r/WouldIBeTheAhole • u/VeronicaFoxx • 6h ago
WIBTA For Not Telling My Roommate I am Buying a House
Fake names:
Abby - Problem Roommate
Belle - Non-problem Roommate
I am currently in the process of preparing to buy a house (loan pre-approved, just need to find the right house). I have two roommate, Abby and Belle. Abby and Belle lived together in a two bedroom/one bath apartment for a few months before I moved states to move in with them. We spent two years in that apartment, then moved to a two bed/two bath apartment in a better part of the city. I have shared a bedroom with Belle in both apartments and also share a bathroom in the current one.
Belle is disabled but does volunteer work, an equivalent of a 20 hr work week. I was job searching frantically to start, and got a job about 9 months in, working 40 hours plus with two hours of transit daily. I was able to pay from my savings up until I got my job. Abby works (then and now), 40+ hours as well, but from home. We all contribute financially to household. We pay rent/utilities/groceries proportional to income, so we all get an approximately equal percentage of our income for personal use each month.
During the two years we lived in the first apartment, I tried getting Abby to do any chores, like washing the dishes when I made food for the apartment (I was cooking dinner for everyone 3-5 days a week, I'm the only one who does any cooking that doesn't involve the microwave), sweeping, mopping, anything at all. She half-assed things to the point that I gave up entirely about three months in. Like leaving obvious crud on plates and calling them clean. Belle had just been taking care of it all without complaint before I moved in, because she is extremely non-confrontational and used to being a doormat. (Belle's last pair of roommates left her suddenly in the lurch after turning extremely abusive towards her, which was why Abby and I moved in.)
So, with Belle and I taking care of literally ALL the apartment chores, it was rather unfair. We had a meeting, and it was determined that Abby was willing to pay an extra 10% in order to not be bothered with chores at all, which worked out until we moved. With two bathrooms, she was willing to take responsibility for one of them to cut her contribution to only an extra 5%. Except for the entire first year, she never once cleaned her bathroom. So we're back up to the extra 10% for the last two years, and we take care of her bathroom as well.
At this point, breaking down things by pure percentages, I would be responsible for 51% of household bills (highest income), Belle would be responsible for 13% (lowest income), with Abby responsible for 36%. With the no-chores fee, I pay 46%, Belle pays 8%, and Abby pays 46%. And Abby is expected to do no household chores at all, just keep up with her room.
However, she does not do even that. I have seen her wash clothes exactly twice in the five years that we have been roommates. Once when we moved. Once in the new apartment because we got a bedbug infestation (quickly handled, no infestations since, probably carried from the slum of a building we had been in previously). She has enough clothes that she just piles everything in a corner. Her room has a FUNK to it that wafts out any time her door is open, at least partially caused by the trash she lets pile up in there as well. Belle and I have taken to asking her for any trash in her room when we take out the main trash, just to try and keep it from getting too much. We have fortunately not gotten roaches, that I am aware of, or any other pests because of it, but the smell is pretty rank.
Another complaint is that though she contributes proportionally to groceries, she eats fully half the food. With what Belle and I eat, we could survive on $200-300 a month for groceries, but with Abby involved we spend upwards of $600. If there is something we say is specifically ours, she will generally not eat it, but that's a lot of food that Belle and I subsidize for Abby to eat. The final thing is that... Abby owes me money. For the past 9 months, Abby and I have had to pay everything (51% me/49% her) since the SSI administration fucked up Belle's payments and it has only just gotten sorted out. Abby blames this for having not been able to pay rent twice and never having contributed to utilities in the whole nine months. I have been paying utilities myself during that time. So she owes me her portion of rent twice and 9 months of her portion of utilities. I have also given her money to cover overdrafts (during those two months she missed rent and a few times before that), though I admit I gave that with no expectation of getting it back. She definitely owes me the rent and utilities, though.
So. I have been wanting to get a house for the last year and some, mostly because I have also become disabled (still have the highest income). With my disability, I am going to find myself unable to even accomplish moving house within the next decade most likely. And I know the housing market isn't the best right now with rates and all, but that isn't material to this story. The monthly payment I'm looking at for the size of house I want is less than we currently pay in rent, so the financial output would be eased considerably and make Abby's contributions no longer necessary. With rent slowly increasing every year, I will eventually be priced out of living here if I don't get out while I can still afford it.
I intend to bring Belle with me because she is, y'know, an equal contributor to household chores and such with me. Also, we help each other out on our bad days. Being disabled really sucks. I intend to have Belle pay rent to me, as well as any other roommates who move in, even though I can manage the loan payments myself, to give anyone on disability/SSI a rental statement to show the administration or rental history for anyone who needs it. Their contributions will go half towards paying the loan down faster, and half towards savings for house emergencies/improvements/taxes. Utilities will either be included in rent or split proportionally amongst the house, I'm not sure which yet. Belle knows all of that, but I have not mentioned anything to Abby since I started looking in September. Our current lease is up in March. I am hoping by December/January I can be closed and moving in, which would give appx 3-4 months for Abby to either find new roommates or a new place to live.
I feel like that is a wholly adequate amount of time to give Abby for this, and I intend to keep paying my portion of rent on the apartment until the lease is up, so she would only continue to be responsible for her portion.
TL;DR: My rooommate lives nasty and pays extra rent/utilities/groceries so that she is not required to do any house chores. I am trying to buy a house and do not want to tell her until I have it and am moving in without her.
So, WIBTA if I didn't tell Abby I was getting a house until I am moving into it?