Paying Utilities in a Househack

[Andrew McCartin]

For those of you who househack using the rent-by-room strategy, do you include utilities in your rents, or split those monthly expenses among your tenants/roommates? 

I can see the pros (not having to pay out of pocket) and the cons (disputes among roommates) to doing this either way, but am curious to hear how you guys approach this. 

Thanks! 

[Dylan H.]

@Andrew McCartin

Whenever I was living there I just gave them an all inclusive price that included utilities. Now I rent that home by the room and have moved out, so utilities are just put in the name of the tenant who will be there the longest and they split them with their other roommates.

There can obviously be some downsides to renting with all utilities included, like tenants not caring about their usage amount. I actually rented a house after college where they included utilities, but there was a monthly cap that if it was exceeded then we covered the difference.

Best of luck!