I'm currently a graduate student living in off campus student housing that is affiliated with my university. Everything is included in our rent, so air conditioning, heat, internet, cable, etc. aren't extra.
I've lived in this complex for more than a year now, and chose to get random roommates at the beginning of both academic years. Last year, I didn't have any problems with my roommates other than normal roommate disputes, but unfortunately all of my roommates were Master's students, so they graduated and left.
This year, I was placed with three new roommates: Jacki (27F), Michelle (~22F), and Phoebe (25F). They have been living with me since mid-August.
Jacki moved in first, and immediately cleaned all of my things. Having lived in apartments for the last two years, I've accumulated a lot of cookware and dishes, but I didn't have any glasses, so I had just bought them and washed them all. Jacki didn't trust that they were clean, so she ran EVERYTHING through the dishwasher, and kept telling me how dirty my dish towels were, even though I put them out the night before.
Phoebe moved in next. She and I are both PhD students, but she's studying biology, and I'm in biomedical engineering. The first conversation we had consisted of her telling me that my thesis is ridiculous and that all the research shows that there's no reason to be studying in my research area. I thought that was rude, but I realized after talking to her more that she gets facts wrong all the time. For example, she thinks tiger sharks are the world's smallest sharks and keeps forgetting that I'm not in her department.
Michelle moved in last, but I haven't had many interactions with her. She seems nice, but is extremely quiet. She mostly hangs out outside the apartment or with Jacki.
Over the past month, I've realized that they've been using my pots, pans, and dishes and leaving them out after use. I've seen these dishes lie out for days without any attention. I talked to all of them when they moved in and told them they were allowed to use any of my kitchen supplies provided they clean it immediately afterwards (i.e. after eating), because I had had a roommate in college who completely destroyed my baking trays by not cleaning them the same day. I really enjoy baking, so I even have silicon mats that go on the baking trays to prevent this sort of thing now. Except, my current roommates aren't cleaning off the silicon mats or the cookware.
There's also the problem with Jacki taking up all of the room in the fridge. She enjoys to cook, so it makes sense that she would have a lot of food in there, except there's no room for anyone else to have anything. Phoebe and I have both pointed out that this is a huge problem. I also noticed that Jacki had been drinking my milk (she's the only one who drinks the same % as me) without asking, and she continually asks me to throw out my food to "make room." Out of all of my roommates, my biggest problem is with her.
Recently, Jacki has been insisting that we not turn the air conditioning below 74ºF. Except, the 74ºF is for the main room, and not our smaller rooms. Each of us has a separate room and bathroom off the large main room. The air conditioning travels first through Jacki's room, then Michelle's, main room, mine, and finally Phoebe's. Each of our rooms has a vent that we can close. With my room being the second to last, I don't actually get that much air if the others have their vents open, so I've asked them to close them, since they aren't taking advantage of the free air anyway. They won't do it. Jacki says it makes no difference. I've told her to cover her vent, but she won't. So, I've contacted my landlords to see if I can move to another room, since I've had so many problems so far.
Since then, Jacki has decided that it's a good idea to turn on the heat, even though it's 80ºF outside. This has already happened once before, and I talked to all of them about it separately. Explained how the main room is much larger than our rooms, and so it takes longer to heat up than ours, so our rooms end up a lot hotter than the setting on the thermostat since it's located in the main room. They had set it to 75ºF in August. I really don't think any of them have used a thermostat before.
Now, it's set at 74ºF while it's hotter outside. I've already explained it to them, but obviously it hasn't stuck. I've been losing sleep because every time I try to even switch the heat off, someone turns it back on. It'd be fine if it were just the three of them, but I'm paying the same amount as them, so I deserve to be able to sleep in my own apartment.
Between the heat and the dirty dishes, we've also started to get flies. Just being there makes me feel disgusting between the smell and how insufferably hot it is. As I said before, I already contacted our landlords to see if I can switch rooms, but I'm not really sure what to do in the mean time, especially if there are no other rooms available. I also plan on calling the building managers later today, but I want to make sure that I explain myself clearly. I do not believe I can live peacefully with these people (mostly Jacki) for a full year. I'm somewhat afraid that I'll end up yelling at one of them over this.
I'm not sure anything I say to Jacki will make a difference, though, because it seems like she lacks a lot of social graces. For example, one of my old roommates, Diane (22F), visited for two nights. I got permission from all of my current roommates before I agreed to let her sleep on our couch. Jacki is in the same department Diane was in, so obviously she asked her some questions about student life. Diane's really nice, and I warned her about this ahead of time to make sure she'd be okay with it. However, we weren't expecting Jacki to invite herself to stay at Diane's apartment in New York City after knowing her for less than two days. Nothing has come of that yet, but it's really bizarre to both of us. All of my friends who have met my roommates so far dislike them, so I know it's not just me.
There have also been a few other disagreements in regards to me driving them places, as I'm the only one with a car, but these are not nearly as bothersome as the heat.
I've already decided to move all of my pots and pans into my room, since they're not cleaning up after themselves, and I don't actually have to let them use them. I'm wondering what other steps I could take to try to diffuse the situation.
TL;DR: My roommates have been using my kitchen supplies without cleaning up after themselves and turning the heat on while it's hotter outside, making it so I cannot sleep. It's also starting to attract flies. One of them has also taken over all of the space in the refrigerator, while another has insulted my study plans. I've contacted our landlords to see if I can switch to another apartment (student housing), but I want to know if there are any other steps I could take to diffuse the situation in the meantime.
Submitted September 26, 2017 at 07:09PM by MyRoommatesAreIdiots http://ift.tt/2fNTviA relationships
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