Hello and welcome to Real Easy English.
In this podcast, we have real conversations in Easy English to help you learn.
I'm Neil.
And I'm Beth.
You can find a video version of this podcast and a free worksheet to help you learn on our website bbclearningenglishcom.
Hi, Beth.
How are you?
I'm good, Neil.
How are you?
Very well, thank you.
What are we talking about today?
Today we are talking about housemates.
Ah, housemates.
The people that you share a house with who aren't your family.
Maybe they're your friends or even strangers who just need somewhere to live.
Exactly.
And it's quite common in the UK to live with housemates when you're younger.
Have you ever lived with housemates?
Yes, of course.
I had house or flatmates when I was a student.
And then after I was a student in my first jobs and before I got married.
That's exactly the same as me.
So when I went to university, I moved in with five people.
And we all had a separate room and a separate bathroom.
But yeah, they were my flatmates for my first year of university.
But in my second year, then I moved into a house.
And we all shared a bathroom and they were my housemates because we were in a house.
Did you enjoy having housemates?
I think it really depends on the people that you live with.
I have had some bad housemates.
Bad because they weren't tidy, didn't clean.
There were dishes in the kitchen that were dirty and not cleaned for a long time.
But I've also had some really nice housemates as well.
Do you enjoy living with housemates or did you enjoy living with housemates?
I think, as you said, it really depends on the person.
So you mentioned people being messy and that kind of thing.
Also, noisy people are difficult, but...
Some of my best friends now have been my housemates in the past.
So I think you can really get to know people very well.
And you can also meet some people who you never want to see again in your life.
That's true.
So Neil, what do you think is... the best kind of personality, the best kind of person to live with?
They have to be easygoing.
What does that mean?
Somebody who is easygoing is relaxed and they don't get too upset or angry over little things.
And they're quite Easy to live with, and there's the clue, easygoing.
I think something else important about living with other people or renting somewhere so paying monthly is having a good landlord.
Very important.
So who is a landlord?
What is a landlord?
So the landlord is, or landlady is, the person that owns the house or flat that you're in and you pay them rent.
So you pay them a monthly amount, but you might live there for a year.
Or two years or three years, but you don't own the place.
It's the landlord that owns the place.
Yeah.
And a good landlord can make a big difference.
Neil, are you easy to live with?
Should we be flatmates?
I don't know.
But I think...
I have made some good friends when I've been a housemate, so they think that I was a good housemate.
Okay.
How about you?
Yeah, I think I'm easy to live with, but I like to sing a lot, so maybe people would tell me to be quiet.
Although no one's ever told me to be quiet, but maybe they... wanted me to, just didn't say.
Let's recap the vocabulary we've heard in this podcast, starting with housemate.
A housemate is someone you live with who probably isn't part of your family. we also hear flatmate.
And we had easygoing, which means relaxed and not easily upset.
Flatmates or housemates often rent a property and that means they don't own it.
They pay money to the person who does own it.
And the person who owns the house or flat is the landlord.
That's who you pay every month and they own the property.
That's it for this episode of Real Easy English.
To test what you've learnt, there's a worksheet on our website bbclearningenglish.com.
And we'll be back next week with another Easy English conversation.
Bye for now!
Bye!
