Running a WG (flatshare) in Germany: cleaning rota, shopping and costs without arguments

A WG (short for Wohngemeinschaft, a flatshare where unrelated people rent a home together, very common in Germany among students and young professionals) rarely fails on the big things. It fails on three questions nobody likes to ask. Who cleans the bathroom this week? Who paid for the crate of drinks, and will anyone get that back? And why does the same person always buy the loo roll? None of these is a character problem. They are organisational questions, and they can be settled in an afternoon if you know which models exist and which suits which flatshare. This article goes through them in turn: cleaning rota, shopping and supplies, sharing costs, agreeing dates and the arrival of new flatmates.

Why it is not a matter of goodwill

Most flatshares start with the same agreement: "we'll keep it easy, everyone just does what needs doing." That works surprisingly well for about six weeks. After that an effect sets in that you know from any shared household: people have different thresholds. One person sees the full dishwasher after a day, another after three. Whoever has the lower threshold does more, not because she is tidier but because she notices sooner.

On top of that is the work you don't see at all: remembering that the dishwasher tablets have run out. Knowing when the bulky waste is collected. Noticing that nobody has bought coffee any more. In families this thinking and remembering work is called mental load, and it behaves the same in a flatshare: it collects with the person who looks first. If you don't share that out too, you only share out half.

Both can be solved with structure, not with more consideration but with an agreement that is written down and works without asking.

Cleaning rota: three models and when each suits

There is no single cleaning rota. There are three tried and tested designs, and the choice depends on how similar your weeks look.

The fixed plan. Each person has their own fixed task: one always does the bathroom, one always the kitchen, one always the hall and the bins. Advantage: maximally simple, nobody has to check. Disadvantage: the tasks are not equally popular and not equally laborious. The bathroom is more unpleasant than the hall, and whoever does it permanently knows that. Fixed plans work if you negotiated the allocation honestly and ask after a few months whether it still suits everyone.

The rotation. The tasks stay the same, but they move round: this week you do the bathroom, next week me. Advantage: perceived fairness, because everyone does everything once, and nobody becomes the bathroom specialist. Disadvantage: you have to know whose turn it is, and that is exactly where handwritten plans on the fridge fail, at the latest when someone has been away for a week and the order has shifted. A rotation therefore needs a place that counts the order forward itself, rather than a person who remembers.

The zones. Instead of activities you share out rooms, including the responsibility to decide for yourself when something is due. Whoever has the kitchen has it completely: mopping, emptying the fridge, buying more dishwasher tablets, ordering a bin when it breaks. Advantage: here the thinking moves along, not only the mopping. Disadvantage: it takes trust that someone runs their zone by their own standard, and that is rarely identical to yours.

What helps in all three models, whatever the design:

• Write down what "clean" means. Not as a contract, but as a short list per task: bathroom = sink, toilet, shower, mirror, floor. Without this list four people clean four different bathrooms and get annoyed with each other.
• A fixed rhythm beats a good moment. "Bathroom is on Wednesdays" gets done. "When it's necessary" gets put off.
• Swapping is allowed, but you say so. Whoever has no time this week swaps with someone, not silently but visibly for everyone. Otherwise it looks like dodging.

Who buys the loo roll? Settling shopping and supplies

In a flatshare, shopping splits into two very different categories, and most conflicts arise because they are mixed up.

The household stuff. Loo roll, washing-up liquid, bin bags, cleaning products, kitchen roll. Everybody uses it and nobody has an opinion on the brand, but it is annoying because it only gets noticed when there's none left. You don't need to split this by consumption, you need a rule: these things are paid for jointly, and whoever sees them empty puts them on the list. Whoever is in the shop anyway may buy.

The food. Here flatshares go different ways, and both are fine: either everyone buys for themselves, or you have a shared basic stock (oil, salt, pasta, coffee, milk) and the rest private. All that matters is that everyone has the same idea of what belongs to the basic stock. The classic flatshare row is not the stolen milk but the different assumption about whether milk is shared.

Three rules do the rest:

• One list, not a chat. A shared shopping list that everyone can see and add to at any time replaces the group chat in which "please bring coffee" has scrolled out of sight after two hours.
• Adding is the duty, buying is voluntary. Whoever uses something up last adds it, even if they aren't the one who shops. That is the real work, and it costs five seconds.
• Stock instead of emergency buying. For things that should always be there, a fixed target list is worthwhile: what should be in the cupboard, and from when is it low? Whoever keeps track like this buys the big pack on offer rather than the expensive emergency pack on Sunday evening.

Three ways to share costs

Now to money, the topic that most often gets swept under the carpet, because nobody wants to seem petty over a few euros. That is exactly why you need a system that doesn't depend on someone asking again and again. Three ways are usual.

The shared kitty. Everyone pays the same amount each month into a kitty or a joint account, and everything shared is paid from it. Advantage: no debts arise between individuals, and nobody has to track small amounts. Disadvantage: someone has to run the kitty and chase top-ups when it is empty. And it is blind to different consumption: whoever is never there pays as much as the person who cooks daily. Suits flatshares with similar daily lives.

The settlement list. Everyone buys when they think of it and writes down what they have paid out. At the end of the month it is added up and settled. Advantage: no advance payment, no kitty, closer to actual consumption. Disadvantage: it stands and falls with discipline in entering things. A paper list on the fridge door goes unmaintained on precisely the days when a lot is bought. And at month end there is arithmetic that again lands with one person.

The balance approach. The further development of the settlement list: every expense is recorded when paid, including who is involved and how it is split, and running balances follow from that. Everyone sees at any time whether they are in plus or minus. Advantage: no month-end arithmetic, no advance payment, and expenses in which only two of four take part can be shown cleanly. Disadvantage: recording has to become a habit, otherwise you have the same gap as with the paper list, only digital.

Whichever way you choose, you won't be spared three agreements:

• What is shared at all? Household stuff and basic stock mostly yes. The new kettle: yes, but who owns it when someone moves out? Clear that once, not every time.
• From what amount do you count? Some flatshares set a threshold below which nothing is recorded. That saves effort, as long as one person isn't conspicuously often just below it.
• When do you settle? A fixed date, say at the start of the month. Open balances over months are the most reliable way to turn a small thing into a topic.

Dates that get in each other's way

Not everything in a flatshare is a task. A lot is a resource that exists only once, and it needs no rules but visibility.

The washing machine. The classic: two people want to wash on Saturday, and one unloads the other's drum. A shared calendar in which you enter your wash as an event solves this without a single conversation. Whoever can't find a slot sees straight away when the next one is free.

The bathroom in the morning. If three people have to be out of the house between 7 and 8, a plan doesn't help but information does. Whoever knows the others shower at a quarter to seven goes at half past. It is enough to make your own fixed times visible once: lecture, early shift, home-office days.

Guests and overnight stays. The point at which flatshares most easily turn emotional, because it is about retreat. Two things help: a rough agreement beforehand (how long is a visitor normal, from when do you ask) and a place where visitors are announced without it looking like asking permission. An entry in the shared calendar is exactly that: information, not a request.

The flatshare evening. Half an hour once a month is enough in most flatshares: what's coming up, what's annoying, what has to be bought or repaired, is the cleaning rota still right? A fixed date stops topics piling up until they escalate in passing.

For dates the same applies as for everything else: visible doesn't mean public. Not every date is the whole flatshare's business. The washing machine slot is, the job interview on Thursday isn't.

Checklist: when a new flatmate moves in

Whether in September at the start of the semester or in the middle of the year, moving in is the best moment for agreements, because nothing has set in yet. What should be settled in the first week:

1. How does the cleaning rota work? Which model, which tasks, which rhythm, what "done" means. Show it rather than tell it.
2. What is shared and what is private? For food, kitchen appliances, cleaning products. The commonest beginner's mistake is to treat it as self-explanatory.
3. How does the money work? Kitty, list or balances, and when you settle. New flatmates start from zero, with no legacy from the time before.
4. How are dates agreed? Washing machine, visitors, a shared evening. Where is it written, and how do you add yourself?
5. What is where? Fuse box, stopcock, spare key, the city's bin collection plan, wifi access, contact with the property management (Hausverwaltung). Written once, this list saves every newcomer a lot of questions.
6. What is taboo here? Every flatshare has unwritten rules: quiet hours, smoking on the balcony, dishes left overnight. Unwritten means the newcomer can't know them. Say them out loud once.
7. Contact details and an emergency contact. Mobile numbers of all flatmates, plus one person each who can be reached in an emergency.

And one thing no checklist covers: agree right at move-in that you'll look at it again after four to six weeks. What sounded sensible on day one doesn't always survive everyday life, and a plan is easier to change if that was foreseen from the start.

When everything is in one place

In the end, organising a flatshare is not a rulebook but a question of shared overview. Most conflicts arise not because someone doesn't want to, but because four people have four different versions: the cleaning rota hangs on the fridge, the shopping is in the group chat, the amounts paid out are in a spreadsheet, and the washing machine is negotiated by shouting. Four places means everyone knows at most three of them.

That can be put together. For a shared household, patchio bundles the calendar with visibility per entry (private, shared selectively or for the whole flatshare), a shared shopping list, tasks with rotation for the cleaning rota, shared expenses with running balances, a pantry and loyalty cards for shopping. If you like, hang an old tablet in the hallway that shows the cleaning rota, calendar and shopping list permanently. What matters in the hardware is covered in the piece on the wall display. What this means for a flatshare is on a page of its own: patchio for flatshares.

A tool doesn't replace an agreement. But it takes the work of constantly repeating it off you, and makes sure "whose turn is it?" is a question for the plan and not for a flatmate.