apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

well, nothing too bad - but it's wearing when guests need to be entertained constantly.

Or the ones that fly in and won't even rent a car, stay for a week and expect you to be their personal taxi.

my friend's cousin is allergic to cats, and my apartment didn't allow pets at the time so mine was at my mom's. she and her boyfriend were at my apartment were here for 3 days and i came home to no toilet paper, no paper towels, an empty fridge, and every single dish in my house dirty, and covering the sink and counter top.

I was used as a New York-address- person (forget the friendship- it's not about that at all).
Because if you live in NYC you hang out all the time, have tons of time/money/fun. And big apartment. So all your friends from the past can come and stay for 2-3 months.
So currently I am stuck in my tiny studio with a high-school friend who decided to vacation in NYC for 2 months.
Guess who's sleeping on the sofa...(and it's not a sleeper sofa)
But this time I said enough- go rent a room/apartment for your vacation because I am NOT on a break here.
Yes- I am a bad friend now.
But at least I will get my apartment back. And bed.

Two months? I can't believe you even let her stay a day on that plan.

Our friend, Ryan, came to visit and ended up staying on our couch for a month. He didn't have any money and since he was only visiting, didn't want to get a job, so we fed him and kept him in beer, etc. The worst thing, in my mind, was happening upon him as he sniffed inside a glass before using it, even though he never went anywhere near dish soap or a sink of dirty dishes. One day he went out to the horsetrack/casino, won $1,500 on a slot machine and left the next day without so much as a goodbye or a fiver on the nightstand.

Countering with a positive houseguest story: several years ago my friend Ryan stayed with me for over a month in my small 2-BR DC apartment (which I shared with a truly heinous roommate). He slept on the couch in our windowless living room, and every morning he folded up all the sheets and blankets, and re-packed all his stuff into his backpack, so you barely knew he was there. He also helped with groceries. Ahhh, Ryan G, what a great guy. :)

i try to encourage my friends to visit in pairs, so that i can continue my life (work, school) without having to worry about entertaining them. visitors want to spend a lot of time with me and often forget that i'm not on vacation and can't afford to eat out for every meal and drink like a rock star, though i often end up doing so anyways.

because of this, i also try to keep the visitors down to once a month. when i first moved here, i had several groups of people visiting me for a month straight, though not all of them stayed with me. it was a bit ridiculous. most of them were able to entertain themselves well, seeing as i live in brooklyn and they have all of nyc to explore. i was surprised, though, that one girl i hadn't been close to in almost ten years, if ever, and who wasn't even staying with me, would call me multiple times daily to complain that i wasn't spending enough time with her and whine that she didn't want to go places by herself. and the time i did spend with her, she wanted to do a lot of really touristy things, which i am ok with except that she also expressed shame in being touristy and was very self-conscious about it, which got old pretty fast.

about ten years ago, i had a girl visit me while i was living in seattle. i told her she should come for maybe 5 days or so at the most. seattle's pretty small, and we didn't know each other especially well. i knew her as the roommate of a guy i was seeing briefly while i lived in nyc when i was 20-21. after i'd stopped seeing that guy, and she moved somewhere else, we were drinking buddies and would go dancing occassionally. although i suggested she come here for five days, she booked her trip for 16 days. in the six months since i'd last seen her, her life had apparently gone haywire with heroin and a really bad relationship. she was broke most of the time she was here, and was constantly fighting with her mom on the phone, often very loudly and very early in the morning, and the conversations included her calling her mother terrible degrading names. she constantly complained that our house was a shithole (it wasn't, we were just 21 year olds in a rental), scoffed at the things we did for fun (the local bar and club scene was apparently not up to par with her), and could not figure out the bus system and had to be taken everywhere. the highlight was when dragged me out to pick up old rich guys one nice. she somehow convinced me to go with her to one of the old dude's hotel suites. i forgot what the reason was that she gave me for wanting to go up there, but she refused to go home with me and i didn't feel right leaving her by herself (she was a total trainwreck). she had sex with the guy with me in the room watching tv (which was over in about ten minutes) and then asked him for $50 for a cab ride home (the cabride would have been less than $10). he went into the bathroom and while he was in there, she shoved everything she could from the minibar into her backpack, grabbed my hand, and ran out of the room. when we got back onto the street, she started making out with some random guy who was walking past, and convinced him to pay for a cabride to the bar down the street from my house. i didn't feel bad about leaving her there, because i know she knew how to get home from there, the guy seemed relatively harmless, and i was too disgusted and exhausted to stick around.

even though she was a houseguest, i guess that was more of a story of some psycho i used to know and less about why she was a bad houseguest.

Yeah, I haven't had any of these nightmare situations. I think the space restriction makes even one guest feel like a whole village has moved in your apartment. The one thing that I agree with godsfool, is the drainage that they create by wanting to be entertained. So I cherish the day when I buy them tickets to a Broadway show, so I can be home alone.

It's very frustrating when you have to fight for your own space & privacy (in your own apartment!)
I love guests who understand that and don't stay for days/weeks driving you crazy & broke.

Gee, Jenny and gussiedup - I wonder if it was the same Ryan!

I spent the past year in a studio apartment in Philadelphia and I couldn't get anyone to visit. Now that I've bought a house, I'm getting more visitors. Here's to no rotten guests! Ryan G has a free pass to my guest room if he's ever in Philly! Gussie's Ryan, not so much.

My fiance and I had a couple visit us in DC in July. There were more showers than normal because we had an extended weekend packed full of events all in 90 degree heat. Upon their departure, I entered our "guestroom" to find EVERY towel that we owned was used during their stay and hung over anything that stood still in the room. Surprize!

Coping mechanism: strongly encourage day trips to Washington D.C. and Philadelphia!

Me: So, what would you like to do while you are visiting New York?

Lovely Guest: I don't know, whatever!

Me: Ok, well, any ideas on what you would like to do for dinner tongiht?

Guest: I'm easy, anything is fine!

Me: Um. Ok. So, I mean, do you want to go out, or we can go get groceries and cook here, or....

Imposing Guest: Oh, I really don't care!

Me: Well, what kinds of food/activities/shopping/sights do you like (*silently begging for ANYTHING, please god give me ANYTHING to work with!!!*)

Guest from Hell: Well, you're the local, whatever you say!!!!!


I am glad to host you, dearest family member, friend, college buddy, past work acquaintence, husband's old drinking pal that makes me question my judgement, but PLEASE, make things a little easier on us by coming with a list of things you'd like to do, a little research on places to eat, and at least ONE activity you can take yourself on solo to give us a moment of quiet time in our home. I love being a hostess, but being a tour guide is another matter.

And to my sister-in-law: it wouldn't kill you to wash a fucking dish. I'm just saying.

There was the now-ex friend who came back to my apartment each night at 4AM, coked out of her mind and drunk, when I had to work in the morning. I live in a railroad with no doors, so this was especially not fun. Our friendship ended when I told her not to call me until AFTER rehab. Apparently I just wasn't any fun.

Then there was the friend of my boyfriend's who got insanely wasted, stole my small (but VERY IMPORTANT) stash of emergency Xanax, and then drunkenly crawled into bed with us in the middle of the night. He's kind of hot, but as he was WAY more into my boyfriend than me, I wasn't having it.

I am far more selective these days and no matter how much I love the houseguest, I have a three-day maximum rule.

Basically, if you live in NYC, you should bill your apartment as being too small for guests. If you want guests, like your actual blood-kin/favorite-sister as I have had, or your best-friend-from-college with whom you're vaguely familiar with the fact that he's decent to deal with from having roomed with him on college choir tours (which I also have done), you can magically make an exception.

Oh, yeah, and if you not only love your parents, but actually like them and get along with them, and are very eager for them to see what great things you've done with your place, then invite them, too. But if they make you insane, you might want to book them into a local hotel, where they'll be more comfortable.

One of the benefits of having a small apartment is that you outsource all non-routine needs. Pantry = corner store. TV watching room = most bearable sports bar. Guest room = nearest pleasant hotel.

Having attempted to deal with rampant domesticity as an in-house project, I'm big on outsourcing lately.

my friend's biz-natch ex-girlfriend who decided to fixate on MY boyfriend. Still friends with her ex, she couldn't stay with him because he had a new girl.

Lucky me, we have an extra bedroom. And she had a bunch of pot and nothing to do. And could also sense/capitalize upon the tension between my boyfriend and me at the time.

So, she and MY boyfriend ended up holed up in our apartment all day getting stoned--which I EXPLICITLY asked them not to do.

I almost left him over it (we worked it out). But she is most definitely never welcome in my home again.

Then, there was terrible friend-of-the-bride-bridal-shower-sleepover girl. I had to schlep her fat ass around while she droned on about how smart she was, how Libertarian, how "plugged in". She showed up for the party an hour early and then acted put upon because I wasn't there to open the door for her. (still out doing pre-party stuff). She is a disaster of a human. Barf.

Everyone else has been just delightful, even if they never folded their blankets.

A recent houseguest (old friend of my roommate) decided to fall off the wagon in spectactular fashion while here. He then beat up his girlfriend (who'd never been to NYC before) and left her, alone, downtown at about four in the morning with no keys and no idea how to get back to our place. She called me at the crack of dawn to help her figure out how to get here and then let her in. Nice wake up call. Roommate was, of course, already gone for work. On the upside, they left some beer in our fridge. Note to self: invite no ex-junkies to stay with you.

I live in a small one bedroom apartment (525 sf.) I have guests come visit me often which I love...usually. This summer though I had a blast from the past call me up. My first boyfriend ever and his partner looked me up and said they wanted to come for a visit and would it be alright if they stayed with me....for 5 days. That's a long time to share living quarters with two people you haven't seen in 13 years!!! I was too nice and said sure! I have to say I lucked out when their plans changed at the last minute and they didn't come to visit. I was very nervous about that much time and all the dynamics that would be involved.

SO....the point of all this is I have a new rule for house guests. When making plans I look at the last year and figure out how many times I have seen them. The number of times I've seen them is the number of days I figure they can stay at my place. Most of good friends I see a couple of times a year so I figure...that's a weekend. I apply the same rule to myself when going to friends homes. Obviously this works becuase the more frequently I see someone the better our friendship would be and more comfortable I would feel staying with them for a longer period of time.

In the future...blasts from the past will need to find accomdations near my apartment.

I have a story about a bad host... I was visiting an old friend in Australia. He had been urging me to visit over a period of several months, and finally I booked the ticket and went. At bed time, he left his apartment with no good bye. It was weird, but I overlooked it at least until I woke up the next morning and discovered that he was still gone and that I was locked in (his door needed a key to be opened from the inside). I tried to call him, but his phone was inside the apartment. There was no food in the apartment, I was hungry, and he didn't come back until HOURS after I woke up. But it gets worse. He did it a second time, at which point I made sure I had my own set of keys. Then another night, he said he was going to meet me at a nearby pub, but he stood me up.

Looking back, I can't believe I didn't leave. I guess I was feeling too poor to get a hotel room. Needless to say, we are no longer in touch.

yes, when people visited me in new york, i just said, "all i have is a twin air mattress." this a) kept the visiting population down, and b) kept visits short. i also not-so-gently say, "i have to get some work done, but you should go to xx museum."

i did once have someone show up for 2.5 weeks, but he was very self-sufficient. although i did lend him my cell phone once and he left it at a bar. the bartender found it and called my home number, and then i had to get out of bed and go get it because my friend had hooked up with someone and left.

he did later apologize, however.

dusty.meyers I like the way you calculate the length of visit. I have it etched into my memory. I always answer a request to visit over night with my list of house rules. I present them in such a way as the person in question knows I mean business. My friends who really know me are amused. The friends who don't know me that well end up with other plans.

Apparently the moral of this thread is: junkies make sucky houseguests. Noted!

Wow, you guys seem to know a bunch of animals! Now that I have a 2BR I get a fair number of visits, but they're all from former New Yorkers who are old, old friends. They usually have so many people to see while they're here that I spend most of my time with them having coffee in the morning or a glass of wine right before bed, and they always leave me flowers or take me out to dinner since they're so grateful not to have to get a hotel!

My problem (and it's a much smaller one) is actually guests that are trying to hard to be considerate - like my parents, who bring their own sheets and towels every time they drive up for a stay, or people who say "I can run out for coffee, don't make any," "I don't need a big towel," or "I'll just sleep on top of the daybed so you won't have to make the bed!" I've started to make the beds before they arrive to head that off and ensure they're comfortable.

How about a tiny one bedroom with my friend and her two kids? The kids only wanted to play video games and the mom wanted to drag them to every tourist destination in town. I had to go too, since they just couldnt figure out how to get anywhere on their own. Mom loved that she was on vacation and by late afternoon everyday, she was too drunk to do much more than follow us around.

We went to the zoo, several kids musuems, the park, etc, etc. The next to the last day, we sat in lower level seats at the baseball game and the 8 year old looked at me during the 2nd inning and said "when are we going to do something fun?"

My friend graduated a semester before I did and when she told me she wanted to come back NYC to find a job, I let he stay with me. Every time I came home from class she was sitting on my couch in her pjs. I told her she had to leave since she wasn't looking for a job. I didn't hear for her for a few weeks and then got a box in the mail with the most beautiful handmade scarf inside. I felt like such an ass.

I had an old college friend come stay with me and it was a disaster. We were supposed to meet for dinner when I got off work and he never showed. After about six hours of frantic phone calls, I tracked him down at about 3am: he was at a bar, drunk with his best friend who had just happened to have broken my heart several months earlier. I told him that if he was not at my place in five minutes, all of his belongings would be thrown in the street. That worked, and when he arrived, I gave him directions to the nearest hotel.

I have enough horrid houseguest stories to fill a book; when you own homes in highly desirable areas (Santa Barbara and at a major ski resort) everyone and their brother wants to come and visit. I now have a very short list of "safe" people who I am happy to have visit and everyone else is directed to local hotels. I have no regrets about this whatsoever; anyone who gets snotty about being turned down as a guest is someone I can live without.

On the flip side: I was a guest with my boyfriends friends in NYC. I'd trekked down with him for the SOLE purpose of seeing a museum exhibit. The hosts were nice, took us to a wonderful little brunch place upon our arrival, then walked us up to the museum. But after about 15 minutes in the exhibit they were restlessly pacing around, waiting for me to 'finish up'. I suggested that they go ahead and we could meet them somewhere...I even encouraged my bf to go with if he wanted. They declined.

While it didnt kill the trip it did put a bit of a damper on it.

I got stuck with a house guest through a former opinionated - not in a good way - classmate of mine and good friend of then live-in, now ex :), boyfriend. She only asked him and he said yes without asking me. A few day later she asked him if an acquaintance of hers could stay the weekend before her friend arrived. Instead of ex saying a flat out no. He asked a semi-friend/acquaintance of his/ours who I didn't want to put out so, I begrudgingly said yes and was now picking her up too. The acquaintance was suppose to stay for the weekend and then go to opinionated classmates boyfriend's until she found an apartment. Her boyfriend fained confusion and got out of it. This girl is one of the biggest cheapskates I've ever met in my life, being careful or watching your spending is one thing but she was something else! She didn't buy any food, I made a really nice dinner the night she came, not knowing what I was in for and treated her to brunch the next day since she didn't withdraw any money. We went to the grocery store in the afternoon, she didn't buy anything complaining about the prices. She had a $30,000 scholarship - $10,000 was her spending money. I had $30,000 in student loans! Here's more - our bathroom was en suite, she - 10 years younger than I am and buff, did this in her underwear. She took everything I offered her but said no to pajama bottoms. My ex said it was cultural, they were both German. She asked my ex for help pouring milk from a gallon jug, I don't remember her asking me when it was just us on the weekend and for help closing the window etc. She found class mates to latch on to and move in with so, I enthusiastically helped her look for apartments on line. One of her new friends needed to find a place quickly, thank goodness. She didn't leave any parting "thank you" token until her boyfriend came and visited her a month later and brought Merci chocolates which she may have asked him to bring especially for us since they are $2 in Germany. I had a little dinner and one of the guests invited her, she drinks and drank freely all night but brought juice/drink with her. I think sippy cups would have been too expensive and they must have been out of kool-aid. Months later, we went to Boston together. I asked her for a quarter to buy tokens and her reply was "what about me" my reply - "I was buying tokens for both of us and just needed a quarter. She was awful!

Wow, sorry that was so long!!

My nightmare of a houseguest never showed up, thank goodness.

A week before defending my undergraduate thesis and having my first solo show in conjunction with the thesis, my cousin decided that he too would come help celebrate - on top of my mother and my sister already visiting and staying in our 1 bedroom apartment.

Sure, fine, come celebrate, no problem, right?

Oh, except that he wanted to arrive at 11 pm on the evening of my opening, and have someone pick him up at the airport 50 miles away. Now I don't know about you, but since I had just busted my a** to get done with school, had hosted my mother and sister (which is enough to drive one to drink) AND it was the opening night for the shows of several of my friends - there was not a chance in hell I was going to take time out of celebrating to drive an hour each way to pick someone up from the airport, especially when we have a perfectly lovely bus service that would drop him off three blocks from the gallery, or much later, 3 blocks from my house.

The day before my opening he send a lovely, overdramatic whining email about how we are such difficult people and all he wanted to do was help celebrate my achievement.

*snort*

And I don't even want to go into the week with my mother here. SHe's one of those "what do you do when you are having fun? Oh that doesn't sound like fun." types.

i cannot understand your post, sissaphus.

okay wait a minute i get it now! whew that was confusing!

So, after hosting a few more difficult houseguests, I recently hosted a couple of friends while they looked for a house. They'd come stay with me every few weeks for a few days. They absolutely showed model behavior. They were clean, easygoing, kept in touch, and bought me dinner frequently as a thank you. I'm going to try to keep that in mind when I'm a guest.

This weekend will mark 7 weekends in a row of houseguests. I have tried hinting that our place is really small, always to the response of "we don't mind being cozy!" The worst is when guests expect you to give up your bed and sleep on the airmattress, and it always ends up being the people you don't really want visiting that are the rude or take your hospitality for granted.

my boyfriends sister and brother in law stay with us often - and the brother in law always brings a big fat bottle of jameson and she brings a big bottle of cabernet.

love them.

Jenradish, I have to lay at least part of the blame on you, unfortunately. If you do not want houseguests, you have to say, "I'm sorry, that won't be possible during this time." You do NOT need to give any sort of explanation. "No" is a complete sentence. Once "friends" learn they can railroad you into accepting, why would they accept a polite hint that you don't want them? You need to firmly say "I'm sorry, it's simply not possible right now." Repeat until they give up. If they show up at your door? Tell them, "I am sorry if there was confusion, but you may not stay here - I thought I made that clear when we talked earlier. Here is a list of local hotels."

wow- I feel lucky now.

my friend jeff came over around july 4th; he was clean, helped feed the cats/scoop their litter, had some of his own events but there was plenty of time to hang out; he helped me with my work (we both do software), and then he treated me to lunch.

plus, my brother and sister in law just stayed over. my bro did all the am dishes and took out the trash; and they cleaned up after themselves well.

there are considerate people out there!

I'm not a New Yorker, but one of my "favorite" guests was my friend who was living abroad and came in to visit. I took half a day off of work to hang out with him, which at the time was a big deal because of the strict policy about vacation time. I suggested he meet me in Alexandria (quaint area with shopping/restaurants where I was working at the time), and he said that he wasn't in the mood for that. I ended up cooking lunch for him and when I asked him what he wanted to do, he said "go to the mall." We get to the mall, and he spent most of the time there ON THE PHONE in Nordstrom's customer service department making plans with other friends for dinner. We basically went to the mall so he could be on the phone. The best part was that he planned for US to go to dinner in Alexandria! So, after making the hour trip on the train each way there and back from my apartment to work, he wanted me to drive the 40 minutes there and back for dinner! At the dinner, his friends (I didn't know many of them or weren't friends with them) ordered a ton of food and split the bill evenly. Ugh. The whole thing was a disaster. And, I had to leave and rush up to the other side of the metro area to see another friend who was leaving the next morning to move to Egypt. I would have much rather spent the quality time with her rather than schlepping all over town with my friend. More recently, he had complained about someone who came to stay with him, and I quietly laughed to myself...

Ooooh oooh, I have a bad host story too. I'll make it short. Essentially, I came to visit a friend who always said how much she wished we could see each other more often (but never came to see me...)...we were going to see Newport, RI and I barely got to do anything. It didn't help that although we got up early in the morning, we had to do an elaborate breakfast of cereal for several hours. We didn't even eat a lunch out. I ate a sandwich by myself. (I should have been glad for that food because they were really sparse with meals. We didn't go out at all and when we ate at home, it was like a roll and piece of cheese...and it was not because of economics, trust me!) Then, she wanted to go to the beach, so we drove around for literally hours, while she and her husband argued over the best place. The best part was in the evening when they balanced their checkbook while I was sitting alone in the living room. I'm all for entertaining myself...but I was only there for 2 days to VISIT her, primarily, and it was just so incredibly rude not to mention boring. They didn't even have a TV that I could flip on and waste time with...

I got lucky when houseguests came to visit me a couple of years ago. I'd only med Dan online via our common blog community. He was going to be coming out to Washington St to Spokane where he grew up for his 20th HS reunion and come visit Seattle and stay with me, along with his partner. Anyway, in the end, both were fabulous houseguests, picked up after themselves, bought a couple of bouques of flowers at the Pike Place Market ($10 each) and dinners out on occasion.

They were here all told roughly 10 days and some of that time, they did things on their own, others, we walked all over the place and visited the International District and down along the waterfront etc. Good times.

I visited another city for a conference and was snatched up by an acquaintance to be hosted. They lived in a cool part of town, I could walk to my conference, etc. Great. Well, even though I bought them dinner, entertained myself for hours on end (by walking around town), and kept my suitcase mess contained, they did a few things:

Every morning before I was even awake the boy came in and used the computer, not even trying to be quiet, tapping on the keyboard that was next to my head. One night very late we came back and had to park... for 45 minutes. Even though we kept passing their place, and there were 3 guests in the car, one of which said "Could we get out and get ready for bed?" (this was around 3am), the boy host said, "No, we'll find a spot in a few minutes..." Also, this guy made his girlfriend walk an hour to an event while we were there, because he didn't want to try to find parking if he gave her a ride, after she asked for one.

Bad host story: A friend of mine was having a big barbecue, and my boyfriend and I arrived a day early at his invitation to spend some quality time with him and his new girlfriend. He lived in a large house with lots of bedrooms, so there was plenty of room. The only problem was that he didn't clean anything. The bedroom I had probably hadn't been cleaned in years, the sheets were dirty, and there were glasses half-filled with old pop lying around the floor. Other visitors had been given bedrooms, so we couldn't switch. Not only this, but he left for work on Friday night at 10PM, and never bothered to explain where the bathroom was in his maze of a house, or how the shower worked, or where the clean towels were. He did not offer us food for dinner or a snack, nor did he have breakfast items. He kept mentioning how he didn't have any money, and while I had sympathy for his financial situation, it boggled my mind that he would invite so many people to visit, and then not spend the money on cleaning or having food around the house. If he couldn't afford it, he should have invited us. I am not the sort of guest to mooch. I'll buy a host dinner, and help with the dishes, but I do think that a host has an obligation not to just let their guests fend for themselves or sleep in filth. By the way, I left this house with a stomach bug, which came as no surprise to me.

hee hee. These are entertaining... We've had many good houseguests, but I'll share a story about the worst. My husband's college friends from Canada came to visit (the first time I had met them). Practically the first thing one of them did was grab our copy of the NYTimes and take it into the bathroom. Ok, I tried not to be judgmental or grossed out. But as soon as he came out, he asked if he could borrow some toenail clippers. I said I didn't have any. Then one of them looked at the vintage croquet set that was a wedding gift to my parents. They had passed it on to my husband as a gift. The house guests knew this story, but suggested that we play croquet on the TRAIN TRACKS. When I expressed discomfort at this, they said, "well, the set doesn't belong to you, does it?" I felt like I was in some surreal bad dream...

We have had good luck with houseguests. We even had one stay for 3 months, recommended by a mutual friend, who we had never met until he walked in the front door. He became one of our closest friends.

The most annoying was our 14 year old nephew. We live in Manhattan, a million things to see and do right outside our door, but we could barely pry him out of the apartment for the five days he was with us. All he wanted to do was stay up all night watching tv, and sleep all day.

These are way worse than my experiences. But, I do have a friend who cannot seem to remember to flush the toilet, give me an idea as to when he will appear or say thank you. (So much for a prep school education.) And, oh...I am reevaluating that offer of free lodging. Am I being harsh? He's well over 40 years old.

I will never forget the friend of my then-room mate who came to stay for a week. I had the week off and my room mate didn't so I would spend the day with her friend. At the end of each day, her friend would tell her everything I had done that day, like a report. I wasn't hiding anything but it was really weird.

Oh dear. I have friends who are living in Paris right now, and enough frequent flyer miles for a free ticket. When they invited me to come stay with them, I got caught up in the excitement (first trip to Paris) and unilaterally planned a two-week stay. I believe I am a good guest (I cook, clean up, can entertain myself, and most importantly - judging from these posts - am not and never have been a junkie), but they have a small space, and I forgot to consider the realities of what it would mean to have to share it for so long until I read these posts. Just sent an email offering to stay in a hotel for part of the visit!

When I was pregnant, we made it clear that we didn't want house guests after the baby was born.

But while I was in the hospital recovering from giving birth, my mother-in-law called and announced that she would be visiting the next day, she would be staying at our house for a week, and she would be bringing her 90 year old mother.

When they got here, they watched hours and hours of Fox news at the highest possible volume because the 90 year old was mostly deaf. They did not rent a car, and expected to be entertained...or worse, they just took our car without asking. They did not understand why I didn't want to take a 6-day-old baby out to brunch. They insisted on cleaning my already clean house, because they wanted to snoop through my things. They scrubbed my toilets, and then wanted to hold the baby when they hadn't washed their hands. They made fun of the way my body looked after giving birth. They wanted to watch me breastfeed, and were mad when I asked them to leave the room.

I asked my mother-in-law to kindly stay in a hotel the next time she visited. She did not.

RIGHT NOW!

I have a guest who:
-Talks through movies
-Talks to much generally
-Talks loudly on her mobile after we've gone to bed
-Walks around our house at night LOOKING THROUGH OUR CUPBOARDS!
-Points out where we need to clean
-Expects myself and partner to taxi her around
-Tells ME (the cook of the house) when her dinner will be ready
-Decides she wants to go out and makes arrangements which involve me driving her to the next town which is half an hour away and going back home and then going back to get her when she CALLS FOR ME
-Made the above mentioned "PLANS" for a time where it was my partners Football Grand Final day (the most exciting day of his life thus far aka UNMISSABLE)
-Leaves tissues on our counter tops!
-Asks me to get her drinks (we are strictly GYO :P)

And the SHOW STOPPER

-INVITES PEOPLE I DISLIKE TO COME INTO MY HOME WHERE I WILL NEED TO SERVE THEM AS A SLAVE AS I SERVE HER!!!

CRY! MAKE THE BAD LADY GO AWAY!!

Before anyone thinks badly I am not overreacting, coupled with snide remarks and notations of her "greater worth" this girly would make anyone barking mad.

Also this is neither my mother nor my partners! Nor is it a RELATIVE! She is a friend... for how much longer we shall see...

i think most of the problems with houseguests come from hosts
being too polite and unable to clarify their borders and own needs to make this work.
if someone would come and waste my place all over i think
i would not hesitate on putting them into a hotel or such.
sure they'd be pissed but recall: they started it.

i would try to make things clear before someone comes and
think they can behave like locusts and other vermin.

from my own experience i can say
this can be tough even if they behave nice, like
bring you gifts,
help you with groceries,
clear up the bedroom...

although everything was just fine i felt a little awkward
throughout the whole time (talking bout 1 week)
cuz my 2 visitors weren't so close friends.
it was nice and we even laughed a lot but it wasn't all the same wavelength it seems.
and we hung out a lot together. i had time and i wanted it but it still was awkward.
so i quickly started to miss having time and space for only myself.
and i was glad when they were gone.

but i would still do it again.
but maybe next time my houseguests should be people i feel more connected with.

(and of course, no junkies, locusts, cycos, etc.)

I read a list of good guest rules recently and the best one was "occupy yourself for at least 3 hours a day" brilliant!

In my friend Tony's family's beach house is a needlepoint that says, "Guests of guests may not bring guests".

We're lucky in that visitors to our country place love to help paint, garden, cook, etc (or at least they say they do). And our city apt is a one-bedroom with only a love-seat, no one even asks to stay over, problem solved! (Actually, I would like to have some guests, maybe we'll get an air mattress one of these days...).

If you have a shred of self esteem and a sense of your own boundaries, I don't see how a guest can pose problems. You agree on the length of stay ahead of time, tell the guest when you are free to hang out with them, and suggest places for them to go. Maybe you let them borrow your key. If they are your friend, they will respect you, your home, your space, and your time. If they do not respect these things, they are not your friend and you should feel no remorse letting them know it. Sheesh.

@ venus_thames: Why on earth would you put up with that sort of behaviour from anyone? I can't imagine how it got that far. It boggles my mind.

I love having guests come to visit and really enjoy doing some touristy-things with people from out of town who are truly excited to be in NYC, I think it's fun. I just had the most wonderful guest for three days and we had a blast!

Seriously. It's shocking how little backbone is being demonstrated here. If you don't like something being done in your own home, SPEAK UP.

I am posting way later but just read this today:

A friend got divorced and moved to a small town to be closer to her parents. She would call all of the time and ask to stay with us because we live in a bigger city and she need the moral support. I didn't have a problem with it until one day she walked out of the bathroom in see through bra and panties and started talking to my husband...he averted his eyes and then she started to giggle saying he was just like "one of the girls." I tried to blow it off but a couple of weeks later she stayed with us again and this time when she heard hubby in the hall walked out naked. He walked back into the den and shut the door. She did all of this right in front of me.