h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

We did it for a year and it worked. Not only did we all chip in for the food every week, at least four of us went shopping together every week. We were all blokes too! It was great fun... we always ended up spending the same amount, because we bought more or less the same things every week.
It was the the saving grace of our sharing experience, as there is nothing more depressing than opening a fridge and finding four different bottles of milk and 3 different bits of cheese and trying to remember which one is yours.... that's bollocks.

My university roommates and I went the complete opposite direction. We went shopping by ourselves, bought only stuff for ourselves, and never touched anyone else's stuff. It worked out because we all had different tastes, and we never wanted to deal with making sure everyone paid the same and shared equally.

What was difficult was when we split up, and I moved in with my current roommates, who believe in communal shopping. So it seems to me that they are always swiping from my supplies whereas I don't ever think to take from stuff they have. The only think that keeps them from eating my food, I've found, is the fact that I put meat in everything. They are vegetarians, so I can guarantee that they won't steal anything I cook that has meat.

When I shared rooms with one other fellow, we religiously visited the shrine known as Sainsbury's every weekend. We could never exceed the 40 quid barrier no matter how hard we tried.

DMT

I've already touched on this, in the Chill Out thread, but I and a former roommate used to go shopping together. Anything we'd both be using got thrown in... toilet paper, cleaning supplies, dietary staples like bread, milk, cheese... and anything we wouldn't be sharing also got thrown in... shampoo, snacks that were not a shared taste... and we'd roughly divide the price at the counter.

So we had just one package of cheese, and if it ran out, we bought more next time, and didn't concern ourselves with who might be eating more cheese. If there was something in the kitchen that was exclusively mine, he knew it, because it was something he didn't want anyway.

The one item we kept absolutely segregated was beer. We both kept our own beer in the fridge, and made sure we had different brands to avoid confusion. Even then, if I'd run out and didn't want to rush out to the store, and I saw that he wasn't going to run out soon, I'd help myself to some of his, and buy him another sixer as a courtesy when I replenished my own stock... and vice-versa.

It really comes down to good people/bad people.

DMT

I don't think there's any inherent good/badness involved... good people can drive each other crazy, too. It just comes down to how much you're willing to work with the other person, and how considerate everyone involved is willing to be.

My situation was probably one that is rarely duplicated. Not only were we best friends before we moved in, but we also entered into the situation with the cautious realization that we could easily destroy a great friendship as roommates, and the fallout would be exponentially compounded by the fact that we made up 2/3rds of the shop at work.

I could never share a place with someone I don't know. For one thing, we're always much more accomodating to people we already know and like. For another, I wouldn't know how much I could trust them.

We do a sort of mixture of the two ideas which have been so far discussed...

We buy our own stuff, then tend to share it once it's in the house. I suppose it's easier that way because everyone wants a different coloured cap on their milk, and some want a more expensive cheese whereas others (me ) are content with the economy shops' own brands... and my parents tend to supply me with the bulk of my food when they come and visit....

My point is, we do our bit independently, but as a group :-s In between the two. We all feel like we an use whoever else's stuff, because we know they'll use something of ours and it'll all even out in the grand scheme of things.