Households are collections of people in the community such as families, partners, housemates, etc. Each household has an account in the Accounting system. So housemates should have their own individual households if they want to keep accounting separate, even if they live in the same house.
Each Household has its own web page. Click the first item (your household name) in the popup menu in the upper right to:
There are also some files that are private to your household including:
These pages cannot be seen by any other community members, including the community site administrator.
Some of he lists have a public checkbox to allow the rest of the community to view a particular item. For example, you can mark a recipe public and it will appear on both your Household Recipes page and on the community's Recipes Page.
Notes and Contacts marked public will appear with your Household on the People page. One possible use of this feature is to show emergency contacts and health-related information for your Household members.