One of the most difficult parts of moving into a house as a student is managing all of the tasks that need to be done. Most students are no stranger to having to do chores, but they may not be used to having to plan them. While coming up with a system can be daunting, don’t leave it until the house is a mess to work out who’s doing what. Here’s how you can get off on the right foot and divide everything evenly when you want to organise chores in a student house.
Start With a Big List
Start by writing down all of the big and small chores that will need to be done in the house throughout the year and how often they’ll need to be done. Some of them will be obvious – dishes, cleaning the shower, taking out the bins. Some of the less frequent chores might not come to mind right away, such as cleaning the oven or the fridge.
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Come Up With Rules Together
Things are most likely to go smoothly if you keep it as democratic as possible. Every person has different standards of tidiness and different expectations going into a living arrangement, so give everyone a chance to have input as to what’s important to them. From there, come up with a basic set of guidelines that everyone can agree on
Draw Up a Rota
Next, come up with daily, weekly and monthly rotas for the different chores you’ve identified. Divide each one equally among the housemates, taking into account when people may be returning home or traveling. This is also a great opportunity to rearrange things if anyone has scheduling issues that make it hard to do a certain chore on a given day.
Tidy As You Go
While your rota should cover most tasks that need to be done around the house, there are always going to be some that are going to be missed. As a general rule, clean up any messes and spills as soon as possible. If you’re cooking, it can be helpful to get some of the dishes done while you wait for the water to boil or for the oven to heat up.
Communicate
While it’s easier said than done, most conflicts when you organise chores in a student house can be resolved with communication. If someone isn’t pulling their weight, it can be tempting to do their jobs for them or let it slide, but this will only delay the inevitable. Bringing up the concern politely before it becomes a source of frustration is the best way to go.
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