If you’re not in a shared house in your 20s with a bunch of people you don’t know, are you really doing your 20s correctly? Shared houses are a character building opportunity. Employers should ask if you live in one because you really do learn excellent interpersonal skills, how to have difficult conversations and generally, how to get on with anyone and everyone. It’s CV worthy. We’ll ignore the fact you also become excellent at petty theft i.e. stealing food, milk, toothpaste, toilet paper and so on.

When moving to a new city or country, what better way than to have an almost instant support network (provided they’re sound) that you can do things with and explore your new surroundings. When I moved to the city I’m currently in, I joined a shared house with 3 women who work in financial services (not the cocaine type though). They were a delight to live with but we were all very boring in our dating ways.

All single yet no one was very promiscuous, we would go out on nights out and all return as single as we were when we left the house that day. We were all a little older ranging from 28 to 36 so it was professional and fun but no wild one night stand stories. We were pretty much an extension of the convent next door. In fact, sometimes you’d see the nuns out in their Honda Jazz with a male riding shot gun. The nuns getting closer to men than we had in a year.

Oh how all this was about to change. One flatmate left and suddenly, within 4 weeks we’d had a full line change with me being the only one standing. From an average age of 31, we significantly dropped to an average age of 25. Your 20s are traditionally your slutty years right? Early to mid 20s and you should be in the STD clinic the same amount you go to the supermarket. The years of terrible decisions, figuring out what you like and don’t like whilst sleeping with anyone and everyone with a pulse.

And as such, the brothel began. The perfect description for our abode. All it took was one wild 24 year old flatmate and suddenly, there were more sins in the house than you could shake a stick at. As I watch the latest man leaving I ponder, how many one night stands in a shared house is too many? I’m of an age when I don’t particularly want to hear people having sex. During university years it’s almost expected but when you spend 5 days a week doing pivot tables for a living, you can’t help but feel you are past hearing your flatmates shagging.

Rather than making monetary gains from this, how can I suggest the idea of packages that, in exchange for cash, the man has to perform a household chore? A win for the flatmate and a win for the wider house.

• Bronze package = a chat, a cuddle and a free drink – no chore
• Silver package = foreplay, lounge access, 2x free drinks – taking the bins out, unloading the dishwasher etc.
• Gold = sex, all round access (shower facilities available upon request) 3x free drinks – get the marigolds on, get the Scrub Daddy out and clean that bathroom sir.

Alas, you have to live and let live because it’s all part of being in your 20s, isn’t it? Excited to see which of these men, if any, become regulars. Whilst one flatmate is kicking a one night stand out, another can’t wait to use the cordless hoover to deep clean her room. Oh the juxtaposition.