In a city as ruinously expensive as Los Angeles, moving in with your significant other can seem like a no-brainer. Saving on rent plus snuggles on demand? Sounds great, right? But research suggests it pays to be very intentional about the decision to cohabitate.
On LAist’s daily news show AirTalk, which airs on 89.3 FM, host Austin Cross talked with experts who shared some insight and guidance for couples who are thinking about making the big move.
Sliding or deciding?
When it comes to cohabitating, University of Denver psychologist Galena Rhoades says there are two terms that are useful to know: “sliding” and “deciding.” They refer to the different ways two people end up living together.
“When we ask people, ‘How did you start living together?’ people typically say, ‘It just sort of happened,'” said Rhoades. Her research found that many couples “slid” into living with their partner as opposed to making an intentional decision to do so. Her work also suggests that couples who move in together not only experience new stresses, but are also more likely to stay together and even get married.
“We now know from decades from research that people who moved in together before they were engaged and before they had decided to get married tend to have worse outcomes in marriage,” she said.
The reason? When couples slide into cohabitation, Rhoades said, they often end up feeling like they have to get married — their lives have become too entangled, and marriage is also the societal expectation. But these couples may not have gotten married if they hadn’t moved in together in the first place. Rhoades said the data is clear that making the…
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