Woman’s Friends Needed a Place to Stay. She Gave Them 1 Month, and Now They’re Pushing Back

A woman has turned to Reddit for advice after finding herself in a tricky situation with two longtime friends who may be overstaying their welcome.

After living in a European country for four years, she now faces the challenge of balancing compassion with protecting her personal space.

Her friends — a couple who moved from their home country to pursue master’s degrees — are on the verge of becoming temporarily homeless. “They told me they would have nowhere to go,” she explained in her post, recalling how they reached out just 10 days before their student dorm contract expired.

Wanting to help, she offered them a place to stay — but with limits. “I offered they could stay with me but only for 1 month,” she wrote, noting her apartment’s small layout and her need for a quiet home.

The couple didn’t seem entirely happy with that arrangement. “They seemed a bit resentful,” she said. “They said there was no need for me to write this in detail upfront and that they were already planning to stay just a few weeks.”

But based on past experience, she wasn’t convinced. When she had previously hosted them for just over a week, things quickly became tense.

“By day 3 I was stressed,” she recalled, describing how they smoked weed daily and spent hours watching TV while she worked remotely. The male friend, she added, seemed unmotivated and unstable. “He used to drink 3 cans of high alcohol beer every day for months,” she said.

She also remembered an incident where he avoided giving a school presentation by lying to his professor. “He told his professor he was back in his home country so he could do it online,” she explained. More recently, he postponed a job interview by two weeks after a panic attack.

To her, these moments fit into a larger pattern. “There is a pattern of poor planning,” she said, noting they moved to the country without arranging housing beforehand.

The girlfriend had also made her uncomfortable. “She once asked to register at mine just on paper which could have caused me legal trouble,” the woman wrote.

Even when the male friend landed a food delivery job, she claimed he deliberately avoided work. “He chose to hang out in low demand areas so he wouldn’t get orders and still collected pay until he was fired,” she said.

Given this history, she feels her one-month offer is more than fair. She’s even agreed to store their belongings afterward if necessary.

“They also have other friends in the city and the girlfriend’s brother lives an hour away so it’s not like they would be on the street,” she pointed out.

Still, she worries they may try to extend their stay. “I am not willing to compromise my mental health and home environment,” she said, viewing her stance as a matter of setting healthy boundaries.

In the comments, many Reddit users supported her. “Only someone who planned on taking advantage of you for a long period would have a problem with this,” one wrote.

Another even cautioned her about potential legal risks: “In the states someone can establish tenancy rights after 30 days. If things go south you’ll have to evict them.”