Roommates Who Don't Really Live There: What to Charge Them?

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NoPlaceLikeRome

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I live in univ. student housing. This semester a girl requested to live with us, moved in a bunch of stuff, bought food, but only lived here for a week. Her whereabouts are unknown (I mean I know she’s still alive, I just do not know what she is doing–she may live with her boyfriend 😦 ). Ought I charge her for electricity? She is required to live on campus by reason of her age. Theoretically if her stuff weren’t here we might be able to have another roommate who could help pay electric, though I don’t think there is anyone actually looking for a space. (I suppose this may raise another obvious question, ought I mention this to the school in some way?)
 
NoPlaceLikeRome said:
I live in univ. student housing. This semester a girl requested to live with us, moved in a bunch of stuff, bought food, but only lived here for a week. Her whereabouts are unknown (I mean I know she’s still alive, I just do not know what she is doing–she may live with her boyfriend 😦 ). Ought I charge her for electricity? She is required to live on campus by reason of her age. Theoretically if her stuff weren’t here we might be able to have another roommate who could help pay electric, though I don’t think there is anyone actually looking for a space. (I suppose this may raise another obvious question, ought I mention this to the school in some way?)
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I don’t think you should charge this phantom roommate electric. She’s not using it, so she shouldn’t have to pay it. She should obviously be charged rent, as she is occupying a space in the house that could otherwise be rented. However, since electricity is generally a spilt bill among roommates, because of the shared usage, your roommate should not be charged because she is not contributing to the usage (make sure any electric devices of hers are unplugged.

On a slightly off topic note, you might want to look at your electric consumption. If the bill is high enough to be a consideration for wanting another roommate, you may be using too much. If someone replaced the phantom roommate and split the electric bill one of two things would happen. Either they would use the same amount or more electricity than you and your other roommate, or they would use less. If they use as much as you do or more, you are still contributing the same amount or more to the electric bill. If they use less, they would be paying a disproportionate amount of the bill, which wouldn’t be very Christian since you are aware of what your rightful share would be.

God Bless,
YACatholic:thumbsup:
 
NoPlaceLikeRome said:
I live in univ. student housing. This semester a girl requested to live with us, moved in a bunch of stuff, bought food, but only lived here for a week. Her whereabouts are unknown (I mean I know she’s still alive, I just do not know what she is doing–she may live with her boyfriend 😦 ). Ought I charge her for electricity? She is required to live on campus by reason of her age. Theoretically if her stuff weren’t here we might be able to have another roommate who could help pay electric, though I don’t think there is anyone actually looking for a space. (I suppose this may raise another obvious question, ought I mention this to the school in some way?)
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When I was in a similar situation (my roomate spent a semester abroad), I had him pay for a minimal electric and gas bill. In other words, I took the lowest the bills had ever been for us and charged him his portion of that amount.

On the one hand, I could have let him not pay anything, since he wasn’t using any utilities, but on the other hand, we agreed to room together with the assumption that we would split all bills, thus making it affordable for both us. So you could argue either way, but I decided to charge him for minimal use.
 
I agree with the above. Charge her rent (consider it a “storage fee” for her stuff) but don’t charge her for consumables that she has never actually used.

I don’t know whether you need to rat her out that she isn’t actually living on campus - that part’s up to you. If it were me, I’d be honest with anyone who actually comes out and asks, without speculating about the boyfriend (I’d just say, “No, she hasn’t slept here in several months; we think she’s staying with a friend in the city”), but I wouldn’t go out of my way to tell on her.
 
Another roommate would increase electricity to some degree, especially if there is a washer and dryer in the house. But, some rooms would be lit if they were there or not. And, part of the bill is just to have electricity handy for when you need it. If you go away for two weeks, your bill will not halve.

I think the phantom roommate should pay some electricity, but maybe not as much as a full share. On the other hand, it could be awkward if she starts moving in and out, staying some nights and not others.
 
Does it take electricity to heat and cool this person’s space?
 
I once had a roommate who mostly lived elsewhere. Our agreement when we rented an apartment together was that we would each pay half the rent and half the utilities. Even though she ended up spending far more time at her boyfriend’s apartment than ours, I expected her to uphold her agreement and she did.
 
GeorgiaPeach said:
Does it take electricity to heat and cool this person’s space?
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That’s a good point. You are paying for the gas and/or electricity to keep this person’s possessions at a comfortable room temperature. Electrical use is not directly proportionate to the number of people living there. (It’s not as though the electrical bill for two people will be exactly twice that of one person). In my past experience, the number of roomates present has not had much of an impact on the utilities bills at all. The thermostat is still set at the same temperature. The lights are still used whether there is one, two, or more people in the room. You pay a flat rate for things like cable and local phone.

When you signed the lease, you were probably counting on that person being there and splitting costs with her. I know that, for a poor college student, even an increase of $30 a month beyond what you originally budgeted for can be a huge problem.
 
At my university, students are expected to actually live in the housing they are paying for. I guess if the school doesn’t know she’s not living there (and she’s still going to classes) then it doesn’t really matter too much. Why doesn’t she just move out completely if she’s not going to be living there at all?

Because of the nature of electricity use, I would still charge her for it – but less than usual because she is not actually there. If I had Internet, cable, phone, etc. I wouldn’t charge her unless she was actually using them.
 
Thanks for the advice, folks. It’s awkward because unlike you guys who talked about these things beforehand, she just walked out one day and never came back–hasn’t even taken her clothes–never said anything to us. And it’s not like we know each other. Mmm. Thanks anyhow…
 
Last year I was living in rented accommodation and ***I ***was the one who wasn’t there a lot.

I paid 1/3 of all the bills till the day I left, and though I think it would have been fairer to reduce my bills 10 or 20%, since when I was not there they would leave the heating and lights (!) on all night long, I still paid up.

As others have said, part of the bill is for provision of service, maintenance etc…
 
NoPlaceLikeRome said:
Thanks for the advice, folks. It’s awkward because unlike you guys who talked about these things beforehand, she just walked out one day and never came back–hasn’t even taken her clothes–never said anything to us. And it’s not like we know each other. Mmm. Thanks anyhow…
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Are you sure she’s all right? Have you heard from her at all, seen her around campus, know she’s been in class? How many clothes did she leave? That seems very weird to me, that she would leave suddenly and not even take her clothes.
 
Our university has tons of phantom students because more financial aid and grants are available to students who live on campus.

They will often dump their personal belongings in one part of the dorm/house and never be seen again.

But, the university pays for all utilities and bundles communication fees into the tuition of every student, so the issue of splitting bills has not come up.

It would be wrong to charge her for something she has not used. And how would you do this, as you don’t even see her?
 
Talk to her next time you see her and work out what you both are OK with. It doesn’t matter if a deal is fair if it’s still not going to happen. If she wants a storage locker and a cut in tuition, she will pay what those are worht to her. If she also expects the apartment to be there when she needs it, she’ll be willing to pay a little more for that. Just make sure she tells you what she is paying for before you set a price and then make sure she sticks to that and doesn’t use other stuff.
But first make sure she’s OK. Why would she walk away from her belongings so long?
 
hasikelee said:
It would be wrong to charge her for something she has not used.
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I disagree. By laying claim to the space, the missing roommate prevents another person from living there who could split the bills, but the existing resident is now stuck with the entire utility bill. That’s not right. By agreeing to share the apartment, both roomates ought to be expected to share the utility bills, unless they had a prior agreement otherwise. If you say that “It would be wrong to charge her for something she has not used”, then if one roommate works a lot and is there only 8 hours one day, but the other one is there 14 hours, by your logic, they shouldn’t split the cost equally. Obviously, you can’t only “pay what you use”, so the most equitable thing is just to agree to split the utility bills evenly. That means if one person chooses to be absent for a long period of time, they still need to pay their share and not stick the other roommate with it.
 
I would note that your electric bill probably includes both a “usage” charge and some “fixed” charges (taxes, account fees, special assessments, facility charges, nuclear waste storage fee, etc). I would charge the phantom roommate for a portion of the fixed charges, but not for usage, unless she has some power-draining appliances plugged in even when she’s not there. Note that things like computers, TVs, VCRs, anything with a remote control or a timer or a clock built in, are drawing a little bit of current at all times, which can add a couple of bucks to the bill.
 
For a year there was a guy listed as living with us that really was living with his girlfriend, but his parents insisted he have an address other than his girlfriends place. He only had a sleeping bag and a few things in a gym bag stuffed behind the couch he would occasionally sleep on, and he showed up often enough to serve as the designated mediator of any roommate disputes. We charged him 1/5 of the rent (there were 4 guys actually living there, two in each room) and he brought his own groceries (probably a bit more than his actual share) instead of contributing to the communal pot, but we didn’t charge him for utilities (since he never touched the thermostat and only used the phone to call his parents with a prepaid card so that “our” number would show up on caller ID at their end.

However, that was an agreement we made before he “moved in” and after the rest of us had already settled on that place and the 4 of us there to split the bills, not something forced on us after the fact. In your case, I’d charge her for her “share” of all the bills, and use mentioning this to the school as the “stick” if she doesn’t pay or propose a very generous compromise. As long as she is paying an agreeable amount it seems she could make a technical claim to maintaining residence there.
 
You said that she was REQUIRED to live on campus due to her age. If this is the fact then IMHO you need to let someone know that she is not living in her assigned space. As a parent or a grandparent of underage students they are still responsible for their expenses and would want to know where their child was.

Don’t help others to sin. We are our brothers keepers in many ways.
 
KathleenElsie said:
You said that she was REQUIRED to live on campus due to her age. If this is the fact then IMHO you need to let someone know that she is not living in her assigned space. As a parent or a grandparent of underage students they are still responsible for their expenses and would want to know where their child was.
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I’m a college student who is responsible for all of her own expenses. That being said, I do agree with you that any parent or grandparent would want to know if their child’s whereabouts were unknown, regardless of whether they’re paying for college and/or housing.
 
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