Renting a house with friends allows you to escape your lives collectively: Stripped of obligations, you have nothing to do but enjoy each other’s company. But while that unhurried togetherness is the purpose, it can also be a challenge. You’re mixing budgets, habits — and personalities. As with all things, the solution is clear and direct communication. “You have to be comfortable talking to everyone how you would talk to your sister or dad,” says Beverly Nguyen, 34, a New York-based stylist and the founder of the home goods store Beverly 1975, who spent part of last summer on a catamaran with nine friends. But adopting such a candid approach is, of course, easier said than done. Below is advice from a handful of vacation-planning experts who are still friends with the people they’ve shared homes with.
The House
Someone has to be in charge
“There needs to be a leader who corrals everyone,” says the New York-based chef Flynn McGarry, 26. This person should be responsible for finding the house or curating a list of choices, booking the place, collecting payment and communicating with the property’s owner. In exchange for this labor, “you take that primary bedroom,” says the New York-based stylist Ian Bradley, 39. In some friend configurations, the organizer might be the same person every year, but the London-based creative director Alex Eagle, 42, recommends taking turns: “It’s too much to make that one person’s responsibility every time,” she says, even if they do get the best room.
Choose a property carefully
Unless, like the Los Angeles-based Zoe Latta, 37, a co-founder of the fashion brand Ekhaus Latta, you return to the same house every year (in her case, a giant 19th-century rental in Vinalhaven, Maine), you’ll be scouring online listings. Study them and study them again. “I’ll zoom in on photos where you can see the reflection in a mirror, and be like, ‘The shower looks like the water pressure is not good,’” says Nguyen. McGarry pays special attention to the sheets in the images. “If the bedding looks nice, they probably spent a little more on the mattress,” he says. Also consider the number of bathrooms: “If we’re traveling with a group of eight to 10,” says Nguyen, “we need at least five.” And it’s worth prioritizing a dishwasher.
Assign rooms in advance
“Nobody feels comfortable advocating for themselves in the moment, when you’re all standing there in the hallway,” says Casey Elsass, 38, whose new cookbook, “What Can I Bring?,” is a paean to the art of being a guest. “It’s how a lot of resentment ends up happening.” To avoid this, whoever booked the house should outline what each room offers (bed details, bathroom access) via the group email thread beforehand. “And then each person can just talk to the central person about what their room preferences are,” Elsass says, allowing any mediation and decisions to happen before arrival.
Split the costs evenly (with caveats)
Absolute fairness is impossible: You will be happiest if you let go of your desire for it. Some rooms will be nicer than other rooms. Some people will come late or leave early. For the least heartache, split the costs of what Latta calls “baseline expenses” — lodging, food, everyday supplies — evenly by person anyway. Incidentals can be tracked in some manner to be dealt with later (Nguyen likes Splitwise; Latta uses a spreadsheet; Elsass, for simplicity, prefers that everything communal be put on a single card belonging to whoever wants the points the most). Anything beyond that should be seen as a non-reimbursable offering to the group. “If someone goes and buys a delicious bottle of Champagne, or loads of treats and beautiful things from the patisserie, those things don’t get added,” says Eagle. “People just contribute lovely things.”
The caveats: In friend groups where incomes vary significantly, an even split may not make sense. (Bradley’s crew has been known to subsidize friends for the simple reason that, he says, “we enjoy their company and understand their means.”) Alternatively, says Elsass, “let the budget for the trip be dictated by the most fiscally conscious person on that trip.” And if someone joins the group for just one night of a weeklong vacation, “it’s a little gauche” to charge them, says McGarry, but they should enthusiastically pick up the tab for that night’s dinner.
Cooking and Eating
The first person to wake up makes coffee for the group
McGarry is unequivocal about this. The quality of the coffee matters less than its existence. As an act of generosity, the earliest riser should also consider doing any lingering dishes from the night before, though not so loudly that it wakes up people sleeping nearby.
Snacks should be light and constant
When people gather to lounge in a communal house, “everyone wants to be snacking,” says McGarry, who favors fresh-popped popcorn for this purpose. “Putting a fruit salad together in the middle of the day is also a crowd-pleaser,” says Bradley. The Brooklyn-based chef and writer Christina Chaey, 36 a fan of things that are “not packaged snack foods” but also require minimal effort, recommends sliced melon with olive oil; marinated cherry tomatoes (salt, pepper, lemon juice, olive oil and herbs) with bread; and quartered Persian cucumbers tossed with salt, drained, and dressed with lemon or vinegar, chili flakes and pepper.
Dietary restrictions should be honored
On vacation, “you plan your whole life around when you’re going to eat again,” says Elsass, and so it’s essential that everyone is able to partake. (Likewise, it’s essential that people with dietary restrictions communicate them in advance.) If someone is a vegetarian, reconsider your blowout group dinner at a steakhouse; if the gelateria with dairy-free options is farther away, go the extra mile.
Meals should be delicious (but not especially ambitious)
In most groups, dinner is the main event, and someone — or a pair or a trio — should be in charge each night. Breakfast is often a free-for-all, and lunch an exercise in grazing, but dinner requires leadership and planning, says Elsass, who likes a “rotating dinner duty kind of schedule.” (There is no shame in a spreadsheet.)
When it comes to the menu, vacations are a time for prime ingredients, prepared simply. “I don’t think I’ve ever made anything other than grilling stuff and pasta,” says McGarry. “Grilling is the best,” agrees Chaey. “You can marinate in the morning, let it hang out in the fridge, then come back and just throw stuff on the grill.” She also recommends a sturdy salad that can be saved for the next day in case of leftovers.
The artist Lily Stockman, 43, convenes her friends annually in a four-bedroom cottage on an island off the coast of Maine, where “every single item save for fish, lobster, oysters and whatever produce is growing in the island gardens” is a boat ride away, she says. The secret to turning that bounty into dinner — pasta with fresh-caught mussels; trout or tuna salad with heaps of fresh herbs — is a thoughtfully stocked larder, says Stockman, who advises keeping these staples on hand:
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Good champagne vinegar
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Two dozen shallots
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Two dozen heads of garlic
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A big box of Maldon sea salt
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Multiple boxes of bucatini
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Smoked trout or tuna
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Endless hard cheese
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Better Than Bouillon
Cooks don’t clean (and vice versa)
People who like to cook should lead the meal prep, and people who don’t should handle dishes; children help set the table. “It’s about finding a role,” says Bradley, who tends to head up laundry. “I surprise everyone: Towels are in the dryer!” Ensuring that everybody has a way to contribute is, in fact, essential for making each guest feel included.
Children
All children, of different families and ages, should be subject to roughly the same rules. “It’s not, one family’s kids stay up all night, and the others have to go to bed,” says Eagle, whose annual summer crew includes 11 under ten. “Everyone’s in it together. The kids are all kind of in a gang.” As to what those rules should be, Stockman’s suggestions (also applicable to adults) include: no whining, yes to helping, and leave everything better than you found it. It’s also absolutely acceptable to plan and execute a child-free vacation, which some parents might actually want. “A trip with kids,” says Nguyen, “is a different kind of trip.”
Miscellaneous
Activities
Excursions should be inclusive but never required. “Everyone’s welcome to come, but you’re not waiting for everyone,” says Eagle. For days at home, Nguyen is a proponent of the (optional) group workout, led by the group’s more athletic members, while Latta suggests low-key crafting — friendship bracelets, Sculpey clay — as well as gathering supplies to create “your own spa situation,” she says. “A goofy sheet mask does that beautifully.” One year, she brought foot peels for everyone.
Alcohol
Find a relatively inexpensive bottle of wine you like, and bring a lot of it. Chaey is partial to Meinklang’s Prosa sparkling rosé. “That’s all you really want on vacation sometimes, just to be a little drunk,” she says.
Cleaning
End-of-trip cleaning is “a group project, no compromises,” says Elsass. (Even if your booking includes a cleaning service, you should leave the house in a reasonably tidy state, both because it’s the civilized thing to do and because you want to avoid unanticipated fees.) The last contingent to leave will inevitably be stuck with the final sweep but ideally, the bulk of the effort is done communally and fast. In Elsass’s group, they put on “Wannabe” by the Spice Girls and get to work. The song is two minutes and 54 seconds long, and usually by the end they’re done and everyone can move on to clearing up their own room.
Errands
Volunteering to walk into town and gather supplies is an excellent way to give yourself a temporary reprieve from other people. “If I need a moment of quiet, I will go pick up something,” says McGarry. Always text the group on your way out to see if anyone needs anything.
Games
“You can’t force a merger,” but if you’re mixing individuals or friend groups, “a game night early on always helps,” says Elsass. Specifically, he suggests playing Celebrity — a taboo-charades hybrid sometimes known as “fishbowl” — on the first night to break down barriers and kick off bonding, a recommendation made by several of our experts. “It’s an easy way to kill four to six hours,” says McGarry, warning that it can get “quite aggressive.”
Gifts
If, rather than renting, your group is staying at someone’s house, a small hostess present is always nice. “It’s a simple way to say, ‘Thanks for not killing me while I stressed you out in your place,’” says Elsass. Once, a friend brought Stockman a “tiny antique sterling sugar spoon they found in a flea market,” which she sees as an ideal gesture: small, sweet and charming.
Noise
“Always have someone on rotating music responsibilities,” advises Bradley, for the sake of both equity and variety. “I think it’s a nice house unifier: like, ‘Hey, you want to put on your playlist?’” There is also a time for (relative) silence: As people go to bed, the night owls should move elsewhere — the roof, the beach, the firepit, the deck. “A party is portable while good sleep is stationary,” says Elsass, noting that early risers also have an obligation to keep it quiet until the group is up. If work calls are unavoidable, they should be taken in the bedroom.
Packing
Chaey recommends bringing a wine key, because, she says, “there’s nothing more annoying than only having a janky one that’s 20 years old and busted.” (If you’re flying, remember to check it.) And if you’re heading toward an ocean, “bring a good oyster knife,” instructs Stockman, “and know how to use it.” In related wisdom, Nguyen suggests packing a first-aid kit.
Pets
As with children, not all vacation opportunities are viable with pets. If it’s important that your dog be included, the legwork for finding appropriate group housing options falls to you.
Social dynamics
Whether or not you’re mixing groups, the guest list should be shared in advance. If there are people who don’t yet know each other, give everyone enough background on everybody else that they can avoid faux pas and break the ice. All guests should come ready to mingle. “My rule with new people is, if someone I love loves you, then I love you, unless you give me a reason not to,” Elsass says.
When it comes to conflict resolution, prevention is the best medicine. Nguyen recommends kicking off the trip with a quick house meeting to go over the property’s rules and set your own group’s expectations, for example: no shoes in the house, no towels on the sofa. Many disagreements can also be avoided by simply doing less. Elsass suggests planning “50 percent fewer” activities than you’d think, to avoid the stresses of perpetual wrangling and logistics. And Chaey likes to build in solo time for the group: “You know how in ‘Downton Abbey,’ they have an hour to themselves to change for dinner, alone with their servants?” she says. Do that, minus the servants. But part of group travel is respecting, or at least gamely tolerating, other people’s quirks. “Know your own limit,” advises Bradley, who on a recent European vacation, booked a cheap hotel room near the group house and stayed there instead. “As soon as I got annoyed, which happened, I would just retreat.”
The post How to Share a Vacation House With Friends (and Not Fall Out) appeared first on New York Times.
