🇬🇧 Is it better to live alone or share an apartment?

Is it better to live alone or share an apartment? This text provides the answer, underlining the choice of those who change city or country, but it also applies to other situations.

I have already taught, days ago, how to calculate the costs of moving to another city or country, and the points you should look for to know the cost for you in your new home. In an older text I also talked about the daily costs and how to calculate them. But I did not specify whether it is better to live alone, share an apartment, live in a pension or rent a room. And here I will talk about this, going beyond the financial aspect of the problem.

Financially, living alone is the most expensive option, no matter where you live. To assess which option is financially more profitable you can follow the tips in the text on the costs of relocating to another city or country as a basis.

There I said that some costs can be divided and others multiplied.

What costs can be shared when sharing an apartment? Those who have only one account and all the residents of the structure can enjoy, as rent, heating, electricity, gas, water, fixed internet, maintenance and renovation costs. In the apartments, some of these expenses are included in the condominium fee, paid monthly to the building manager or landlord (it depends on how it works in each country. I may have spelled the name of the fee wrong because I only know the name in Portuguese, I have translated it into other languages). Food, if you go shopping to the supermarket for all residents of the apartment and prepare food at home, can also be included in this calculation. The consumption of all this is certainly a bit higher in a house with two or more people, but it does not double having a second person in the house. And the economy is there.

The multiplied costs are those you move with your family, including small children, for example, and the bills are paid by one or two people, not everyone. Pet costs also multiply, although it is cheaper to buy a large package of food for three dogs, but vaccines and microchips are individual. Even health care if needed. Human health is also a cost multiplied, but in the case of sharing an apartment everyone pays their own.

What about the emotional price of each option? Are you willing to pay?

Emotional pricing includes things like sharing the property with someone with a very different personality than you. The friction that this can generate. Knowing how to deal with these situations, knowing your limits. Be prepared to leave if the property isn't yours. And it also has the positive side. You can share a flat with a person who understands things you don't understand and helps you in the process of adjusting to the new city, or knows exactly who to call when something in the house is faulty.

Sharing an apartment can also be a way to get company to go out to the new destination, but it is not a guarantee of this benefit. I have lived in more than one apartment where my tastes and those of the people who lived with me were very different. In Porto Alegre I spent almost a year going out alone. And it was a fantastic experience. I made a profit because I didn't have company at first, because I developed more independence to have fun and also to travel.

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Nycka, the Nomad