Was having a conversation at work earlier about how the TV in my flat. I said how my flatmate owns the TV (as in he paid for it) and I can use it if he isn’t using it, but if he wants to use it for whatever I let him because ultimately he owns it.
My colleagues seemed to think this was really weird though. “if its in the communal area then surely you have as much right to use it as he does?”
None of my colleagues were in house shares though so I wasn’t sure if they were being out of touch, or whether me and my housemate have an unusual dynamic?
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I think in every house share I lived in (and I lived in them from 18 to 27), somebody owned the tv. But it was generally accepted that if it’s in the communal area it’s a communal TV and the owner can’t just pull rank because it’s their TV.
I’ve never experienced the owner of the TV insisting they should have priority on that basis. If they want priority, they shouldn’t make it a communal TV, imo.
I’d imagine you’d have it as someone owns it (paid for it, unless you split it) but they wouldn’t ever demand to take over the TV in a communal area just whenever – I imagine they’d still want to get priority in case like they had a specific thing they wanted to watch though, like say a weekly popular TV show airing or something.
When I lived in a house share, the TV in the communal area was from a previous tenant and they’d just left it behind, nobody actually owned it. We all thought it was a little weird, but we just kinda figured it out.
I think that it being in the communal area complicates things a little. The way I see it is that it is ultimately his TV but it’s in a shared space. If he wants to watch his TV that’s definitely his prerogative.
It becomes a dick move if out of the blue he just takes over the communal space and is like “sorry bro, I know you’re 2 hours into this movie but I just decided I don’t want you to watch anymore”.
Really something that you should talk to him about though, he owns the TV but not the space.
Regardless of who owns it, if it’s in a communal place then you should have fair use of it.
If he wants to watch or play what he wants, when he wants he should put it in his room. His ownership extends to being able to take it with him when he leaves or keeping it in his bedroom. Putting it in a communal space makes it everyone’s, imo. By his logic you could just put a hifi in and insist on listening to loud music all the time because it’s your hifi and you can do what you want with it.
The fairer thing is to find stuff that you both want to watch or you both get a decent go on it. Wednesday night is yours, Thursdays his. Or you can watch an episode of something and he can watch one after. That sort of thing.
But with shared houses, especially if you’re not good friends with your housemates, that sort of thing can be tricky. I’ve only done it a couple of times and in those instances we didn’t really have a usable living room you could sit and watch tele in.
None of the houseshares i lived in have people put a TV in the communal room.
My current houseshare the landlord has put in a cheap TV for us to use as we wish, though in the past 3 years i don’t think it’s even been turned on.
Most people tend to have their TV in their own rooms and the only communal room that gets used is the kitchen.
Got my own in my room
I think it’s fair that if someone has paid for it then they get priority use of it. If anyone thinks differently, perhaps they should buy their own and put it in their room. That’s what I did with my first flatshare. I wouldn’t have dreamed of arguing that I had equal rights over something that I did not pay a penny towards.
Mine is in my room, my housemates is in the living room and shared use. I assumed she’d want hers in her room and we’d split the cost of one but she was happy to put hers in the living room. I tend to watch in my room unless we’re watching something together.
The tv was bought split equally between me and my housemates. Having said that, I never watch tv but couldn’t exactly say no and sound petty at the start when we were in the process of buying utensils and appliances for the flat…so I’m not getting any bang for my buck but it is what it is.
Communal area: it’s everyone’s tv, regardless of who paid for it.
That’s why I kept my TV in my room.
When I used to live in houseshares, the landlord would always convert the lounge into another bedroom to make more money, and the only communal space would be a tiny kitchen. So I have never encountered issues with sharing a TV.
I couldn’t live without my own tv in my room.
I own the TV in our house.
Anyone can watch whatever they want, whenever they want. I never pull rank. Your house mate should turn it in
Every share I’ve ever been in the living room tv is owned by one person but what to watch is up for grabs. Nowadays I would assume most people use tablets or laptops in their rooms anyway. If there is a program they want to watch on the TV at a certain time like a weekly show that’s a fair enough compromise for everyone to have dibs for favorite programs otherwise its whoever gets to the TV first.
That’s very weird imo. I’ve never been in a house share where someone other than the landlord owned the TV, but if I did live in one and someone owned the TV I don’t think they’d have priority. If it was my TV I wouldn’t take precedence for it’s use, all i think ownership would do is allow the owner to take it if they leave the house share
I bought the TV, but if someone was watching a show before me then they have the right to finish watching to the end of the show.
Then it becomes a discussion about what to watch next, and you still have no right to force what is watched next because it’s a shared space.
If it becomes an argument, you can remove the TV since you own it. Both of you would need to be prime arseholes for it to escalate to that point though.
When I lived in a HMO we had no living room so if you wanted a TV you could just stick it in your room and use it whenever you like.
Your housemate is a cunt.
When I flat shared I owned the TV in the living room so yeh if I wasn’t watching it he could, but if we were both in the room I chose what we watched. If there wasn’t something I specifically wanted to watch I’d usually try and watch something that he might enjoy too though if he was in the room and most of the time we’d decide together and liked a lot of the same stuff.
Occasionally I’d come home and he’d be watching something and I’d have to say when this is finished I’m watching something else.
I don’t think that’s weird, it was my TV and I was always reasonable about it. Just if I wanted to watch something then I would.
I hated him though, so maybe if i’d liked him it would have been different.
We both had TVs in our room aswell for the record.
Also he worked strange hours so would often be at work during prime TV watching hours.
When I was sharing I had it in my own room
Lived in shared housing for ten years with six different groups of people and everybody has watched TV in their room.
TV in the communal space is a communal TV for viewing things, but generally is owned by someone and would go with them when they leave.
Normally the communal TV is used for things everyone enjoys and if you want to watch something specific do so in your room.
>My colleagues seemed to think this was really weird though. “if its in the communal area then surely you have as much right to use it as he does?”
I’d agree with this. If your flatmate who owns the TV wants to be able to pull rank over their ownership, they can keep it in their room.
If it’s in a communal area, it’s available to anyone who may want to use it.
In all my house shares (quite a while ago) we jointly rented the TV from somewhere like Curries, and gave it back at end of tenancy.
It’s my TV but my flat mate and guests can use it whenever he wants – in that regard it is communal.
Logic being, because my TV is there, he can’t bring in his own if he wanted to, because there’s no space. It’s only fair for it to be fair game.
Every shared house I’ve lived in (which is 9 total) the TV has been communal to use.
Someone has always owned it, as in it’s their TV and they’ll take it when they leave, but what happens on the TV has always been communal. The general idea is that if someone wants exclusive right over the TV they buy one for their own room.
Edit: worth noting that in all but 2 of my houses I was friends with everyone or most people before moving in, it’s a lot easier to just agree on something everyone wants to watch (or have some give and take) when everyone is mates.
Agree with most of the comments being that a TV may be owned by one person, but is fair game for everyone to use if in a shared space. (With the exception that you can take it with you if you leave).
Your scenario would be weird it applied to other household things like the kettle, the microwave, washing machine, fridge, dining table, sofa etc; “hey can you take your clothes out mid cycle, its mine and my shit comes first”. (If you take an extreme unfurnished house share scenario).
When I lived in one the tv in the communal area the landlord brought so we all used it but it became a running joke that it was only mine as I was the only person who used the living room.
I moved into a flat share years ago in London, they had a small big back TV. I had a flat screen so I put it in the living room instead of my bedroom, wasn’t bothered who used it except for F1 and Football when it was mine. Worked out ok, no fuss.
Flat shares are exactly that, share and compromise imo. (Within reason)
I had a 3 bedroom house and I used to rent out the two spare rooms to people who I worked with if they needed the start up etc.
I never had a issue with people wanting to watch stuff in the front room even though everything was mine. However I did have tvs in each of the bedrooms so more often than not I was usually alone when watching TV.
Me being laid back bit me in the ass in the end though because one person has his friends over and I was robbed while I was asleep upstairs.
I lived in 3 houseshares. In the first I didn’t own the TV but could watch whenever, it was really 1st come first serve, unless one of us really wanted to watch something specific.
In the second it was my TV, but my flatmate hogged it, she was WFH and would be in the living room from 8am to 12am, very annoying. If my bf came over if take it to my room and we’d watch it there.
In the third we had a communal TV, but the screen had a blue tint that irritated me, so I had my TV in my room and watched it there.