Hey there struggling and even middle class Brooklynite. Ever think that following the societal imperative to marry a partner would free you forever from the shackles of roommates? After all, you’ve got two incomes instead of you, and you need just one bedroom for two people. Haha, whoops, according to a story in the Times, you’ve slipped on the banana peel of hope if you thought you’d just be living with your legally betrothed after marriage, because more and more married couples are living with roommates. Hey, look on the bright side: free live-in babysitter!
We’ve been through the travails of the city’s roommate situation recently, whether it’s rich people deciding to pair up in apartments rather than make friends or just the fact that as an adult you’re sentenced to roommates forever. However, you might have read the latter post and figured that you’d escape after meeting Mr. or Mrs. Right and running way together. Nope, not if this Times trend piece looking at couples living with roommates stretching to married couples doing it is to be believed.
Why is this happening? Well, it’s not as if anyone who’s close to lower or middle class has a great chance at being able to afford a home around here. Not with home prices shooting up into the stratosphere in Brooklyn and rents not really doing you any favors either. So if it’s between being married and moving somewhere or being married and living in New York, the obvious choice is always choosing New York over an easy marriage. After all, everything here worth doing winds up being difficult, just ask Kimmy Schmidt.
Now, to put things in perspective, these married couples living with people who aren’t their children are doing so in part because they don’t want move to smaller or “less desirable” areas. Which is certainly something you can do instead of subjecting roommates to your weird married person sex and fights. Still, it’s not as if we’ve never heard of beautiful things coming out of couples living in close quarters with other sexy New Yorkers.