When Rachel needed a place to live, Maya was only too happy to offer her spare room. What are friends for?
Rachel had recently returned to her home town to start afresh, having been made redundant. Maya, a childhood friend, owned her three-bedroom home, having been helped to buy it by her parents.
When Rachel offered to pay rent, Maya suggested a figure – the market rate. Rachel agreed, recognising that she was in a bind and that Maya was helping her.
Over time, however, she found herself increasingly at Maya's beck and call, and doing more than her share of the housework. If Maya left dirty dishes in the sink, or didn't clean the stovetop after cooking, Rachel did it for her.
She even obliged with Maya's more idiosyncratic house rules, such as no laundry in the common areas, and no strong kitchen smells. Rachel hung her laundry in her room and refrained from cooking fish or curry. "That was my way of saying, 'Thank you for sharing your house with me,'" she says, even though she was also paying rent.
But Maya's demands escalated. She started questioning how often Rachel worked from home and did her laundry. But the breaking point came when the front door lock broke. The locksmith who fixed it said it was a building fault; Maya blamed Rachel and charged her for the repair.
"I realised what had been obvious the whole time," Rachel says. Maya treated her like a friend only when it suited her. Otherwise, Rachel was her tenant. Rachel moved out not long afterwards. "I don't think I want a friend who would do that to me – or anyone else."
Friendship should be cherished as a relationship between equals, but worsening inequality is testing that, forcing friends into the uneven dynamic of landlord and lodger.
Introducing the "friendlord": you need a room, they have one to spare, and you know you get on – they might even cut you a deal on the rent. It can seem like the best possible compromise in such an unequal society.
It's also a risk, creating a power imbalance in a personal relationship. Not all friendships are built to withstand discussions of money, requests for repairs or cohabitation. And should the situation break down, you stand to lose not just a roof over your head, but a relationship, too.