She was looking for a flatmate but what she found was her future husband. Ms Vanessa Tan, 28, owner of Plain Vanilla Bakery in Holland Village, put up a post on accommodation site easyroommate.com.sg advertising a room in the private two-bedroom apartment she was renting off Holland Road.

When banking executive Philip Kenchington, 29, responded, she "Google stalked" him and saw a bunch of drunken photographs of him on Facebook. It was not a promising start but she "needed a roommate because of the money", so they arranged to meet at the apartment on New Year's Eve in 2009.

Mr Kenchington, now her husband, says: "When she opened the door, I was struck by how pretty she was."

The British citizen took the room but on the day he was supposed to move in, he did not turn up.

Says Ms Tan laughing: "I called him and he was hung over."

But after the initial hiccups, the two hit it off and became a couple after just six weeks. Within 1½ years, he proposed at the doorstep of their apartment, the place where they first met, and they got married in August last year.

When the two got married, they needed another flatmate and turned once again to the website that brought them together.

Three short-term flatmates were found through the site. Ms Tan says: "The site has been good to us. Maybe we should write them a testimonial."

Melissa Sim

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