September of second year. You’re about to move into your second year house, probably somewhere in Jesmond, probably with 4-7 housemates in tow. You are so excited to finally get to live with all of your best friends from first year! And then it all goes wrong …
"The second year house curse happens to the best of us"
The second year house curse happens to the best of us. There is not a single soul who has not either experienced it themselves, or vicariously experienced it through a friend who has been adopted into a second household after the curse starts its effects. But why is this phenomenon so common?
It starts with the house signing. Unlike first year, where for the vast majority of us your housemates will be randomly assigned by whatever student halls provider you choose to live with, in second year you choose. However, you choose in October or November, from a pool of people that you have known for a month or two. Of course it sounds great at the time! But you don’t really know these people. For the unlucky few, there are horrific falling outs before they even reach the tenancy start date, leading to housemates dropping out and the whole process beginning anew. At best, you develop very close friendships with these housemates by the end of first year - but you can’t know what they’re like to live with until you’re actually living with them.
"In imagination, having an eight person ‘party house’ sounds great, until you actually have to live in the self-proclaimed party house... when you have a 9am the next day."
Second is the numbers. Why do we all so naively think as 18 year olds that the more people we live with, the better? In imagination, having an eight person ‘party house’ sounds great, until you actually have to live in the self-proclaimed party house with seven other people and all their guests when you have a 9am the next day. And who is cleaning up that mess? And how do you divide the 2 bathrooms, when one is an ensuite in the attic? Nevermind the fact that there is never enough kitchen space to hold everyone’s individual pots and pans.
So September comes, and you move in with all of these people that you know well enough but not what they’re like in the privacy of their own home, in a house that’s too small to contain you all. And the dynamic is strange. This isn’t like first year, where the people are strangers and if you really dislike them there’s nothing much to lose. The tensions are much higher. Confronting a friend one too many times about their really annoying tendency to never take out the rubbish is suddenly friendship-ruining - and all the other flatmates will be taking a side too!
"You know you don’t have to rush into a tenancy agreement in October."
But it’s only for a year, and you’ve learned now. You know you don’t have to rush into a tenancy agreement in October. You’ll wait until December now and sign on with people you know much better. You’ll move somewhere quieter, like Heaton, and live with maybe 2 or 3 others. And you and your new house will all bond over your crazy horror stories of your second year flatmates.