Finding a Flatshare through Facebook & Gumtree

Pimlico Flats recently had a tenant whose joint tenant wanted to move on. The tenant who wanted to stay very successfully found a reliable and well recommended flatshare from amongst her contact by using Facebook. As it worked so well I asked her to share her story:

By L. an existing tenant of Pimlico Flats.

When my flat-mate decided to leave our lovely Pimlico flat to be closer to her office (and to help out a friend who had a spare room which needed to be filled), I must admit I was slightly panicked. The rent for our flat was extremely reasonable (as well as being excellent value for money), but not so low that I could even imagine paying for it all myself; we also still had a good seven months left on our lease. I wondered how I was going to explain to my landlord that I couldn’t afford the rent on my own and, as all my friends in London were already sorted for accommodation themselves, that I didn’t know anyone else who could take on my flat-mate’s share of the rent. I resigned myself to an uncomfortable conversation with my landlord and a horrible period of flat-hunting far away from the area of London I had come to love and call home.

Luckily for me, my departing flat-mate had a very clever idea for finding someone to take her room. “Why don’t we just make a group on Facebook?” It turned out to be a brilliant idea; the flat photographs well, Pimlico has excellent transportation links and a real sense of community, and the rent is very reasonable for the rather ample amount of space on offer. We made our advertisement a ‘group’ rather than placing an ad in Facebook’s Marketplace; this allowed our friends to invite their friends to the group and also allowed for a wall and a discussion board where prospective flat-mates could ask questions. To cover all our bases, we also set up an advertisement on Gumtree. Then, we waited.

Within a day of both ads going live I had 30 emails from potential flat-mates who had seen the Gumtree advertisement and wanted to see the flat. I responded to them as they came in with my responses ranging from ‘No, the room is a single room so you AND your boyfriend won’t both be able to fit’ (don’t people read the advert before replying?) to ‘No I won’t send you a picture of myself so you can get a better idea of who you’d be sharing with’ (rather creepy, if you ask me).

Our Facebook group had only garnered a mild amount of interest (as in 3 replies) but the quality of them was far superior to the misspelled and slightly off-putting responses which had resulted from the Gumtree ad. Most helpfully Facebook allowed me to see who I had in common with the potential flat-mates contacting me. When V. got in touch about 3 days after I set up the Facebook group to say that she needed to move into a flat asap, I could immediately see that we shared a friend in common from Scotland and a little bit about her. I felt much more comfortable inviting her round to see the flat knowing a bit about her and that we knew someone in common (who I could ask for an informal reference) than I had with any of the more anonymous Gumtree respondents.

So, obviously, I would recommend using Facebook to find new flat-mates if you find yourself in a situation similar to mine. The usual caveats apply however; people can sometimes turn out to be not who they seem (no matter how many friends you have in common!) but if you apply a bit of common sense and caution, you will go a long way to keeping yourself safe.

Starting a Facebook group is simple:

1. Go to your profile page and click on the section of the side-bar labelled ‘Groups’.
2. At the top of the next page you will see a button called ‘+Create a Group’. When you click on it, it will take you to a page where you can fill in your group name, a description of the group and contact details.
3. I recommend titling your group something like ‘____ room(s) available in lovely (Pimlico/SW1) flat £____/month’. The more information you can include in your title, the likelier people will be to invite their friends to it. After you’ve created your group, you can invite your friends to it; don’t limit the people you invite to only those living in the city where your flat is located; you never know how many friends of friends may be living in your town and looking for somewhere to live.