Roommate Agreements: What to Cover Beyond the Lease

Your lease is a contract between tenants and a landlord. It covers rent, security deposits, and what happens if someone breaks a window. What it does not cover is who cleans the bathroom, how to handle overnight guests, or what happens when your roommate's partner essentially moves in without contributing to utilities.

A roommate agreement fills that gap. It is not a legal document (in most cases). It is a practical understanding between the people sharing a living space—and it can prevent the kind of slow-burning resentment that turns friends into enemies and strangers into adversaries.

Why You Need One (Even If You're Friends)

Especially if you are friends. Friendships survive disagreements about politics and taste in music. They rarely survive disagreements about dirty dishes and unpaid electric bills that fester for months without a resolution framework.

A roommate agreement gives you a neutral reference point. Instead of "you're being inconsiderate," the conversation becomes "we agreed to X, and that's not happening." It depersonalizes the issue and focuses on the commitment.

What to Cover

1. Shared Expenses Beyond Rent

Your lease says how much rent is due. Your roommate agreement should cover everything else:

Utilities split: Equal? Proportional to room size? Based on usage?
Internet and streaming services: Who pays? How is it split?
Shared household supplies: Toilet paper, cleaning products, trash bags—who buys them and how are costs shared?
Groceries: Completely separate? Shared staples? A common fund?

Be specific. "We'll split things fairly" means something different to everyone. Clear financial terms matter just as much in a roommate situation as in any other arrangement.

2. Cleaning and Maintenance

This is the number one source of roommate conflict. Address it head-on:

Cleaning schedule: Who cleans what, and when? Rotating responsibilities work well.
Common areas: What standard of cleanliness is expected? Define it. "Clean" means different things to different people.
Personal spaces: Is each person responsible only for their own room, or are there shared standards?
Dishes: This deserves its own bullet point because it causes more roommate fights than probably anything else. Set a specific rule. "Dishes must be washed within 24 hours" is better than "do your dishes."

3. Guests and Overnight Visitors

Heads-up policy: How much notice should you give before having guests over?
Overnight guests: How many nights per week or month before someone is considered a de facto roommate?
Contribution from frequent guests: If someone's partner is there four nights a week, should they contribute to utilities?
Quiet hours during visits: Especially important with thin walls.
Off-limits areas: Are certain common areas off-limits for guests?

4. Noise and Quiet Hours

Quiet hours: Specify a time range (e.g., 10 PM to 8 AM on weekdays).
Music and TV volume: Headphones after quiet hours? Always in common areas?
Work-from-home considerations: If someone works from home, daytime noise levels matter too.

5. Shared Spaces

Kitchen: Designated shelf or cabinet space? Shared cooking equipment?
Bathroom: If shared, what is the morning routine protocol?
Living room: Is it first-come-first-served? Can one person monopolize the TV?
Storage: How is closet, garage, or basement space divided?
Parking: If limited, who gets priority?

6. Pets

Even if no one currently has a pet, address the possibility:

Are pets allowed by both roommates (not just the landlord)?
Who is responsible for pet-related damages?
What about pet noise, especially barking?
Allergies or phobias?

7. Substance Policies

This can be an awkward conversation, but it prevents much worse awkwardness later:

Smoking or vaping inside the unit?
Marijuana (where legal)?
How to handle situations where one roommate's substance use affects the other?

8. Communication and Conflict Resolution

The meta-agreement—how do you handle problems when they arise?

Preferred communication method: In-person conversation? Text? A shared document?
Cool-down period: Agree to wait 24 hours before addressing an issue when emotions are high.
Escalation: If you cannot resolve a conflict between yourselves, what is the next step? A mutual friend as mediator? A formal mediation service?
Regular check-ins: A monthly five-minute conversation about how things are going can prevent problems from building up.

9. Moving Out

Your lease has its own terms for this, but your roommate agreement should add:

Notice period between roommates: How much advance notice does one roommate owe the other before deciding to leave (above and beyond what the lease requires)?
Finding a replacement: Whose responsibility is it? What say does the remaining roommate have in selecting a replacement?
Shared property: What happens to furniture, kitchen equipment, or other items you bought together?
Security deposit: How is it handled if one person moves out and another moves in?

What People Get Wrong

"We don't need this—we're friends." You need it more because you are friends. An agreement protects the friendship by giving you a framework for resolving disputes that does not require anyone to be the bad guy.

"It's weird to make it formal." It does not have to be formal. A shared Google Doc works fine. The point is not formality—it is clarity. Write it in casual language. Use bullet points. What matters is that both people agreed to the same expectations. For tips on tone, check out our guide on plain language vs. legal language.

"We'll figure it out as we go." You will—through arguments, passive-aggressive Post-it notes, and eventually someone moving out early. Or you could spend 30 minutes writing things down now.

"The lease covers us." The lease covers your landlord. It does not address how you and your roommate split utilities, handle guests, or divide cleaning responsibilities. Those are your problems to solve.

A Simple Format

You do not need anything fancy. A roommate agreement can be a shared document with these sections:

Financial split (rent proportion, utilities, shared expenses)
Cleaning responsibilities (schedule, standards, consequences)
Guest policy (notice, overnight limits, contributions)
Quiet hours (times, enforcement)
Shared spaces (allocation, rules)
Communication plan (how to raise issues, check-in schedule)
Move-out terms (notice, replacement, shared property)
Signatures and date

Both people sign. Both people keep a copy. Revisit it after the first month to adjust anything that is not working.

The Bottom Line

A roommate agreement is a small investment of time that pays for itself many times over in avoided conflict. You do not need a lawyer. You do not need fancy formatting. You just need an honest conversation and a willingness to put the results in writing.

For more on structuring agreements, visit our Writing Your Agreement hub, and explore other types of casual agreements that benefit from written terms.