Relationship Milestones: Moving In Together

I’ve briefly lived with two other exes, and it made me realize I didn’t want to marry them. I lived with my husband for a year before our engagement, and I almost left him too after six months. Living together is special because you get to see each other all the time, but it’s also hard to get in a rhythm, and you may find out things you didn’t know before. There’s also nowhere to go when you’re upset. I know some people don’t want to move in ahead of time but I really really recommend it. I would have made huge mistakes and would likely be divorced if I hadn’t tested and practiced first.

I think moving in together is a good test run. I know to some people it's against beliefs, but for us it was nice to assuage a lot of our anxiety. Plus, by the point we moved in together we weren't quite dating long enough for a proposal. He was, however, basically living at my apartment lol. His place was like solely for him to get fresh clothes maybe. By the time he was living out of a suitcase at my place every night, we both agreed it made sense for us to move in. Plus our dog - she very quickly adopted him into the family - hated the one or two nights he spent at his place, and neither of us slept well. Also, thankfully, he was still in the middle of a job hunt and tackled the huge job of moving a lot of my things to our new place while I was at work.



I think for us how we did it took a lot of the stress out of everything. We didn't pressure ourselves. It just kind of organically became a thing we both enjoyed, and then we just got rid of his apartment and consolidated into a new shared one. Honestly, the worst thing for us so far has been the ac in the bedroom. But it did take us time to work out quirks, get comfortable with each other. Our communication got a lot better quickly, and we really haven't had that many problems since.

I'm especially glad because my parents were old school, and they ended up in a messy divorce when he finally broke down and admitted he wasn't happy living with her. To each their own! Our pattern certainly cut down on my anxiety and allowed me to just enjoy being with my husband.

I lived with 1 ex prior to my now husband and that experience made it clear that guy was not the one for me. My husband and I moved in together about a year after we started dating and lived together for about 5 years before getting engaged. There was absolutely no doubt in either of our minds that we were right for each other when we got engaged. The transition was super smooth and effortless when we moved in together. I was a little worried because I had lived on my own since I was 18 and we were 23 when we moved in together, but this was his 1st move out of his parents house. Thankfully, his momma raised him right lol. While he wasn't too skilled in the kitchen at the beginning, he was great with doing his share of the household chores and we fell into a good routine without much trying. This step is definitely an exciting one because you get to know the person so much more intimately when you live together.

I moved in briefly before our wedding but i felt i was essentially already living there. it's definitely a nice feeling to have a new routine together and to be able to live your life together

My fiance and I have been together for 8 years. He proposed last year, June 2019. We have never lived with each other, ever. He lives at home with his family, and I live by myself. We are (supposed to be) getting married on August 29, 2020. With my lease being up at the end of April, we wanted to find a house soon, since we're getting married in August.

We ended up finding a house, and I'm paying 1 more month for my apartment, then moving out by the end of May.

This is a really unpopular opinion, and I get a lot of really weird looks when I explain my situation, but it is against my beliefs to live with each other before marriage. My parents are very old fashioned, and I grew up with that old fashioned belief, I guess. I like living by myself. I like learning how to function independently. For me, I wanted to learn how to take care of myself first before living with anyone. My sister was the same way and also did not live with her husband before they got married (or more like, a couple of months like my situation).

Obviously, I know lots of people who live with each other before marriage, and that's fine. But when people try to convince me that we should live with each other to get used to it, or say that it's weird, or say "Ohhh you'll be driving each other crazy when you get married then", or "What, is it like a religious thing or something?" it makes me very annoyed. He also is over a lot, so it's not like I don't know what his house personality is like. Everyone has quirks that you'll have to live with, and if you love each other, you'll learn how to compromise, no matter how long you've lived with each other or not.

Anyway, we will officially be living together starting on June 1, and then hopefully getting married at the end of August!

I had some roommate issues my senior year of college so he ended up moving in with me then (3.5 years into the relationship), which was about six years ago. I am so glad we've lived together, I think it's so important to see that you're compatible in that way before marriage.

I moved in with my now fiancé after only dating for 2 months. We had known each other for 10 years and were very good friends, so we knew each other well before we chose to make that step. And it was very easy adjusting to life with him. It was definitely a milestone though, because when I moved in with him I knew I wasn’t ever going to move out!

My fiance and I started dating 4/15/2018, we moved in together 10/15/2019 only after 6 months of dating. When you know, you know! He proposed 11/16/2019 and we are getting married 9/5/2020. I don't think I could marry someone if I had not lived with them. I is so much fun living with the person you love. Everyone told me I'll get tired of being around him all the time, but I still haven't. We even work at the same place. (We have different mangers, I work in the office and he works at the treatment plant.) I have never regretted moving in with my FH.

View Quoted Comment I definitely hear that! In my experience, living with my ex didn’t change anything about the relationship (we lived together almost 5 years before we broke up), so I’m not too worried about finding out something different. Definitely depends on the people and relationships!

My FH is the first (and last) boyfriend I have ever lived with! We lived together for a year before getting engaged. I was skeptical about living with someone prior to marriage, not so much for “religious” reasons, but I was worried it would take away the excitement during the newlywed months. Now, I’m so happy we lived together first. It’s really helped get to know each other better and ultimately got us to getting engaged! ❤️

First significant other I’ve lived with. We dated almost two years before moving in together, then dated three more before getting engaged. We were both raised with the modern idea of having to live with someone to fully know them before you can even think about getting married. Granted I was ready to get married three years ago 😂 but we’re only 25 and started dating right before high school graduation. So in total we’ve been living together four years & just celebrated six years last week.

For us it will be after the wedding, as we're international long distance. I'd be more than happy to live together sooner if it was possible. Though he could stay with me for up to 6 months in one stretch.

After FH and I started dating he would come over and visit and stay the night because he lived an hour away from me and then after a few weeks he just never really went back to his moms lol. Then we just made it official when I made him start paying for some of the bills. It was almost a natural thing and it just felt right, now we’ve moved into a different apartment and have a pup together at almost three years together and plan on house hunting after the wedding! When ya know ya know!

I lived with my ex from just out of college until he *really* messed up and I kicked him out. (We were also engaged.) That was most of my 20s, and... it wasn't pretty. The relationship was the problem, though, not the living together.

With DH, he still lived with his parents when I met him, which would have been a red flag, except he was not yet 23, and grew up in NYC. We ended up making it a condition of him moving in with me that he needed to go have roommates elsewhere, first. It took a while, because a good roommate situation in NYC is hard to come by (and, in the end, I wasn't thrilled with the situation he chose, but... it was his decision), but then he spent about 1 1/2 years living with friends. Meanwhile, I got some help from my dad to buy a little condo just outside the city, so we always had a place to be that was just ours. I had DH help me pick out furniture (I'd lost most of mine to a flood within a previous apartment... that's a totally different saga of mine), and pretty much had him set up the kitchen, knowing he'd eventually move in and it'd be *his* kitchen.

I'm an introvert, by nature, so it's both hard for me to live with someone, and super necessary, because it's very easy for me to become a hermit who never goes to bed. When he moved in, we made a point of making sure his stuff was placed in a convenient way for him, that we had pictures of his, and so on. It's been several years, honestly, and we're still sorting through boxes and rearranging stuff so that it works best. But it's a tiny space, so when we come up with a space-saver or a lifehack of some kind, we jump on it.

The funny thing about living with someone, for me, is that I'm an only child. So I feel like asking someone to change how they do something, or deal with my quirks, etc... is a huge imposition, and DH grew up in a NYC apartment with parents and a sister, so he's just like, "oh, yeah, that's in your way, ok, moved".

I did think DH moving in would help me go to bed at a reasonable hour, but he usually goes to work at 430AM, so.... nope! I usually get home at 11PM/midnight, so I just stay up 'til he goes to work. Oh, well!

MY FH And I Moved In Together Before The Proposal. We Have 2 Sons So It Made Things Easier

I've never officially lived with any exes although it felt like it. My FH and I were best friends for about a year before we started dating so I'd stay at his house a lot. Then once we started dating we moved in together after about a month (I know it seems crazy fast, but it worked for us). We've lived together ever since and it's been great. I have a lot of anxiety when I'm home alone, especially at night so living together has soothed so much of that

My wife and I moved in together after almost 1 year of dating. We got engaged about a year and a half after moving in together. I have lived with an ex in the past and could never marry someone without living with them first. Living with someone totally changes things relationship wise. Regardless of how many sleepovers you have had or weekend getaways, moving in is a big step and you really get to know someone no a whole new level!

Good luck with getting your new place ready! It sounds like you two have a lot to look forward to in the coming months!!

I believe in living together before marriage. There is no better way to TRULY know the person you are considering marrying. I broke that rule with my first marriage (I moved across country to live with him about 2 weeks after we got married) , and regretted very quickly because he hid a lot from me when we were long distance. It was one of those light switch situations where he revealed a completely different person to me as soon as I moved in with him after we got married. I'll NEVER go through that again.

My current FH and I were already planning on moving in together in 2 months when he proposed. He's a little old-fashioned and I'm pretty sure he didn't want to live together without being engaged, not that he ever outright stated that. We settled on a long engagement to compromise (18 months).

Thankfully, thanks to 2 and a half years of dating/getting to know each other and him practically living with me before we moved in together (4-5 days at my place on average since I lived alone and he had roommates), I'm happy to say that he is exactly the person I expected him to be after living together for over a year.

My FH and I lived together for about one year before he proposed and we had been friends for 10 years. After the proposal, we went through some extremely trying times, including- serious health issues & diagnoses, surgeries, deaths, a miscarriage, school, job change, family feuds, financial stress...but we also learned a lot about each other. We have lived together for almost 3 years and we are still learning about each other each day. I can say, you really don't know someone until you live with them. I believe it's in your best interest for your future to try it out before you get married.

I have also come to the conclusion that only the strongest come out of an engagement, married. We are a strong couple and built ourselves a very strong foundation of love, trust, understanding and communication. If we hadn't, I don't know that we would be together today.

I think the last night we didn't spend together was in February, but when the stay-at-home order was made, he was at my apartment 24-7. We moved into our own place on April 25th. I'm loving it! And being a DINK (for now) is freaking awesome.