Living Alone Freaks Gen Z Out. Honestly, Fair

There was a time when the height of adulthood looked like a solo apartment. A modest little place, maybe a studio with scuffed hardwood and too much light in the morning. You’d have a coffee table you probably couldn’t afford, a bookshelf you swore you'd fill, and no one to share it with but yourself.

It was the dream, or at least it was sold to us as one. Independence. Solitude. The quiet triumph of being completely, undeniably on your own.

But somewhere between skyrocketing rent and a global pandemic, that fantasy started to crack. These days, the idea of living alone feels less like a milestone and more like a myth. Not because we don’t want space, but because space comes at a price most of us can’t pay (financially, emotionally, or otherwise).

A generation starved for attention

It’s a strange thing, to grow up in a world where you can talk to anyone, anywhere, at any time — and still feel utterly alone.

Gen Z was raised on connection. We were handed smartphones before we knew how to drive, taught to curate ourselves before we learned how to be ourselves. We’ve spent entire years of our lives talking through screens. Commenting, liking, reacting, posting. Always visible. Rarely seen.

Then came 2020. The year everything closed, and the quiet got loud. Overnight, solitude went from aesthetic to terrifying. We weren’t just alone, we were alone. No casual run-ins. No distractions. Just endless hours with our own thoughts, and whatever the Instagram algorithm decided we needed to see that day.

It changed something in us. Permanently.

Studies since the pandemic have shown a dramatic spike in screen time and social media use. Platforms like TikTok became lifelines, coping mechanisms, escape hatches. But they didn’t fill the hole. They just helped us forget it was there for a few minutes at a time.

Now, five years later, the loneliness lingers. According to a 2025 report by Befriend.cc, a shocking number of Gen Zers say they have few or no close friends. Not casual acquaintances. Not people they DM when something funny happens. Real friends. The kind who know your weird snack habits and the name of your childhood dog.

So maybe it’s no wonder we’re living together. Not just surviving the cost of rent, but softening the blow of isolation. After years of performative connection, we’re craving something real. Shared silence. Shared meals. Shared presence.

Because at some point, it stopped being enough to be “in touch.” We want to be in each other’s lives.

Independence Costs More Than Rent

There used to be a moment in your twenties when you signed a lease, bought a couch, and felt like you'd arrived. You might have lived on instant noodles for a few months, but you had your own keys. Your own space. A door that closed behind you and whispered, you made it.

Now? That door costs three grand a month and comes with water damage, no laundry, and a 45-minute commute to the job that barely pays for it.

Living alone has shifted from a coming-of-age milestone to a financial achievement badge reserved for tech bros, nepo babies, and people who accidentally went viral and monetized their personalities. For the rest of us — the ones balancing internships, freelance gigs, retail shifts, and inboxes full of “just circling back” emails — independence is less of a lifestyle and more of a logistical nightmare.

The numbers don’t lie. Rent prices have surged to historic highs in cities across North America, with wages barely keeping up. In Canada, the average rent for a one-bedroom in a major city now hovers between $1,800 and $2,500. In the U.S., it's not much better. Add groceries, transit, student loan payments, and the inflation tax we’re all quietly paying, and suddenly, living alone doesn’t feel like liberation. It feels like self-inflicted exile.

So Gen Z is doing the math. And the math is mathing: roommates make sense. Friends make it livable. Co-living has become a survival strategy. And honestly, it's also a way of saying, I don’t want to struggle through this alone.

Because let’s be real. We’re already paying more for less. Why should we pay for loneliness, too?

We’re Not Afraid of Growing Up. We’re Just Done Doing It Alone.

Yes, the rent is too high. Yes, we’re working three jobs and still googling “how to eat healthy for under $20 a week.” But if money was the only reason we lived together, we’d all be on Craigslist, splitting rent with strangers and arguing over who left dishes in the sink, don’t you think?

So, that’s not what this is.

Because what started as a financial necessity is also an emotional one. We’re not just splitting costs. We’re creating homes. And in a post-pandemic world, that feels more urgent than ever.

Something shifted after the lockdown years. Not just in how we work or sanitize our hands, but in how we define comfort. In what we now consider “enough.”

Before the pandemic, living alone was a quiet flex. You could close the door on the world and disappear into your own little bubble. After 2020, that same silence started to feel unbearable. The bubble popped, and what was left was a lot of empty space and the realization that being alone — truly alone — is not all it’s cracked up to be.

We watched the walls close in on our bedrooms, our mental health fray, and our friendships stretch across time zones and pixelated screens. Zoom happy hours and Discord hangouts helped, but they couldn’t replace the sound of someone moving around in the kitchen while you spiral. Or the comfort of a shared eye-roll after a long day. Or just knowing someone else is nearby, living beside you instead of through a screen.

So when the world reopened, we didn’t race toward solitude. We moved in with our best friends. We chose laughter in the hallway over square footage. We picked connection over quiet.

We remembered what it felt like to be alone for too long. We remembered who checked in and who didn’t. We remembered that even the strongest people need soft places to land. And if you’re lucky, sometimes that soft place is a second-hand couch in a too-small living room with three people you love more than anything.

Adulthood Looks Different Now — And Honestly, Better

There’s this idea that living with friends is what you do before you grow up. A temporary situation. Something you put up with while you figure things out. And sure, that might’ve been true for our parents — the same people who bought houses at 24 and think “just save more” is actionable advice.

But for us? Living with friends doesn’t feel like a stopgap. It feels like a choice.

A smart one.

Because adulthood doesn’t look like it used to. It’s not a house in the suburbs or a 9-to-5 or being able to afford a washer-dryer combo. For our generation, adulthood is about stability (whatever that means to you). And for a lot of us, stability looks like two or three people you trust splitting the bills, checking in when you disappear for a few hours, and sending “made you tea” texts when they hear you coughing through the wall.

We’re not trying to avoid responsibility. We’re just smart enough to know we don’t need to carry it alone.

It’s not glamorous, but it’s real. Group chats about toilet paper. Venmo requests for Wi-Fi. Crying on the kitchen floor because life is too much, but at least someone’s passing you a paper towel and not pretending they didn’t hear.

Maybe we’re not moving out in the way older generations expected. But we’re building lives anyway. Together. On our own terms.

Maybe This Is the Dream

There’s this narrative that we’re doing it wrong. That we’re behind. That we’re clinging to adolescence by choosing to live with our friends instead of striking out on our own. As if independence only counts when it comes with crown molding and a Keurig machine you bought yourself.

But what if we’re not falling short of adulthood? What if we’re redesigning it?

What if the dream isn’t a one-bedroom and a front door that closes the world out, but a hallway that leads to people who make the world easier to live in?

Because at the end of the day, we’re not just trying to survive rent hikes and job markets and mental health spirals. We’re trying to survive life. And if the past few years taught us anything, it’s that doing it alone isn’t a requirement. It’s a choice. One we’re allowed to opt out of.

So no, we’re not ashamed of our shared leases and our group calendars and our homes full of secondhand furniture and inside jokes. We’re proud of them. They’re messy, chaotic, beautiful proof that we’re taking care of each other in a world that often doesn’t.

Maybe this isn’t a backup plan. Maybe this isn’t a delay. Maybe — just maybe — this is the dream.