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Hi everyone I can imagine some of you have roomates and could help me come up with a fair split because we’ve been unable to find a compromise. I need others advice!
My housemate and I co-signed a lease to move into a 3-bedroom 2-bathroom under this agreement:
$1900/month for me (master bedroom, ensuite bathroom)
$2100/month for her (2 smaller bedrooms, bathroom)
She uses the 3rd room as her at home office with daily assistant on weekdays
We airbnb the 3rd room on weekends to lower overall rent
The place comes with 2 secured parking spaces, 1 for her and 1 for airbnb guest (I have no car)
We would split cleaning the bathroom every other booking
How would you fairly divide the airbnb profits?
notes to consider:
She purchased the guest bed and lamp, I built it
I purchased the home furniture to share
She has to share her bathroom when there are guests over on weekends
I manage the Airbnb reservations 100% including check-in, laundry (coin operated), communication,
Forum won’t allow me to post listing link for reference because I’m a new account
I disagree. theres not much in it and I think it should be 50/50. She’s losing access to a room she pays for, and having to share her bathroom. You don’t have a car so you are not inconvenienced by the loss of parking space. You do reply to guests and do the laundry, but you take it in turns to clean. It’s roughly equal.
I was going to say 50/50 until I read about the part where you do all the bookings etc. As it seems pretty even other than that. She has given up her spare room and bathroom, you have given up your parking space.
Who does the cleaning? If it’s you, I reckon 50/50 and you keep the cleaning fee.
What does she think/you think the split should be?
EDIT - just reread that you split the cleaning. 50/50 then. Keeps it nice and simple
Let me be the first to say that since you are not the owner of the property you need your landlord’s permission to, in effect, sub lease on airbnb. Also keep in mind that many HOAs and communities around the world restrict Airbnb. I say this not in judgement, but as a warning. I hope you are not dependent on the income from Airbnb because there are many risks. We’ve had people post here who lost their lease when the landlord found out. That can be expensive, not to mention fines from the city.
As for your question, I’d go with a 50/50 split. She’s already paying more rent. The nit-picky “I bought the lamp but she assembled it” level of recordkeeping seems a bit much. Though you are doing the Air work, she has to share her bathroom. For each their own but I don’t want to share my bathroom. And you say you’re splitting the cleaning but I think the airbnb bathroom should be clean at all times which is hard to do when someone in addition to the guest is using it.
Clarify this. Does this mean you will be spending hours at the laundromat washing Airbnb items even if all of your personal laundry was done yesterday?
Will you have self check in? If not, I think you should get slightly more of the Airbnb fees than your roommate. For me, the most time consuming aspect of Airbnb is waiting for guests to arrive.
You say that the Airbnb guest room is your roommate’s home office. Please be warned that guests are well known for rifling through anything they have access to. Your roommate will need to put any sensitive information in a locked file cabinet and password protect her computer.
These answers are coming in hot and quick thank you everyone!
Some of my descriptions do some petty you can probably get a sense that
it’s been complicated.
Where we’ve had an issue is we originally had a 3rd roommate option, then
my housemate asked to instead have both rooms to use as an office. Losing a
3rd roommate raises my original portion of rent which is why we agreed to
Airbnb to cover that difference.
Splitting 50/50 profit could be fair I appreciate the feedback. I’ll
consider it though, having a 3rd roommate would reach the same result
(lowered rent split) and I wouldn’t have to manage Airbnb bookings and
cleanings.
Landlord restrictions aside though I appreciate the tip and the hosting
community.
I am going to be honest. If the original deal was a third roommate, your current roommate should be paying both portions of rent. AirBNB is not easy money. It is another job… Feels like the rules were changed and you are bearing the brunt of that change.
Why did you agree to pay more when s/he proposed keeping two rooms for him/herself?
He has a significantly larger room, she has two smaller rooms. I’m going to guess the split is made on floorspace. With her two rooms she probably has slightly more floor space hence her higher rent.
Bottom line is, she is now spending more since the roommate is taking two rooms, once of which was supposed to have a roommate. Why should she have to do all the work that AirBNB requires to make up the difference?
“Aside from the landlord restrictions?” What does this mean? Seriously the biggest issue you have here is not going to be who assembled the lamp and who gets a wee bit more percentage than the other but in that what are you going to do if you are both kicked out when you are busted? If you have permission (make sure to get it in writing) then I think if you are concerned about petty things like lamps do you have it sorted out who will clean the toilet and who will do the Air laundry? Who will pay for all the supplies for cleaning? Who pays the insurance? Who pays the taxes? Whose account is it under? (That person is responsible for state, federal and local taxes as well as occupancy taxes.)
Those of us who are experienced (I’ve been doing Air almost eight years) can tell you this is not easy work. It’s no get rich quick scheme. And if you are hiding or sneaking from your landlord, you are playing Russian roulette. Airbnb is easy to spot. The first three or four guests rolling in and out will alert your neighbors who might tell your landlord.
Just to add my two cents…in my experience when a roommate paid more for the master bedroom it was more about having your own private bathroom. The size of the room came into play, but the reason the master bedroom was treasured and that roommate was willing to pay more was because of the privacy of having their own bathroom and they could poop in private.
