<p>You need to check on what limitations the landlord may have on appliances, including fridges, microwaves & anything else before you go out & buy (or even rent) tons of stuff for your rental. If you don’t and there is any problem–increase in electricity, fire, fuse blows, etc., you’ve violated your rental agreement and may end up paying damages.</p>
<p>I live on campus and I spend about $300 on food (including going out). AND I don’t eat very much-usually about 2 meals a day. Actually for a guy my size I eat very little-think 800-1350 kcal for a normal sized 20 year old. Not on a diet or anything, I just don’t eat very much. My record for the longest lasting loaf of bread was 6 weeks. A dozen eggs normally last a month or more. Most guys my age and size will easily go through 4 slices of pizza-I’m done after 2.</p>
<p>And some days I’m too tired to cook so I don’t bother. And it still comes out to $300+ a month.</p>
<p>As for fridge space, I occupy almost the entire fridge compartment and a small space in the freezer, my roommate occupies the entire fridge compartment and all the cabinets. That’s fine by me, I don’t like frozen foods and avoid them like the plague anyways. No labeling of any kind. But then it’s pretty easy to differentiate between my food and his-basically anything that hasn’t been pre-processed (fresh) is most likely (99% chance) mine. Anything that’s rotten, comes in a box, package or jar is his. Unfortunately for my OWN safety (and for the safety of everyone who enters my kitchen) I do have to clean out the fridge once in a while and dispose of his rotten food. Sorry, I’m not getting food poisoning because you won’t throw away your moldy tomato.</p>
<p>How anyone can cover rent, bills, internet, food and socializing costs for less than $500, I’ll never know.</p>
<p>When I was in group living situations we had shelves designated for each person. Since we ate dinner together we also had shelves for the group items. In one house since our eating group was large we did end up with two full size fridges and they were both fairly full.</p>