POLL: What is your current living arrangement?

I live at home with my family... Dad and mum, my brothers and our pets. It's a safe space for me, I wouldn't want to leave anytime soon. 

Right now, I live with my boyfriend, and we both have an equal portion of the mortgage. We believed that this was the best option for us. We also received the help of a Mortgage Broker Sheffield, when we needed to make this selection. It was difficult for me to adjust to someone other than my parents at first, but I felt relatively comfortable with time. I have an excellent partner that supports me and understands what I need. I hope my experience was beneficial to you in some manner. Good luck!

Congratulations, I am so pleased you managed to get out. Warm thoughts and wishes.

Im now 25 but I was luckily at age 24 i was assisted to move out of a horrific family situation with the help of council, I was living in a leaky cold static caravan in my parents back garden. Only problem is that they lived in a rural village with no bus route, roads where not safe for bikes as their where a lot of farm machinery which was operated by lets say individuals on specific substances on the roads .my family refused to assist me in getting anywhere and i am not allowed to drive. they practical abused me and forced me on benefits to pay for family of sixs electric, water, council tax, internet. It got to the stage i couldn't afford heating as i could get gas or afford the electric. 

It took over a year but i eventually got a top floor flat with a housing association block of flats, they gave me the support of a tenancy coach, and got help from social integrated housing to set up bills and build basic life skills. 

I would of never been able to move if i wasn't supported through the process and benefits to be able to afford where i am living know.    

Who do you want to loan it to?

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Still living in Mayfield (name of our home) with my parents. Which is nice as they are both really loving and supportive of me. But I do dream of being independent and moving out, perhaps getting married and having children.. but that all seems a bit unlikely now as I can't even leave the grounds without having a panic attack.

I'm glad to hear you're okay and completely understand about spoon conservation. I hope your family developments all go well.

It sounds like you were part of a nice community where you used to live. I think I would miss that too if I'd had it. The lack of public transport must be frustrating at times, although, like you, I prefer to walk everywhere as well. I avoid hairdressers for the same reason that you avoid taxis. :-)

I love the idea of imaging the dog conversations. Maybe they're just singing, 'Who Let the Dogs Out?'.

I wish I'd included the "nerds in Mum's basement" option now you've said it! Maybe that explains the difference between the number of views and the number of votes on this thread... Thank you for your good wishes. My fiancé is quite trainable and eager to please, which bodes well; but, whilst he is quite tidy, I do still find it really annoying having his stuff in my home. I'm conflicted because I love him and want him to live here and to feel wanted here, but it would help if we could afford some proper integrated storage so at least I wouldn't have to look at his stuff! 

I haven't had chilli for a while! I might have to make some this week!

Thanks Nessie - hopefully I'll be back to joining you all a bit more regularly in the near future; I've just been conserving my "spoons" for some rather interesting family developments (reunions and, it seems, maybe more auties amongst us).

Having friends on my doorstep was certainly a big boon where I used to live. I'm hopeless at making arrangements, and I can't drive, so it was great to be able to regularly bump into people as I passed their allotments or did my shopping. When the weather's OK it's not so bad here, as it's only about an hour's walk away along country lanes, but the public transport here is hopeless. It takes longer to get there by bus than to walk it, and the last bus I can catch to get home is about eight o'clock nowadays - not much use for an evening visit, as I'm rather taxi-phobic (a special "cautious driver who doesn't want to talk b****cks for the entire journey" service might help a little bit there!)

Much as their noise makes me cringe, I really feel sorry for the dogs; it's not their fault that they get left out in the yards all day with nothing to do. I think they get boisterous just out of sheer boredom a lot of the time, and I sometimes wonder what they must be yapping about to each other; "Hey Fido, aren't your humans back home yet either?"

The survey results so far are interesting - a pretty even split between the loners and the sharers, not at all the "nerds in Mum's basement" image that many people seem to stereotype us with. I must admit, my fear of co-habiting has often greatly concerned me when there has been potential for romance in my life - I hope that your situation eases with a bit of time to settle into sharing your living space.

Hi Trogluddite, good to see you on here again and thanks for weighing in.

Cat + Curry = the secret to a happy life 

I'm sorry to hear that you had to move away from your friends since losing your job. I imagine that must be really tough. I think I would struggle to live in a street surrounded by dogs as the noise would really get to me, especially with young children next door too. It certainly doesn't seem right that Social Services place unreasonable expectations on your landlady but it's great to hear that she's so autism-friendly, that is rare. Having a lovely view in the day and complete darkness at night must be very calming. Do you find you sleep better for it?

For the last couple of years, I've rented the top floor of a back-to-back house, shared with my landlady.

Cons:

• I find sharing difficult, especially as my body clock is at odds with my landlady's.
• I had to move away from a part of town where the majority of my friends live, so I'm more isolated than I used to be.
• Had to ditch a lot of possessions in the move from a larger house.
• Two party walls now have an infant's nursery on the other side.
• Every other house on the street has a trigger-happy yappy dog in the yard.
• Social services seem to think that it's OK to expect my landlady to be an informal support worker.

Pros

• On the edge of the city, so I have countryside on my doorstep, and a decent choice of local shops.
• Utilities are all included in the rent, so my terrible money management skills aren't a problem.
• Nice big room with a pretty view, and my bathroom/toilet is en-suite.
• Landlady is very "autism friendly" - discussed before moving in, and this was the deciding factor among the places available.
• Room is always nice and warm, and very dark at night.
• Landlady has a very fluffy, affectionate cat.
• Excellent local curry house!

Ideally, I'd prefer to be back in a place to myself, and back in the village where I lived before, closer to my friends. However, given my low income since losing my last job, I could have done a lot worse - the only other option was the inner city (to be fair there were only two riots during the time I lived there years ago!)

The flat is rented from a housing association, one that seems to to Be involved in a lot of supported accommodation. The company that does the support is a separate company who rent the building from the housing association. Then obviously tenants pay the rent for their individual flat. The housing association don’t really get involved in much though and leave pretty much everything up to the support company. 

It's British-ese for Trailer Park.

Thanks for your question and joining in. 

That's one I hadn't thought of. I wish I could edit the response options on the poll now you've said it!

Who do you rent the flat from? I guess some people who 'live alone and rent' will have support workers visiting them at home periodically anyway, so you could select one of those options as you are in a self-contained flat. Although, if you are getting regular help from the support workers on site (say, daily support), then 'live with others (not family)' might be more appropriate. Or you could just go with 'other'. Completely up to you.

whats a caravan ?

sweet !  great mam, .  had chili for dinner. yum.

I’ve lived alone for almost eight years.

We're good thank you Jake! How are you?