Renting an efficiency or one bedroom apartment means you make the rules and you pay the rent but when the living space expands to more than one not only the rent changes, the rules do as well. Taking into consideration the financial means of a potential roommate no longer is the single most important factor, one must now look at several traits to help make a decision that will result in not only a rent check being delivered on time but also a living situation that delivers little friction.

A few things to consider when looking for a roommate are:

• Job Obviously a person without one must have some way to pay the rent but beyond that different professions have pros & cons. For example an airline pilot might be gone for several days at a time whereas a night watchman would probably have a normal 5 day work week but might have a shift that begins at 10 pm and ends at 6 am which means they would be coming home when youre getting up or getting up when youre coming home.
• Personality Are you loud and obnoxious? Quiet and polite? Somewhere in between? Personality is a major factor to why we dont get along with people in everyday life so it is an obvious bullet point on a checklist for any potential roommate.
• Appearance Dress like a slob, you probably are a slob and if thats the case then whose going to be expected to clean the dishes? Well its probably a safe bet it wont be the slob and if keeping the house clean is important then you should put a spin on the old saying, Dont judge a book by its cover, and judge away.
• Taste This one will require you ask questions but finding someone who has similar tastes to you may prevent you coming home and finding the giant lion head mounted over your fireplace. (Im assuming for this illustration that you are an animal lover and opposed to big game hunting)
• Honesty A background check is essential to insure you know what kind of person youre considering and doing so will also help determine a persons honesty. If you can trust your roommate, you might as well call it a day and go back to your one bedroom room for rent.
• Credit - Just like a background check, a credit check is mandatory to help you understand a persons ability to manage their finances, which could be a direct correlation to their ability to pay in a timely manner.

As you can see this list could and should be expanded to include references, transportation needs, relationship status and much more in order to give you the most accurate portrait of the person you are considering sharing the rent and your home with.

Mark Stone

I was born in Ohio but raised in Carlsbad, New Mexico. I spent a year in Southern California before moving to Dallas, Texas where I currently reside.

I am an SEO expert with more than 8 years of placing websites on the front page of major search engines.

I spent the first 20 years of my adult life as a professional musician traveling the world and playing in front of such acts as Dolly Parton, The Commodores (w/ Lionel Richie), Kenny Rogers and Jerry Lee Lewis. I currently play some weekends with probably my favorite project of all time, fruitcake-superbeing.

I enjoy sports, especially the Dallas Cowboys, music of all kinds well maybe not too much classical or jazz, art if someone's not trying to explain it to me, comedy, swimming and a number of other things most of which are legal.

My family is my first priority and I'm proud to be the husband of Barbara and the father to Kiani and Shyler. I have two pets, a Catahula named Zoe and a Normal Grey Cockatiel named Baaka.

I hope to one day retire to Hawaii and fulfill my final dream of opening the worlds first Spam On a Bun trailer. That's S.O.B. if you didn't catch it.

I wish there was more peace, less poverty and definitely more politically incorrect humor in the world. We need to learn to laugh at our differences a bit more folks.

If you're serious about marketing your website online, my company can help but don't call or email us if your budget has less than 5 figures, we're good, not cheap.