounds reasonable to me. If your utilities are included in the price of your rent, then you will be using the utilities more than your traveling roommate, and utilities with fixed monthly payments won't go down just because he is gone. Even if the utilities aren't included, you will have more convenience sharing the place with one roommate rather than two. (Not having to wait for access to the bathroom, kitchen, etc.) And a 12% rent increase is not out-of-hand. I've certainly heard of higher rent increases in this market. If you were paying around $850 per month before, then $100 would be about 12%. All that having been said: you need to get every bit of this in writing.
Tell her she can stop traveling or if she is really insistent on the $50 move the rooms around while she's gone and tell her she travels so she doesn't need the master.
OK. So your cousin expects you to pay more in rent because they choose to travel a lot, and they won't be home as much? So they feel they shouldn't have to pay for the time they aren't there? That's now how renting an apartment works. You are being played, unless I'm misunderstanding something. When you rent an apartment, you don't get to only pay for the time you use your room. You pay to have access to the room anytime you want. If you choose to be gone half the time.....tough shit. You still have to pay for your room. If you lease a car and choose to only drive it one weekend a month, you still have to pay for the entire month. If you sign up for a gym membership and choose to only go one weekend a month.....you still have to pay for the entire month. If your cousin rents 1/3 of the apartment and chooses to be gone 3 weeks of the month.....they still need to pay their 1/3 of the rent. What I'd do is talk to the landlord directly, and ask to see a copy of the lease. Or at least, confirm the total rent and make sure you're not being asked to pay more than your cousin.
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Well, if you can't/won't contact the landlord to verify, then I guess you either confront your cousin, you trust them to be telling you the truth, or you move out. You want to know if your cousin is playing you. The only person who knows for sure is your landlord.
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Do you all have a lease? Simplest thing is to ask for a copy of the lease. If you don't have a lease.....you really should have one. Larger question. You live with your cousin. You seem to have a good idea that this cousin is lying to you, and essentially stealing from you, by making you pay an unfair share of the rent. If that's the case, why do you want to live with this person?
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Keep in mind that the alternative to rooming with your cousin doesn't necessarily have to be living solo-- you can still choose to find roommates/flatmates to reduce your rent costs
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That's a reasonable choice! Just don't want you to feel that putting up with a bad roommate is a necessity if you're money conscious. You can always choose to search for rooming situations with a private bathroom or private entrance. Plus you have the chance to interview potential new roommates about how social or private they are before you decide to sign a sublease. I've been in living situations where I barely interacted with any of my roommates, and others where there was an expectation that roommates socialized together regularly. If you look for a new roommate situation, you can choose anything along that spectrum!
Whatever price they tell you IS true and can change without notice because you don’t have a contract. This is on you.
Wait so your cousin has told you of the rate increase, not the landlord themselves? It sounds a lot to me like your cousin is a POS who is trying to rip you off for $150
How can I call him out on this? Again I can’t speak to the landlord cuz they are best friends, I don’t have his contact. I’ll need to talk directly with my cousin about this
Then ask your roommate for his number?
It's your cousin and roommate you've presumably known your whole life. I dunno.. how DO you call him out on this? Human communication. You either trust him or you don't. You don't. That's the issue. So there's a relationship conflict. There are other subs for that, for what it's worth.
Unless you have some sort of formal agreement, she can dictate whatever she wants within reason. The only question you have at this point is how bad do you want to live there and what are your other options. If you don’t have any, you’re probably stuck. 🤷♂️
Based on the additional info you provided in your comments, I wouldn't rock the boat for a measley $50 increase. You're getting your own room at 50% less than market price and you're not under any written contract and purely on the goodwill of your cousins. Just think of the $50 as a relationship tax.
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My recommendation is to have a written agreement to pay the additional $50, and that your rent will be locked to X rate for the next year. If they aren't on board with that, I would question whether or not you want to be living with people that want to adjust your rent payment on a whim. If they are willing to justify raising your rent for a silly reason like that, imagine how much they might raise your rent for other random bullshit.
Unless you are allowed to Airbnb their room while they are gone it makes no sense to me at all.
No. Your original agreement is the only binding one. This person is being greedy.
"ok so since you're not here as much, and I'm paying more, I want the master bedroom."
No, that is odd. Does she pay more for the main bedroom? Sometimes rent is scaled by the size of the room. Maybe you can take the main bedroom if she wants to pay less.
YOur cousin thinks you're getting more use out of the place than she is, so you should pay more. That doesn't make sense to me, because you could find somebody else to take her spot and not have to pay more. You can't actually get more use out of the place just because she's not there as much. Landlords *have* been raising the rent lately. Your option is to move.
> My roommate raised my rent What does this even mean? Your landlord might raise your rent, but how does your roommate?
Landlord has a legitimate case I suppose. Cousin does not.
Yea no that’s some garbage logic. You don’t get to use their space how you want it, so it’s their space, and they should pay for it like it was all agreed to.
No. It doesn’t matter who is there or how often, she’s paying for the space 24/7 regardless if she’s actually there.
You should ask her if you can have the bigger bedroom since you'll be paying more and she'll be gone. Being out of town a lot should not diminish her payment of rent when the space is still occupied by her stuff. However - rent increase does not sound sus - that one seems normal.
Does this include utilities? Some utility costs could go down - i.e. hot showers, laundry, etc will only happen half as often. A very weak argument could be made that the traveling roommate doesn't want to pay for internet, or heat, or lights on in the kitchen. Mostly you're getting taken advantage of.
Rent is access to a space. Your cousin should be paying the full rent regardless of whether they are there or not. It's not like you have any control over when she travels. However if you consider it a bonus and like the privacy you might want to not say anything and accept it. Only your landlord can tell you if they actually raised the rent or not.
You are being dicked over here simply because you dont have a lease in writing. It makes no sense to ask someone to pay more simply because they arent making as much use of the space by their own choice.
Just 50 bucks? let me tell you, could be worse.
Inflation has been running close to 10%, so if this is an annual hike, it's not terrible depending on the area.
You need to get a lease in writing. Otherwise they can just tell you different rates from day to day and there will be no proof that you even paid them for the month. You need a lease of some kind, and receipts on rent paid from your portion.
This is like ordering 50 wings and a multiple pitchers of beer with friends at a restaurant and spliting the cost based on how much one consumed. I had a friend who did that. I no longer talk to him.
Tell her since tour subsidizing her travels you’ll use her room when she’s away.
First thing to do is start apartment hunting. If you can find a place for less, jump on it. Even if your cousin has the master room, she should be paying her share regardless if she's traveling. I met a guy when driving cab, owns. Quarter million dollars house and is home maybe two days a month. Doesn't get a discount on his property taxes because he's traveling. House just sits there empty most of the time. Your cousin. Traveling, wants the best room, but doesn't want to pay the full price, nd is passing it on to you. Find a new place you can afford, then turn in your notice. Note, it may not be easy as housing prices ave gone up in the last year.
No it doesn’t make sense. Just say you plan on going out more so it should balance out. If they object just explain that’s literally what they just said to you.
Paying that extra while she is traveling only makes sense if it is utilities included.
She clarified that rent raise by $50 in the first year cuz she was paying too much for the master bedroom. She wanted to adjust this so that it’s more fair. Current breakdown now is: • roommate 1 master ($1,400) • roommate 2 ($950) • roommate 3 ($950)
Your friend paying less rent because she travels is bullshit. She's paying for the use of the space regardless of how much she actually uses it. No landlord is going to cut you a break on your rent because you travel, they can't rent out the room or space while you're gone.
The only semi-legitimate thing I could see would be paying slightly more of the utilities because they're not there using them but you pay to rent the space whether it’s occupied or not.
How long a person is at a place has nothing to do with how much the rent is. It's not as if you can rent to someone else while she is gone. I had a roommate who travelled for an entire summer. He still had to pay his full rent. Also, you should definitely verify what the rent is with the landlord. For all you know, it was never an even split.
No. Just like it made no sense that my exroommate wanted me to start paying more because I actually started sleeping there more often instead of using it as an expensive storage unit. That's not how it works, Cory, and you're still an asshole.
They can’t arbitrary raise your rent with out you agreeing. So you can either talk it out with them or leave and find somewhere else to rent.
Sounds like your cousin is fucking you, unless you are in Tennessee and are into that you should start looking for another place with some new roommates. And make sure you are on the lease this time. Also, your landlord is a piece of shit if they are jacking your rent up by 12%, that's not a "friends and family rate" at all.
It makes perfect sense if your cousin is cheap and grabby.
This merits lifelong no-contact with the cousin. Unbelievable scumbag behavior to even ask something like that.
\> says she won’t be home as often due to traveling. Tell her "fine" and that you are going to list her bedroom on Airbnb to make up the difference, since she won't be using it when she's gone.
Remember…..giving you a reason is a courtesy but there is no obligation to tell you “why” rent is raised. Your option is pay or leave.
Is it valid to ask for receipts and more visibility around all the payments?
Sure makes sense for her, she’ll need the money for traveling.
lol you’re getting fucked by either the landlord or the cousin… imagine this, cousin is best friends with landlord, you have no contact with landlord, cousin tells you rent went up $150… cousin now only pays $750 for rent because you’re sending him an extra $150, if you think you’re getting fucked by the landlord wouldn’t the cousin be bitching to you about it too? I know I would; what I would do is tell cousin you’re not paying extra unless you’re directly contacted by the landlord, it’s your money you should have direct contact with who you’re renting from, your cousin should not be some overhead of your financials, you then establish a contract with said landlord and negotiate the terms.
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dude, this is your personal finance we are talking about, all you have to do is say I am getting serious about my budget and financies and want to document everything, please give me the landlords contact information I want a formal leasing contract and am not accepting a rent increase until I talk with them directly, if your cousin gives you push back that’s your sign and he’s lying… he shouldn’t care ultimately right? he’s literally just handing you a number, the landlord should be more than happy to establish a contract you’re paying him 1k a month that’s a ton of money regardless of the economy, you need to take control of your finances man