<p>^Excellent question, Hunt. I was engaged from the summer before my sophomore year to Christmas during my junior year. We were IN LOVE, or so I thought. Solid, committed, blah blah blah. I got dumped out of the blue because he met somebody else. I’m sure glad we weren’t living together! The girl he met ended up dumping him, by the way. Everybody changes so much at that age! My high school classmates wouldn’t have recognized me four years after graduation.</p>
<p>Ok, honestly i wasnt looking for parenting… Mostly responses from students a year or two older who went through the situation. Also we both have serperate friends, differnt jobs and school schedules. Thanks for respo</p>
<p>@collegeloving23:
I read all your replies and can’t help think how much you still have to learn.</p>
<p>Why did you ask this question? Are you willing to change your thinking? You seem set on your direction.</p>
<p>Even in the very very small chance that it might work out, you will still lose out on the many diverse experiences college life has to offer.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t do it.</p>
<p>Firstly, you might break up, which would turn the arrangement upside-down and could lead to some very awkward situations before one of you could move out.</p>
<p>Secondly, living together might harm the relationship per se: you might be among those couples who need more time to grow while you are living apart, before you are ready to live together.</p>
<p>You.may be completely in love and be the best of friends, soulmates… but you are also both young and (thus) likely have no idea how to deal with a roommate, much less one who is of the opposite sex <em>and</em> a bf/gf. </p>
<p>Very much could go wrong while very little could go right(-er, compared to inhabiting different cribs).</p>
<p>@Hunt ; nicely put.
These things happen more often and OP needs to know.</p>
<p>I actually havent made up my mind, and since its over a year away have time to think. Im just trying to collect all the ideas. And i was hoping to recieve more of people cons / pros rather than “dont do it, bad idea, never” etc the reasons listed didnt really apply to me or my situation!</p>
<p>^
Understandable.
However, some posters probably have gone through that and all they can say is just those short phrases to sum it up.
In all, I think you will be happy with this thread at the end of it all, so just take it with a grain of salt and see what applies directly to you.</p>
<p>What about this idea? Have him (or you) rent a small studio/one bedroom. Have the other person keep a dorm room. If you both decide in the fall, move in together in the apartment, and if things go sour, the person with the dorm room moves back in to it. </p>
<p>Risk - minimal. Only one person has a lease on a small apartment. The dorm room rent MAY add some unnecessary cost (but you’re planning on a 2 bedroom now and a studio plus dorm room is probably less than that).</p>
<p>Benefits - great time to see what real life can be like. </p>
<p>What are you planning when he graduates a year ahead of you? Make friends now so your senior year is not a lonely dirge. </p>
<p>2prepmom- that is a great idea, but no i wouldn’t want to be the person in the one bedroom apartment. Where i go to school those cost at least 1,000 per month and are extremely lonely. Also most people move off campus by sophomore year so i dont think the dorms would really be an option. Like i said previously if we were going to do this we would have space because we would get a 2 bedroom place and have our own rooms. So essentially its the same thing has having a one bedroom. (Expect the place would be 600.00 or less per person each month rather then one person paying 1,000(+) and the other paying the dorm. Also: i have made some great friends since ive been here (currently in summer courses and living on campus- my boyfriend is 3 hours away at home) </p>
<p>And i will have a whole year in the dorms with 1 friend and 2 randoms (apartment style on campus) all girls in the dorm.</p>
<p>He will be living in an apartment with friends so we will be easing into everything and im sure i will spend a couple nights a week at his place this year. </p>
<p>Thanks for responses i appreciate them. Instead please provide me with ideas on how to not be overwhelmed, i havent made any choices but if HYPOTHETICALLY we did move in sophomore year some advice on maintainh school work and our own friends? </p>
<p>Sue22- you are correct! I was assuming we would still be dating lol we started dating when i was 15 im currently 18 and will be 23 when graduating college. Not sure where that poster got their numbers from. Also we wouldn’t get married till after college there are some things im set on waiting on…</p>
<p>Btw iim looking at this whole situation as more of a “moving in with my best friend” not sleeping in my boyfriends room. I think any roommate situation can be difficult and it wouldn’t be based on breaking up or staying together.</p>
<p>That seems to be everyones concern. Best friends can get in fights and hate each other amd random roommates can be psycho thieves. ThAt isn’t really the point of the q! We arent looking to move in, get married and have kids at 19 no worries!</p>
<p>We just want to be roommates, share an experience and hope everything works out for the future… Hope that cleared things up a bit:)</p>
<p>21 minus 8 equals 13. </p>
<p>23 minus 8 equals 15.</p>
<p>I’d chalk it up to unclear responses. </p>
<p>I don’t think you should be so dismissive of “parenting” advice from posters on here. The opinions from parents come from real experience. And your original post specifically asked for advice. It seems that perhaps you just aren’t really happy with the advice you are getting.</p>
<p>^ ^ LOL…</p>
<p>^ I agree fully with blprof.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m not really sure how you currently being 18 turns into you being 21 next school year.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I would think the main pros and cons are fairly obvious, and I would imagine that you already know most of them. At the end of the day, you just have to decide whether the pros outweigh the cons, and to be honest, it sounds like you’ve already made your decision (although it may change by the time you have to actually decide).</p>
<p>The only real pro I see is splitting the rent, but you could easily do that with roommates. The other posters have commented on many of the cons (putting unneeded pressure on the relationship, the bad situation you would be in if you broke up, potentially spending more time with each other than with friends, etc). Why don’t you both just get off campus apartments with friends? You could still split the rent so that you don’t each have to get your own apartment, and it sounds like it would be more convenient to your boyfriend who could just stay in his current apartment. You’ll be able to spend plenty of time with friends and you’ll each have your own space. You could get your own room (which you were planning on doing with your boyfriend so I can’t see the extra cost being an issue) so that your boyfriend can still spend nights over if he wants to. But that way you aren’t spending ALL of your time together and you can both have the space you want.</p>
<p>It doesn’t really matter what you do. I think it’ll be a learning experience for you either way. But it just doesn’t seem like there’s much point to getting an apartment with your boyfriend. You can still work on your relationship while living separately, you can still have fun, you can still split expenses with your roommates–I’m just not quite seeing the reasoning behind wanting to live together so much.</p>
<p>
And I’m sure this is the idea and plan for many couples who move in together while in college. The boundary of best friend blurs when you mix in “special feelings” and a roommate “situation” because a whole other beast. </p>
<p>Proceed with caution. Be aware of all the possibilities. Have a plan B, C, and D. And most importantly, enjoy yourself. </p>
<p>Thanks :)</p>
<p>I think you should try it because if you get a 6 month lease that gives you a semester to live together and see if you like it and you can always get a different place for the next semester if things don’t work out. Im also 18 turning 19 in 4 months and I live with my boyfriend I met about 2 years ago and have been dating for a year and a half. I think the pros and cons of living with your boyfriend would be the same as living with a regular female friend. if you are best friends and get along well you think you can live together but things change when you move in because your routines are different one of you is more or less messy than the other. one of you waits too long to clean dishes and the other ends up doing the dishes and taking out the trash all the time and simple things turn into resentment. I think living with your roommates this year would prepare you for how to deal with roommate troubles and make the transition to living with your boyfriend no different than living with them. having your own room and friends I think is good because if you do get tired of each other you have your own room to go to and you can always leave the house to blow off steam. before I lived with my boyfriend whenever we fought we always had our own places to go to and would get over it in the morning but now that we live together and share a room we are almost forced to stay together and go to bed angry. I sometimes will sleep on the floor just so i dont have to share a bed with him. but I have had many roommates because i went to college early and i learned how to deal with roommate problems and i dont let them affect our relationship and we are still fine after living together for half a year. </p>
<p>@Collegeloving23
College is as much about personal growth as it is about book learning.<br>
Your plan leaves no breathing room for either of you.</p>
<p>Your boyfriend will make guy friends who will, for example, want to all go to a party at a girls dorm floor or apartment. If he goes, you will get understandably very jealous. If he doesn’t go, it will likely be because of you, and the fallout from that will be even worse.</p>
<p>There is a reason the word “disaster” was used by many of those who replied to this thread. You and your boyfriend will always be in each others face. It’s inevitable that some or many females will pay attention to him, as guys will toward you. Add in college’s normal alcohol and hormones and you’ve got one of the big reasons these end with ugly and hurtful feelings. </p>
<p>If you read this and think “this won’t happen to us because we love each other or we’re special”, they all start out that way. Yours is no different.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t do it. As many others have stated so much of the College experience are the out of the class room experiences. Involvement with new friends, activities, clubs, social functions. A relationship commitment of the nature you are describing would negate so much of what your experience at school could be.
I had a steady girl friend at another college that I visited every weekend, I missed so much of what should have been my college experience. We Married and then Divorced three years later. The fixation with “the one” at such a young age is not at all a good idea IMO.
Relationships are so much better when the people involved have had more life experiences and have a greater level of maturity.</p>
<p>My feeling is that if you have to ask, it’s probably not a good idea. I assume you’re contemplating a 2 BR in case it doesn’t work out? If you were ready to live with this man, I think you’d happily be searching for 1 BRs. You aren’t going to be able to figure out if marriage will work by living together while somebody else is underwriting the costs. It seems pretty easy to handle if things don’t work out though, doesn’t it? Just go to your room, close the door, and “deal with it” until the lease runs out. Then use your college loans, or grants, or money from mom and dad to rent someplace else. Marriage isn’t like that. There’s generally one residence that someone has to leave, shared accounts and finances that have to be untangled, friendships that are kept (or broken) depending on which spouse is closest to them, and money that has to be raised to cover increased living expenses. It’s not easy.</p>
<p>Not that breaking up with a live-in boyfriend is easy. Since you’re concerned about missing out on the “college experience” of “partying (and) multiple partners,” I’m not sure you’re comfortable committing to a longterm relationship anyway; you need space and time to figure that out. And if you do decide to marry him, you’ll have the rest of your lives to live together. However, I’ve known many people who stayed in relationships much longer than they really wanted because breaking up is harder if you’re living together. And it’s been the women, more so than the men, who had trouble breaking it off. Most felt guilty, dreaded moving (or making him move) or didn’t have the money for a new place, and were worried about the effect it would have on friendships. The longer they stayed, the harder leaving got and it didn’t make focusing on school and grades any easier either. For what it’s worth, the few couples I know who dated all through college who are still together did move in together, but only after both graduated and had full-time jobs. </p>
<p>The one thing I haven’t seen mentioned, and one I would think a great deal about, is what will you do if you accidentally become pregnant? I’ve known college students who faced that dilemma. Would you have the baby or not? Keep him/her, or opt for adoption? Continue your education, or not? I know one couple who decided on abortion (their relationship ended soon after), one who got married and ended up having a miscarriage (both dropped out of college to work and never went back to school; that relationship didn’t last long either), and at least 4 who got married and had the baby (the husbands continued school, the wives didn’t; only one of them remained married and not very happily). I’ve known plenty of older people whose relationships have ended too, but in the majority of those cases, both partners already had a college degree when they got married and could provide for themselves financially after the marriage ended.</p>
<p>It is a tough decision and you have a lot to think about. Do what you feel is right for you, but don’t do anything that will jeopardize your education. Good luck.</p>