In Troubled Times, Roommates Becoming the Norm

"For many urban professionals -- despite having a good job and a college education -- the American dream has been seriously downsized. Instead of hungering for the house with the white picket fence, they fantasize of one day renting an apartment with no one else's milk in their fridge.

Although living with roommates into adulthood may clash with our sense of financial entitlement, particularly for members of the educated, professional, middle class, it's become a reality of urban life that doesn't seem destined to disappear any time soon. We're living in a time of extremely strained resources, economic and otherwise.

The American dream is undergoing a seismic shift and our expectations about how we can and should occupy space will have to change right along with it."