House guests may begin to stink after three days, but it seems to me that there is still more time before they become another roommate. I think that time comes when it becomes apparent that they are not about to leave any time soon. That could be different depending on the circumstances of their arrival. I generally think that it is important to discuss this issue as soon as it becomes apparent that the length of a stay is indeterminate or when the house guest starts to become annoying.
Once I had a couple of housemates; one of whom had been my lover. We broke up, but we thought we could continue to live in the same house because our breakup was kind of mutually agreed-on. However, later on, she took up with a gay guy, who she let stay in her room. I’m not sure how long this went on for, but it wasn’t long before he started acting like he lived there. He’d play my records over and over, filling them with scratches and ruining them.
One day, he decided that it would be a good idea if he added some pine scent to the house (who knows what he had been doing to make that necessary). He thought and thought and then decided it would be best if he put some fresh pine boughs in the oven to release the scent. They released a scent all right, but it wasn’t pine!
Soon after that, my other roommate and his macho boyfriend got together with me to read the riot act to my former girlfriend and her gay friend. Things did not get violent, as we thought they might, and within a day or two, they both left for a basement apartment in a large rambling house in a rather dicey neighborhood.
Eventually, I think she got tired of her friend’s antics, and got married to someone, had a couple kids, and then divorced. I haven’t heard from her in years, now. I left for grad school not too long after that incident. I don’t know what happened to our third room mate. I think he survived the time of AIDs. I hope so. He wasn’t the type to go to the baths, as far as I know.