:sigh: Are you another one of those 'I gotta drive the car first to see if I like it?' types?
Yep. You mean you'd buy a car without driving it first?
While you are not responding to me, I do have some comments on the matter.
At least for guys, there is a heck of a lot of value in having lived with a girlfriend at least once in your life. There are hundreds of different lessons about the realities of living with women that take time to be hammered home, and I've seen many relationships fail because it took too long for those lessons to sink in. People have limits and everyone is human.
That said, after one good learning experience, there is little practical value in living together, at least from the standpoint of the guy. There are benefits, but it is not really necessary if he has his head screwed on straight and has the perspective of prior experience to understand the situation. Men really do not understand their relationship to women when living together lacking a laboratory to sort these things out in. It is much easier to evaluate a potential mate after having lived with a women than prior, as we are often raised with ridiculous expectations that are not helpful when it comes to making a relationship work.
Maybe if our culture cast off many of the ridiculous modern myths of male-female relationships that seem to be cultural doctrine, we would not need to figure out the reality through trial by fire. I am a vastly better potential mate now because I learned my lessons the hard way many years ago. Some other poor girl had to put up with my learning curve (not that women do not have one as well), which makes things much smoother for me today.