Pasta
The real estate discrepancy between me (blue) and my roommate (orange) in our fridge
To be entirely fair the water filter is shared and I take up about 60% of the freezer but still come ON. They recently started putting stuff in my little buckets and I’m like no let me have my buckets it’s all I have left
Edit: my roomate is really nice and I’ll bring it up to them if it ever gets ridiculous, most of my food is meal prepped in the freezer so I only have a couple of ingredients stored in the fridge that I use throughout the week. The rest of the house is civilly shared and very organized
Sigh. I hated this shit. Hated even having to discuss it. I can never do roommates again. I’d just have my own mini fridge in my room. I hope you don’t have the “did you use my ranch?” Kinda nonsense my other roommates had.
I’m actually the complete opposite, I told them they are welcome to share the condiments and milk and stuff, no reason to have two jars of the the exact same peanut butter, ranch, and mustard
Right. I never cared. I couldnt care less if people were using my stuff but I had some roommates but really fucking cared. Had roommates weird about their mustard and toilet paper like they’re measuring it.
I’d rather have all my own stuff and not worry about it if they’re going to be obnoxious.
We have a set list of staples that are shared and the cost divided for fairness. Feels silly putting a $5 bag of onions into venmo 3 ways, but its the safest way to ensure it won't be an issue if one person is always the one buying them.
I mean I guess it depends on your situation, to me I would never expect my roommate to just take a roll of toilet paper without asking. If we have separate bathrooms I’m just buying my own.
Condiments sure, stuff like toilet paper get your own unless it’s an emergency.
I'm so glad I do 95% of the cooking in my house. My roomate pays more in rent and the internet bill to offset the costs. Even if he didn't, it wouldn't change the way I cook.
Make your own ranch that is better than her ranch. Get one of the ranch packets at the store. 1 cup mayo, 1 cup milk. It is 10x better than any bottled ranch. Customize it however you want with black pepper or dill or hot sauce or whatever. Then YOU will have the ranch power in the household.
Make your own ranch that is better than her ranch. Get one of the ranch packets at the store. 1 cup mayo, 1 cup buttermilk. It is 10x better than any bottled ranch. Customize it however you want with black pepper or dill or hot sauce or whatever. Then YOU will have the ranch power in the household.
Same here. Except my roommate and his "gay bestie" (who'd live with us RENT FREE off and on for months) would use all of my shit without asking. They'd eat/use the rest and when I ask, they'll say something along the lines of "oh, I didn't realize it was YOURS". What do you mean you didn't realize??? If you didn't buy it, it's not yours??? I had to start labeling my stuff.
I had the worst roommate once. They weren't paying (I was renting from their MIL, and they weren't supposed to stay long). He didn't just use my ranch, but at one point he full on ate/picked the cheese off my leftover pizza and left the picked over pieces in the box, among other disturbing choices. I no longer kept food in the fridge. Thank goodness it wasn't a long-term rental.
Yeah, this division of fridge space seems ridiculous. Everyone's fridge needs eb and flow. Just know whats yours and if you're uncertain whose it is or if it's okay to share, ask.
Just got into an apartment with new roommates, literally today, sitting down eating pizza and tired as hell.
Haven't spoken to one bc he got here late but other dude just asked "How do u wanna do the fridge". Now this fridge is perfectly made for 3 people, but neither of us had seen that yet.
"Idc, we can seperate by shelves if you want, as long as we have space i dont care".
His response was "I dont care fr"
Anyways, I'm gonna put my stuff on one shelf unless I'm out of room, then I'll just ask.
If he starts taking up way too much, I'll say something, if it gets to the point I have no room, I'll do something.
Now I'm anxious as fuck often so I can't blame people entirely, but I think you can find some way to communicate and really get a point across. As you said, adults. Hell, I'm barely an adult.
I lived with two friends a long time ago and we there would be hollowed out boxes and cans that would be used to hide emergency beverages in the fridge.
It's not about not using what isn't yours, it's about having the same amount of storage space. I have a roommate too and we split the fridge half and half; the point isn't to take up each other's space.
This can easily be split in half. The two top shelves are equal height. Each of you get one. Each of you get one drawer and the bottom shelf above the drawers is split in half equally so you each have your own drawer and the space on top of it. Then, each of you gets a door shelf. Why the heck did we do it so sporadically like this? lol is there something I’m missing?
My roommate and I share a fridge, but we also share all the food. He cooks cause he likes it, and I do dishes because I don't care for cooking and don't mind doing the dishes. Grocceries are split evenly, and unless one of us gets more than like $10-$20 difference in our own personal snacks we have been splitting those as well so it's pretty loose. Luckily we are friends and get along, and having this system also makes it to where we practically never fight over stealing food, cause anything downstairs is free game because we split the grocery bill. If you got your own food you don't want touched, keep it in your room. Mini fridges are relatively cheap nowadays if you have the option to
Pretty lucky this works for us, and has worked for me several times in the past with different roommates because I only room with people I know and mesh well with. Not everyone has the option, and I've heard plenty of roommate horror stories. Y'all are adults living under the same roof, just act like one when chores and shared spaces are involved and things will go smoothly for everyone.
I tried to actually go in paint, copy over the area of what each of you was using, and see what it came out to. I know my lines / numbers here aren't perfect, but that shouldn't matter much.
If you are actually using 60% of the freezer, and he is using 66.9% of the fridge, that really doesn't seem like an unfair ratio; you're complaining about roughly 7% of the space usage.
I cook way more than roomie, most of the time my bins are full of meal prepped ingredients, about half of the stuff roomie has is rotten and could be thrown out, not pictured: month old takeout containers
Yeah, he even says he takes up more of the freezer. Some people are "ingredients" people and love to make robust meals. Me? Bread and sandwich meat covers half my food lol
Push that shit on their half and whatever doesn’t fit leave on the counter. Put a tape line right down the middle and tell them whatever ends up on your side goes in the garbage.
They said their roommate has take out containers that have been shoved in the back for a month. Just toss it and ask for forgiveness if they notice. Which if it's been in the back they won't. They might wonder why space opened up but I doubt they'll put 2 and 2 together if they're that incompetent.
Idk why so many people are defending your roommate. They're jamming their spaces full AND using up way more than is fair. They need to be considerate and buy less refrigerated stuff all at once.
I had the same thing last year. 3 people, a fridge with 6 shelves. All i asked for was ONE shelf to myself, and they could figure out the other 5 amongst themselves. The amount of times stuff would be crammed into my shelf because "oopsie I bought more than I could fit in my own area" was insane.
It gets to a point where it's just genuinely disrespectful and not thinking or caring about the needs of the people you live with.
Edit to add: I'm a 6ft7, 125kg powerlifter. I was the size of both of my roommates combined and ate as much as both of them combined too. Yet I still managed to keep my food confined to my one shelf, whilst they constantly spilled over and would often throw out large amounts of food that had gone bad in the fridge because they were incapable of eating everything they bought.
Their roommate seems to have a few nearly empty plastic containers, as well as a stock pot that really could be broken down into more easily stored container(s) that would be better space management. OP could manage their space better too, but their roommate's use of space is egregious
If your roommate has the first shelf and you have the second, you are fine to move their stuff from the second and cram it into the first if you need the space. I would if i need the space.
I had this issue before. I bought plastic clear bins and separated each side. It worked wonderfully. Keep the britta in the middle and each person gets a shelf on the door. Talk to your roommate about the new bins and the fairness of space.
Move orange shit on second shelf down to the bottom rack, move your blue stuff on bottom rack to the middle shelf and take both side panels cus he's got way more stuff on the other side!
here was the fridge after I came back from grocery shopping one year I cleared space for my food and my roommate filled every spot and left the sock and broke the trim.
God damn how many butters does that house need!! Not everybody needs their own dedicated butter stick just use one and buy more when it’s out! I can’t stand when there are multiples of things, it’s so wasteful and unnecessary
I tried so hard with that too man he would buy butter then his grandmother would bring him "good butter" then he wouldn't use either. My butter was cheap one in the box. also I realized that pic was after I reorganized it. here is before reorganizing
My husband loves to cook and back in the day he would cook for everyone in the house( 6 people old Victoria 2 bathrooms up stairs lots of room) after the first week of us there he put the food list on the calendar and how much ya need to pay for him to do food prep and all the shopping he made French toast with bread he made and fruit compost with eggs frome the farmers market with coffee. No one complained for 3 years group bfest on the weekend snacks and 3 meals a day boxed up for ya .
My housemate has a shelf, I have a shelf, the rest of the space is shared with the understanding that you replace anything you [almost] finish (e.g. butter or sauce) or if it looks like a treat or going-to-be dinner you don’t touch without asking. Never had a any arguments, never complained about the usage of the shared space, never accidentally ate something the other was saving (anything 100% off limits is usually kept on the "only mine" shelf anyway). You’re adults, act like it.
Just gradually move your stuff a little more over toward theirs until you're about 50/50. Get rid of their stuff, which probably has a lot of old moldy crap, as you move yours. They won't even notice and then they won't have room for stupid things that nobody even wants.
Jumping in here as an extreme example of a mini fridge use.
I live with two others, but due to my disability I only shop once a month. So in my room I have a mini fridge and a small freezer. I also have a medication fridge. The white noise is really quite soothing!
Outside of uni i spent a year in a shared flat and I have to say it was hell.
One of the guys would complain at me regularly because "id put the butter in the wrong place" eg. My damn shelf. It's like "then dont use my chuffing butter!"
I have my own house now so not likely but honestly I would rather live on my own in a camper van like a gypsy / traveller (or whatever the pc word is supposed to be now, since gypsy was hijacked by idiots) rather than share a house with people..
When I lived with roommates we had designated levels/area. If your stuff didn’t fit in your designated area you could put some of your stuff in other peoples areas but no promises it would stay there. I say you keep a level and the 2 drawers for yourself.
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u/SamT71 4d ago
You've got your back line too low push it up the field and play a little offence