Choosing where to live after graduation is a big decision — with pros and cons. Here are four options
By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant
If you’re graduating this spring, you have a lot of decisions to make in the coming months, one of which is where to live.
It’s a tough choice with a lot of considerations and you do have several options:
1. Live With Your Parents
Pros:
Since you probably have some school loan debt and need to save up for your first place, living with your folks can help you financially. If they are on a tight budget, offer to pay toward the rent or mortgage and chip in for food and utilities. But it’s still a bargain over getting your own place.
Of course, you pick up after yourself (right?!) but living with your parents likely means a little help with household care that would land firmly on your shoulders if you have your own apartment. Sharing meals and leisure with mom and dad can also provide an emotional boost, if they’re supportive. Since this is a tough transitional period of your life, you can benefit from staying with them.
You can also enjoy spending time with any siblings and pets you left behind. The extra time with your family is precious, as life moves by fast.
Cons:
You may find yourself reliving the same arguments and tension from high school, as it’s tough for parents to realize how much you’ve grown and matured in the past four years.
Your parents may struggle to step back and allow you to live as an adult if you’re once again under their roof. If you have a boyfriend or girlfriend, expect your love life to feel very awkward.
2. Get an apartment with a roommate(s).
Pros:
Subletting saves on rent. Sharing the expense will give your budget some breathing space.
There’s no one to judge you on what you want to do and when you want to do it. A college dorm can feel like a halfway house toward the goal of becoming a fully-fledged adult and having your own apartment represents the next step.
Sharing an apartment with roommates means that you have some help when you need it, along with camaraderie.
Cons:
Just as with living with your parents, you compromise on privacy when you share an apartment with roommates. You also have to consider the needs of your roomies such as tiptoeing around if they work nights and you work days.
Even if you choose to cohabitate with friends you’ve had for years, living with someone can cause friction as undesirable behaviors surface. Some people avoid having friends as roommates to preserve their friendships.
Roommates can choose to leave their sublease, which can leave you financially strapped if you rely on their money to pay the rent.
Most apartments don’t allow pets and if they do, landlords typically limit the size, species and number of pets, as well as charge more money.
3. Get your own apartment.
Pros:
You don’t answer to anyone in your household and live completely autonomously. If you want to move or redecorate or stay out late or get up early, you can do it. No one’s stopping you.
Renting alleviates you from paying for repairs and replacing any appliances that come with the place (unless there’s damage from irresponsibility).
Cons:
It’s fun feeling independent until you realize you’ll go home to a dark, quiet apartment where no one waits for you. Lonesomeness is rough.
Leasing an apartment by yourself is costly. Making the rent payment is all up to you, along with the utilities.
Some apartments have noisy neighbors on the other side of the wall.
4. Buy a house.
Pros:
Could you get any more adulty than buying a house? It’s a big part of the American Dream and can help you build wealth as your home gains equity. Even if you don’t make any big improvements on the place, if you generally take decent care of it, your home will grow in value.
You can not only redecorate but you can also completely gut and redo the place to your liking, along with the landscaping and exterior to make it truly your own.
You can throw parties, get five cats, have guests stay with you long-term and basically do whatever you’d like, providing you are not part of a homeowner’s association.
Unless you have very close-by neighbors, you can enjoy quieter living than in an apartment.
Cons:
Home purchases are costly. Although interest rates are going down, expect to put down 20% of the home’s cost to get a mortgage. If you mitigate this effect by purchasing with your significant other, you put yourself into financial jeopardy if you part ways. Many financial advisers agree that it’s risky buying a house unless you’re married first.
Home maintenance is expensive as well. Unless you’re handy, plan on setting aside plenty of money to pay for upkeep and repairs. And even if you are handy, you’ll need tools, supplies and equipment to keep your home going. These upfront costs can be challenging if you’re just starting out in your career.
You’ll also need to pay for homeowner’s insurance and property taxes.
Buying a home means putting down roots. Will you work at your first job long enough to justify buying a house? Is the industry in that area growing enough to guarantee you’ll live there for a while?
