How much do you need to live in Central London for university?

[Leicester1960]

Dd results permitting will be going to Central London for uni in September. I hadn't considered quite how extorianate accommodation would be !

She wants to go catered.

This will cost £200-250 per week depending on the room allocated. Self catering is still about £185 per week.

She'll get a minimum loan of £180 per week.

How much extra will she need?

She isn't one to buy valentino jumpers but of course we'd like her to be able to still enjoy herself.

My aunt who lectures ar a london uni doesn't think £180+100 per week would be enough.

Our biggest concern is, how much do you need on top of catered accommodation?

It just depends how careful the children are with money and if they will be getting a part time job as a lot of students do that.

If the question is how much extra will she need on top of her rent I would think £100 a week perhaps and mine will have £150 which I can afford.

Factor in travel costs first which will depend on which halls she gets. That could be £30 a week (check on TfL website). Then check exactly what meals are provided and add say £5 for each meal she'd have to buy herself (typically weekday lunch), plus say £20 a week on launderette, snacks, tea and coffee. Then a study budget to cover photocopying, books, pens, paper etc - £15 a week maybe? Having fun, clothes - up to you! Maybe £40 a week?

So that comes to £130 a week... ouch!

We have DS1 about £50 a month when he was at UCL. He was self-catered and his hall was about £90 a week.

I'll add that this was the cost in his first year, 7 years ago. It is now £120 per week.

Titchy, a lot of the UCL and intercollegiate halls are pretty close to UCL, within easy walking distance. I think £30 for travel is probably at the upper end. Remember many Londoners, especially those travelling outside rush hour, will take buses rather than the tube.

Books depend on course and fun probably costs much the same wherever you are, and depends on interests. wanting to sit in a pub watching South Koreans in a world gaming contest perhaps

And travel can easily be zero.

Indeed travel might well be cheaper, or zero. But OP hasn't said where the accommodation is (in fact allocations probably won't have been done yet) - dc may well end up in zone 3 or 4 - university of Westminster for example has student halls in Wembley and Harrow.

Also got DC starting Sept. Self catered. We were going to pay the halls /accommodation and leave DC to manage on maintenance loan which in our case is £4750.

Same as Fortysix. We paid halls (£10,000 a year) and DS managed on the minimum maintenance loan (was just over 4k, think is now just over 5k for London) Yes. It is really expensive. He had a job in the holidays which helped a little. Transport - bus or walk.

I don't think zone 3/4 halls would be 200-250 a week though. Christ I hope not. So you'd have lower rent to compensate for higher transport costs.