If your uni student dc lives at home and commutes

OP, I understand where you're coming from with this. My son has started uni as a commuter student and I do charge him because I have to. I lost all financial help in July and his dad has stopped paying me any maintenance directly.

Circumstances dictate that he has to contribute. It is good for him to understand that as an adult he does have to pay his way sometimes.

It's quite often the luck of the draw. Obviously they have to do well at UCAT but the interview process seems very random.

Google suggests 25000+ applications for just over 8000 places for 2026 entry.

3 hours of commuting by train for a medical student would be very, very difficult.
Medical students do very long hours at the university, easily 8 to 6, and every day. How close to the university is the train station?
And then when they go into hospital placement, he could be sent to all sorts of different places, and have to do shifts.

I think living at home is almost doable, but he'd probably be better off with a car. Better still, he sucks it up and lives on campus, or nearby. He doesn't have to be social if he doesn't want to be. There are plenty of housing options at universities, for all sorts of students. A friend of mine for instance, couldn't cope with the noise and drinking/partying culture of halls, and spent the majority of her degree living with a host family just off-campus. That could be an option.

Well Ive never needed to look at it that's why I asked

Good for your DC. They obviously had a stellar UCAT and good interview skills. But yes, it is not easy to get a place for medicine, even for kids with all 9s at GCSE and A* at A Level. Just look at the number applying and the number accepted.

Id it really that tough? My DN got into Imperial college at the first attempt ( he started a few weeks after his 18th birthday

He may very well not be accepted at a close uni for medicine. The application process is pretty horrific. My DC took 2 years to get in and ended up at a uni that was not in their top 5 choices. On the plus side they saved lots of money in their year out. From year 3 they are on placements about 60-90 mins drive grom the uni city (although they do get free accommodation there). Their uni days in years 1 and 2 were very long.

I think you need to look very closely into medicine applications and how they work. You can only pick 4 and you have to apply competitively, also commuting that distance may not even be possible for a med degree with placements and hours.

I think it will be incredibly hard to do medicine if he also needs to do a 90 minute commute each day. Tbh, if he can't cope with living away from home I'm not sure it would be a good degree for him anyway. Also, if he lives at home the maintenance loan is lower and obe he has paid for transport and daytime food etc he probably won't have much left

I am not charging mine. Not medicine but they are doing a course where they are being taught 42 hours a week. They will work either a Saturday or Sunday to top up their funds after settling into a routine - their choice, I think it may be too much.

Im expecting to need to subsidise money needed for equipment etc so deffo not charging rent.

Oh maybe that was it. Apologies. It was nuts as they had a baby by then.

Newcastle university would not place a student at Bristol.

Are you sure he didn’t go to Bristol as a newly qualified doctor (there is a lottery type system for training posts and you can end up at a deanery not of your choosing).

This is a very good point. My brother-in-law is a psychiatrist. He is from Derby. He went to university in Newcastle and his placement was in Bristol. He has no connections with Bristol, but he had to live there.

I'd echo people's thoughts on here about the nigh impossibility of doing a 3 hour commute each day with the amount of time medical students spend in school.

There'll be plenty of times there'll be an 8am call on site, of course.

So that length of commute is simply not doable - forget about it.

However..its important to be aware that the social side of things is not necessarily like the boozy/shouty/clubby type of affair we might all think of when we think of uni students.

My kids were at uni these last few years and so I know there's plenty of scope - as there probably always has been tbh - for the less outgoing people to enjoy themselves socially.

And unis are very aware of the diversity of experience that students may want these days. They're customers now, so they'll provide services when needed and will certainly help the transition from home to uni - if only to keep the cash rolling in, if nothing else.

So, my advice:

Half hour commute absolute max.

But, mainly, don't worry about the costs - no one else does - and get to living at uni. There will be things to get involved in if they fancy...if not, just study and walk to lectures. Enjoy a coffee, sit on the edge of a group of classmates and listen in. Collaboration on coursework is key, ofc...stuff will happen...it'll be good.

A very good degree from a very good university is worth having...the education is enough; and you never know, the social side - raucous or quiet - may follow.

No, my elder DS attends Uni while living at home. We also pay his travel costs for him.

We are in the fortunate position that this doesnt really effect our finances.

He is also working and puts a lot of his money away for when he does move out.

We are happy with this level of support. He is aware of the real world. But why not shelter him/give him a leg up where we can?

He also pulls his weight in the house, cooks and cleans, and does general jobs around the place like we all do.

.

oops wrong thread

On the discussion whether ND students can become "people people".

I think one should differentiate between living situation and work. For ND students, the commute can be bad but doable, whereas if you have loud neighbours in your student halls and lots of parties (probably depends on the location) there isn't much of a chance to ever switch off. For many ND students it is important to have downtime according to their preferences (be that quiet or blasting favourite music through headphones or whatever), which is often difficult in student halls.
Even a tedious commute can be preferable if you know that you'll end up at home where everything is "safe". The living-at-home-issue doesn't need to have to do with having someone else do the housework.

Similar for people who prefer quiet without being ND, lots of communal activities can be hell. That doesn't mean that they can't do a day job with people, when the focus is on the work topic.
It can definitely be possible to switch your mind from being "on" for work with people to "off" when you're at home. I don't think everyone who is working with people in some way - which are a lot - are all extremely social personalities; they surely differentiate between a work persona and a private persona, too.

Besides, he might later go into medical fields which don't work with the public every day.

For the residentials it might be possible to do a short-term rental if they are far away.

How is he going to cope becoming a doctor if he doesn't like people, cross etc

Medics get no choice where their placements are. Although his commute could be "only 90 minutes" by train, most placements will involve further travel. For example, at Exeter your placements could be in Cornwall, at a hospital a couple of miles from the station. He may have no choice but to live in medics accommodation if available. Can he drive? That's the most common option for placements with GPs etc.

They can only apply for 4 medicine courses plus one "other" course.

But you're right that very few get their first or even second choice and the advice is that they must apply "strategically" based on their GCSE results, UCAT score, etc. Working out which are the best fits to the applicant's specific scores is a big task in itself.

I have to say that a 90 minute commute is just not going to be compatible with an arduous course like medicine (and when hospital placements start, he could find that he faces an even more difficult journey). A ND medical student faces enough obstacles as it is - and shielding himself from making connections and relationships with others isn't going to help in his journey towards becoming a doctor.

Mine lived at home for some of his degree. I didn’t charge him any rent as when he worked (summer only) that was when his loan for the year had run out. He was at uni or his girlfriend’s quite a lot so didn’t cost me loads. He sometimes bought and cooked his own food.

Has he considered taking a year out? He could volunteer at and old people’s home or in a hospital and get a part time job. It would really help him to focus on being among people, organising his own daily life, doing his own laundry.

Then I expect he may be ready to think about living away from home.

Is that 90min commute door to door (of the various university buildings) - what’s the travel like at the other end? I hated being late when I was his age - so stressful - and I hated crowded/late buses and trains so I’d have to leave super early

Leaving money out of it - going to catch a train at 6.am so you can be sure to arrive at 8am before worst of rush hour will be very tiring. Up at 5am everyday (9am classes and lectures are common).

Suggest you and your ds look into whether he could apply for any charitable grants to help support him at uni. Look at the Turn2us website, also some universities may have grants/scholarships.

DD gets an NHS bursary for her post grad degree (diagnostic radiography) in England.