Student Housing Second Year

[HelgaHufflepuff76]

My daughter is just coming to the end of her first year at Kingston Uni and is looking for accommodation for her second year. She’s been looking since the beginning of the month and hasn’t had any luck. So many of the houses expect you to find all the other occupants for the other rooms, which she began to do at first, but people kept disagreeing or pulling out last minute. Now she’s been forced to look for somewhere with one of her friends who is on the same page financially etc. they’ve had a few viewings but they’ve either lost out or someone’s pulled out or the landlady doesn’t respond etc.
Are they doing something wrong or is it usually this difficult? Would you expect to have found your second year accommodation by now, or are we panicking unnecessarily?
Any advice welcomed

DS went back into halls-style accommodation for second year and hasn't sorted his third year housing yet. I think he sorted this year's out in about June or July.
If you're not bothered who you share with you can just apply to private halls and they'll fill the flats with others who also don't mind.

I was concerned DS hadn't sorted anything out when he came home for Easter.
His main issue is that he hasn't connected with anyone he'd want to live with and so was just sticking his head in the sand.
I think a number of people were asking him about it over the holidays and he and his GF (at another uni and had already sorted a shared house for next year) looked and private company student accommodation and he has now booked a room in one of those.

London seems to be different to the rest of the country.

Dd has to vacate her current house in July. She hasn't found anywhere for next year yet as everywhere wants people to move in the next month. She found her current house which she moved into in October at the end of August.

London has a very fluid rental market. If you don’t want to pay for the summer you start looking for 1st Sept. So much later. However rents might be for a full year. Not terms.

In other cities students often look in January or even earlier.

A student should be able to get a couple of rooms or a shared flat in London over the summer. Has the uni got an accommodations office where flats might be advertised?. Some halls might allow 2nd year students but some would not. Having a proper flat is nicer.

It’s often the case with student housing that you find the other tenants. That’s pretty normal but two people in London can rent but it costs more. That might be the bigger issue here. They will have to travel and landlords often do want a year. London is a different market from other cities.

My DS is in Bristol. Private accommodation for 2nd year onwards is looked at in January. He just keeps looking in RightMove. There is a filter for student accommodation. Again, in Bristol you have to be quick. There are usually several groups of students booked to view each property and you need to decide more or less instantly if you want it and pay a holding deposit. Leases are for a whole year.

@Seeline
Bristol has always been early doors. DD was there and it’s a race to get better flats and houses in the better areas. However London isn’t like that.

looking at Kingston, there are rental properties with 2 bedrooms at circa £340 a week. £1400 a month around that area. There will be cheaper places no doubt but everywhere around Kingston is fairly expensive. She needs to evaluate cheaper areas and transport links.

Is it worth posting on The Student Room forum?
London is indeed very different. DD is in Newcastle, and she and her friends had sorted out accommodation for years 2 and 3 by the Christmas. Good accommodation for the following year gets snapped up very quickly.

Try the Spareroom.co.uk website, if they haven't already? (but probably worth looking anyway, as new accommodation offers/ requests for sharers to 'buddy up' with will be added all the time).

DD will be going into fourth year. She wants to share with one mutual friend, and they've started keeping their eyes open this week. She reckons in reality July is the time, but I can remember her telling me some groups of friends didn't find accommodation until mid August.

If they potentially need one or two others to go in with, are there any uni group chats/forums to post on?

Friends' DCs told me they had to decide around Christmas in first year who they wanted to share with in order to find houses in Jan/Feb to start in the Sept/Oct (two different unis in large cities). Sounded ridiculous to me but I guess it's self-perpetuating as if everyone else does it, you have to do it. Not too surprisingly, one of them ended up in a house with people she fell out with by end of the summer term and had a nightmare second year sharing with them.