How sky-high rents are transforming roommate households

Roommates sharing apartments was what Friends, Girls, The Big Bang Theory, and New Girl were built on. But thanks to sky-high rents, the ‘young upstarts navigating the big city’ trope looks ever more like fiction than reality.

The soaring cost of living is pricing young people out of the rental market altogether, and keeping older people in shared rentals for longer. The result? Roommates are getting older. Meanwhile, unaffordable rents are endangering social spaces in shared homes, limiting one of the major benefits to living with roommates.

The proof is in the changing shape of the roommate market. In 2015, 18-24 year olds represented 37% of renters in shared households, according to a breakdown of SpareRoom user data. By 2025, that figure had fallen to 28%. Those aged 25-34 years old – the age group we most typically associate with renting with roommates – fell from 40% in 2015 to 31% in 2025, though this is still the most dominant age group.

Meanwhile, roommates aged 45+ are on the rise. In fact, their share in the market has doubled in the 10 years to 2025. That’s why, today, it’s not uncommon to find households of roommates with massive age gaps. Almost four in 10 roommates now live in multi-generational households, where the difference between the oldest and youngest adult is 20 years or more.

Retiree roommates are the fastest growing

Retirees are less common in shared apartments; this age group accounts for less than 5% of all US roommates, but the share of over 65s more than tripled in the 10 years to 2025 – the biggest increase of any age group – as reported by The New York Times.

The simple truth is too many renters are struggling to afford the high cost of living. More than half (54%) of 1,257 US roommates told us they were spending 40% or more of their take-home pay on rent in an August 2025 survey. And, despite the fact living with others has always been the cheapest way to rent, a sizable proportion of those surveyed – 42% – still described their rent as 'unaffordable'.

Roommate rents remain stubbornly high

Despite some marginal decreases throughout 2025, room rents hit record highs in 13 of the 30 most popular metro areas among roommates – including Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Houston, and Portland – and there have been no significant decreases in room rents, which is what renters badly need.

As a result, fewer young people can afford to leave their family homes and older renters are increasingly being priced out of home ownership: they simply cannot save for a downpayment and afford rent, nor the higher price of renting solo.

This is fueling other transformations in the roommate market. For many couples, living as a twosome in an apartment of their very own is a rite of passage, a major life milestone. But, for others, it's a pipe dream. Around one in eight (13%) roommates live in households that include at least one couple, according to an August 2025 SpareRoom survey of 1,257 US roommates.

Some of these couples are renting with roommates, while others have managed to buy homes, but rent out spare bedrooms to roommates to help cover their mortgage and costs, as reported by The New York Times.

Roommates forgo living rooms for cheaper rents

High rents are also driving a rise in living room conversions. The number of shared rentals without living rooms is almost three times higher today than it was five years ago as renters turn their communal spaces into bedrooms to lower rent per person, according to SpareRoom data.

In 2020, 9% of shared homes across the whole of the US had no living room, by 2025 that figure had risen to 25%. While 30% told us this was a decision taken by the landlord, around half (49%) said it was a decision made by roommates, suggesting affordability is a top priority for cost-burdened roommates today.

The changing shape of roommate households

The sky-high cost of living is transforming the dynamics of roommate households as we know them. Americans are completely rethinking how they live, and the traditional idea of ‘home' is evolving. From retirees and couples with roommates to the death of the living room, what was once unconventional is now the new normal.

The market is under intense pressure, but it's also adapting. Renters are finding creative ways to make shared living work for their budgets, even if that means sacrificing social space for lower rent, and embracing a setup that would have looked unconventional a decade ago. Whatever comes next for roommates will be dictated by the trajectory of rents.