A teenager has been backed online for keeping her housemates’ rent after not telling them she was their landlord.
The 18-year-old student, who did not give her name, asked for advice on Reddit after a fallout in her college home with her two housemates, who found out she was their landlord when one of them opened her mail.
The difficult situation has led to debate online, and two ethics and etiquette experts who spoke to Newsweek agreed the tenants should still pay rent but said the student helped cause the problem by not being transparent.
In a post to Reddit’s AmITheA****** subreddit on September 23, which has racked up close to 6,000 upvotes, the poster began by saying her family is not “mega-wealthy” but her parents gave her a mortgage-free home in the city where she was starting college.
While her parents still legally own the house because of “tricky” real estate laws, any money made from it goes to her. So she got two female roommates, whom she called Sasha and Bea in the post, and they quickly became friends as well as roommates.
But, as she wrote in her post, “I didn’t want to tell them that I own the house as I thought it might create a weird dynamic between us, and I didn’t want them to view me any differently.”
Yonason Goldson of Ethical Imperatives LLC told Newsweek that “not disclosing that she was the landlord created the problems that followed.
“Withholding information makes her look like she’s doing something wrong and naturally breeds suspicion, resentment and mistrust. Transparency is virtually always the best policy,” he said.
The trio split the bills, but the rent they send to her father, who has a different last name, comes back to her in a mailed check.
Via her account u/OldOutlandishness252, the poster said that the conflict began when Sasha found the checks when she opened her mail and the two roommates figured out she was the landlord’s daughter and was making money from their tenancies.
Jo Hayes of EtiquetteExpert.org told Newsweek the poster should have “definitely made clear that she was the daughter of the landlord. Transparency in such situations is crucial.
“However, it was entirely wrong of her housemates to open her mail. That is a major crossing of boundaries and privacy. A big no,” she said.
The poster wrote: “I told them everything and they’re mad at me for hiding this from them and think I’m not only in the wrong for keeping it a secret but for making them pay rent in the first place.”
Her housemates argued they shouldn’t have to pay rent because the house was mortgage-free and their rent “goes into my pocket,” while the poster hit out at Sasha for going through her mail.
She wrote in her post: “We weren’t friends when they moved in and the whole point of me wanting roommates was so that I could earn extra cash so I don’t see why I should let them reside for free.”
Both experts agreed, with Hayes saying the fact that the house is mortgage-free should be “no consideration” and that the housemates should not even have known this was the case.
Hayes said the situation highlights “why it’s always best to separate business from pleasure, wherever possible.”
“Once friendships [or] relationships form, boundary lines can become vague [or] fluid, but business dealings need to have very firm, clear boundaries,” Hayes said.
She suggested the trio should sit down and talk things out, but if there is no solution and the housemates refuse to pay rent, they should leave. And the poster should make it clear from the outset to new tenants that she is the daughter of the landlord.
As Goldson put it: “The roommates’ argument that they shouldn’t have to pay rent has no merit. If I shop in my best friend’s store, I still have to pay for the merchandise I buy.”
He condemned the “invasion of privacy” resulting from Sasha opening the poster’s mail and said the “only way to move forward is for all parties to take responsibility for themselves.”
“The landlord needs to apologize for keeping her ownership secret. The roommates need to apologize for opening her mail. Then, perhaps most important, they need to explain why they think they shouldn’t have to pay the same rent they would pay for any other accommodations,” he said.
Reddit users flocked to the comment sections to share their own thoughts, with one of over 5,000 comments stating: “They do not have a leg to stand on. Just because you are extremely privileged does not mean they should get to live rent free.”
Another user said the poster wasn’t in the wrong for charging rent but was wrong “for lying to them” because “living with a landlord is different than living with an equal roommate and they deserve the chance to decide if they want to do that.”
A stock photo shows a smiling woman with house keys around her finger. When two housemates found out their third roommate was their landlord and was getting their rent money, trouble ensued.
Malkovstock/Getty Images
As one user put it: “This isn’t really about paying rent; this is about being dishonest about the living situation. OP needs to be upfront that they own the house and the money the roommates pay goes to her—it affects the power dynamic in the household whether it’s disclosed or not, and deliberately withholding that information for whatever reason is a****** behavior.”
In 2023, around 23.6 percent of people under the age of 25 were living in a residence they owned themselves, according to Statista.
On average, 65.9 percent of Americans live in an owner-occupied home, with the highest homeownership rate found among those in their early 70s.
Newsweek has contacted u/OldOutlandishness252 on Reddit for comment and could not independently verify this story.
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