Is £150 a week average for student accommodation?

[peaceanddove]

DD is checking out universities for Sept. 2021. Her first choice offers some amazing looking accommodation, it's more like a chic Scandinavian style hotel to be honest. There's a gym, spacious social spaces, games room and has its own cinema! It's secure and includes all bills and is only a short walk to city centre and lectures. But it's £150 a week! Is this average please?

In 1993 I paid £27 a week! Not en-suite, and and a bit rubbish, but all the halls were the same in price and quality. I loved it

Thank you for everyone's input so it seems like she's getting quite a fabby deal for impressive accommodation then? The room is quite spacious with a queen size bed and it's en suite. There's also an on site laundry, various communal lounges and kitchens. Also she can walk to and from lectures, and it's only a 15 minute walk into the city centre so no transport costs which is good.

I used to work in a private student accommodation in Edinburgh, similar to the set up you describe. £150pw was the ‘silver’ tier studio flats (the ranking was a room in a shared flat, then studios: bronze, silver, gold and platinum). That was in 2011 so no doubt that has gone up now, so I’d say £150pw is pretty good!

DS University was £21-£26 a day

He lives at home rent free (and he is occasionally grateful )

Totally depends on the location. My dd is in London which is a lot more expensive than this.

No idea of the actual cost, but mine was only just covered by my student loan, this was back in 2004. Could have gone cheaper but it was right in the city centre next to the uni library, so had no travel costs.

DD at uni in west London at the moment. She pays £125pw. Not en suite though. She is happy with her accommodation.

Northern cities can be cheaper.

Not necessarily all. York is particularly expensive, and some of their accommodation is quite small and grubby. More like £170-£180 for the larger modern rooms with ensuites.

Northern cities are not cheaper. DS will be in central Manchester in September at a cost of £140 PW...on a basic maintenance grant. It's very expensive.

DS will be in central Manchester in September at a cost of £140

DD graduated from Manchester last year and paid about £100 for halls then £80 to £90 for student houses. £140 is massively self indulgent. Loads of cheap accommodation in Manchester.

I think for freshers being on campus is important, after that you can move off into houses or share at a slightly reduced cost. I have been looking for Ds1 who would go to uni in 2021.

There seems to be a wide range of uni rents, Warwick for instance ranges from £91 per week to £181.

The double bed rooms are more expensive, as are en-suites. If you are funding any of this then I would suggest you do some research into the uni accommodation as your DD might not get first choice category.

Yes we're very keen for her to be in halls in her first year because it makes it much easier to make new friendships etc. Then I think we're looking at investing in buying a house for her in her second year where we can rent out the other rooms to her friends.

@aibutohavethisusername it's in Sheffield. Great city - DD is very excited to be going. She's 10 min walk to campus too.

No need to pay that. Last year for DS he lived in halls and it was about £95 a week for a basic shoebox with shared kitchen and shared toilets/ showers. this year for a room in a ( very nice as far as student accommodation goes) house it's a similar amount.

Shares in private providers of student accommodation have performed brilliantly over the past few years. This thread explains why.

I am a landlord in a university city on the south coast.
The uni halls are hugely expensive and luxurious. Ghettos for students.
The private landlords offer FAR cheaper accommodation, think less than £100 pw all inclusive.
You may be looking at on line learning now as the virus has shut down many universities. When will they reopen?

Just out of interest, and for future reference as my DD is a lot younger, does the loan cover this or do they have to pay for this themselves by taking on a part-time job?

Yerro. How much loan they get depends on how much you earn.

If you have a good income they will only be able to get a smaller loan and you will be expected to give them money. Obviously not all parents on good incomes are willing or able to do this. So students then have no choice but to get a job if they can.

If you have a low income your child will be able to get a bigger loan and probably some additional financial help from the uni.

Thanks, Tinkly. I just wondered where the money for their accommodation was supposed to come from. So the loan might cover it, or they get a job - which, in all fairness is probably a good move on their part anyway.

But we're expected, as parents, to fund their accommodation if on a good income?

Everyone, regardless of parental income, gets a loan to pay their fees.

If your household earns less that £25k, your kid gets about £9k and usually a few thousand more from their uni.

If your household earns mote than about £60k, your kid gets about £4.5k loan.

You are expected to help them out if they don’t get much loan. We topped ours up to the £9k they would have got if our income had been low. It was up to them if they then chose to spend it on expensive accommodation or not. (ours went cheap). Obviously not all parents help out. Ours did have jobs too, for extras.