5 Pros For Living With Your College S.O. Before Marriage

By Francine Fluetsch on December 9, 2014

image via http://redcarpetmovingandstorage.com

If you’ve been dating someone for a while, the question of whether you two should move in together before getting married may come up. Some parents are still old fashioned and will be really against this idea, but I feel like the pros definitely outweigh the cons for living with your significant other before tying the knot.

Here are 5 pros for living with your significant other before marriage.

1) You can figure out if you are compatible to live together.

Hanging out with someone all the time and living with them is a whole different story, something I’m sure you figured out your freshman year of college when you were placed with a roommate.

The good thing is, you should know your significant other pretty well, so there won’t be too many big surprises, but little annoyances can build up quickly, and it’s better to snub these in the butt before they become bigger problems.

For instance, when my parents first moved in together, my dad didn’t do a lot in terms of housework. His mom had been one of those rare people who actually likes cleaning, but this did not fly with my mom.

They have now worked out a system where they both contribute, but it took a while. Some chores are more despised than others, so maybe the two of you can work out who hates the chore less and make a system that way.

If you guys practice different levels of house cleanliness, you may want to work that out as well. Some people think kicking things on the floor under the fridge counts as cleaning (out of sight, out of mind right?), while other people like to scrub the tile grout with a toothbrush.

Remember that if you get married, you are most likely going to be living with this person for the rest of your life, so don’t be mean about getting your way, but make sure to voice your opinion and don’t let the little things build up.

 2) Living together is the solution to busy schedules.

Once you graduate college, it will be time to get out there in the big bad world and get a job. With both of you having jobs, it may be harder to see one another, but if you live together, you’ll be able to have more down time while keeping up with your busy lives.

Being busy while living together will also help you two figure out how to still make time for one another, which is very important to keep in mind. If one of you starts to feel second best to work dinners and such, it’s best to work those feelings out in the early stages.

Living together should help with this, since you’ll see them every day.

3) Living together is a baby step toward marriage.

Living together is a “baby step” if you will that builds up to marriage. If you are ready to get married, that’s awesome, but some people need to go slower but don’t want to be living with their parents until they are 27.

This will add excitement to your relationship, a bigger step to show your commitment to one another, without having to go all the way to marriage yet. This will be the time to learn even more about one another, to travel together, and even to save up for a bigger place for when you do get married.

Of course, when you first move in together, it will probably be a small, quaint apartment, due to how expensive everything is, but it will be a fun journey saving up and making your little place cute until you move.

This is one of the points where some people would rather not move in together first, because they want all the excitements of living together to start when they are married, and that is a totally valid reason.

If you are worried about this, but want to move in together before you get married, you can still make it exciting, especially if the two of you move into a house or bigger place when you are married. It will still all be new territory, and exciting nonetheless.

4) You can try out different places to live.

The two of you could try moving someplace for a year or so to see if you’d like the area. If you are renting a place, you are less tied down and you have more options to try things out. A lot of people end up living where they grew up, and while there is nothing wrong with that, it’s fun to gain some new experiences and see if you might like it better than the familiar.

My plan is to move to Switzerland for a year after I graduate (my boyfriend doesn’t know this is the plan yet, but I’m sure he’ll be excited) not to stay permanently, but I want to experience a little taste of where my family grew up.

Get out there and have some adventures. Once you have kids, traveling will be much more limited, so you want to get it out of your system so that will at least hold you over until the kids are old enough to appreciate culture.

5) You can figure out the ‘what ifs.

It’s the little things that you might not even be thinking about yet that could cause conflicts when you finally do get married. There are booklets that the two of you can fill out and compare answers before you get married to see if you agree: Will you circumcise your child if it’s a boy? Is it okay to spank your kids? Do you even want kids? What about pets? Will you have separate bank accounts or just one joint one? And so on.

Knowing your partner’s point of view on things that will become important issues will give you peace of mind and could save you from a very big fight later on. It would be horrible to be married and then realize your partner is not down to have kids at all when you really want them or something like that.

Whether you decide to live together before getting married or not, just remember that it should be your choice, and you should do whatever would benefit you and your partner the most.

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