living with friends can be great. I've done that and really enjoyed it. but you don't always have the luxury of great friends right away in a new place. living with randoms is more of a mixed bag. sometimes they become new friends; sometimes they just bring stress and destabilize your life. I see studios/1BRs as a way to cut out this variance while also sacrificing money and some potential upsides.

I don't really see how apartments are unfriendly to communal living though. 2BRs are very common in new developments (where I live anyway) and 3BRs aren't that hard to find either. I don't find yards to be essential to getting the benefits of communal living.