I live with three other roommates in a rental house near our campus. We’re all friends, and have been living together for about 1.5 years now. Our current lease ends in late July, and we’re all in pretty similar financial positions. We’re all students, we all have various part time jobs and gigs, we all pay our own rent/utilities, and we all pay for our own tuition (whether directly or through loans,) without familial assistance.

One roommate rarely purchases shared household things including kitchen/bathroom cleaning products, paper towels, toilet paper, garbage bags, hand soap, dishwasher detergent, etc. He bought dishwashing pods once. That’s it. The other three of us always uphold our end of the bargain, as we can’t just not have toilet paper every time he doesn’t buy some. We have a sheet on the fridge where we keep track of who is spending money on the house to try to keep it even and take turns.

We all feel annoyed and have vented about it as a trio because purchasing these “for the benefit of everyone” types of things add up. About three months ago we had a roommate meeting where this topic was discussed. We didn’t want to make him feel attacked so we used language to suggest that, in general, we’d like household spending to be more even. He agreed, bought the dishwashing pods as I mentioned, and then went right back to not contributing to the house. In his defense, we haven’t been as direct as we could be.

What makes this feel worse is that he doesn’t compensate this financial inequality with labor. He’s the messiest and needs to be reminded about chores multiple times. We HAVE had talks where we’ve directly told him that we’re frustrated with his passiveness in the cleanliness department. Similar to the purchasing issue, he’ll change for a day or two and go right back to his default.

We used to be close, but his failings as a roommate make me see him very differently. Us other roommates have talked about being petty such as keeping toilet paper and soap in our rooms, hiding detergent, etc. We feel that there is no way for him to make it up to us financially or relationship-wise. We’re all just super annoyed and wish that this grown man would treat us as equals and not as his parents.

Summary: Roommate doesn’t buy shared goods but uses what we buy. We’re leaning towards being petty and not allowing him to use our things. We have about four months left in our lease.