Maintenance vs rent timing

[Whatabanana]

I was trying to work out an easy way to top up the maintenance payments (eg a set amount per week) but the timetable of maintenance and rent has left me confused. My daughter's rent comes out seven times and the maintenance is only paid three times. We are left in a deficit of about £950 by the time the third rent payment is made. Then a deficit of nearly double that for the last three rent payments. And then the final maintenance gets paid on the 17th of April when they only have about a month left. Is that right???

It's a nightmare! We had a running spreadsheet to try and work it all out and liaise with DS.
Was a baptism of fire for my DS who up until that point had even failed to learn the skill of changing his own toilet roll!

Thank god it's not just me😅😓. My children are also quite challenged in every department, I could have done without this nightmare on top. I don't understand the logical of the timing for that last payment. Presumably I'll need them to pay me money back at that stage😬

*logic

Is this private halls for first year?

my three weee all in university owned halls in their first years and it appeared that the three accommodation charges were timed to be due a good week after any maintenance loan payment should have arrived.

there does seem to be quite a difference in approach between Uni owned halls and those unis that outsource halls.

Were not weee. I’m not in a theme park😀

It's a Unite student flat. Your system sounds much more favourable!

The 3rd payment is to help over the summer months....plus just as a heads up, you'll probably need to find a deposit for 2nd year accommodation ( and quite often pay for it over the summer too- if you're lucky you may "only " have to pay half rent when they're not actually staying in student house !)
I've had 3 students at Uni since 2012 onwards , with 3rd finally graduating this year...after 10 years of bank of mum and dad, we'll now be able to pay for some much needed building work at our house!

I hadn't even thought about the second year yet 😬. Just our luck to have two starting at once as well. Hopefully not for ten years though!!

Does the Unite flat not allow you to pay in 3 instalments? My son's does. His first payment will go out for his second year before his maintenance loan will even hit his account. Luckily we can cover this. For second year he didn't need to pay any deposit for Unite.

Also if they are thinking of staying in the Unite accommodation check when the availability goes live. You'll find it may be as early as late October or early November.

Thanks for the tips, we can cover if needed but I thought the dates might be a bit more streamlined. I remember there was an offer to pay all at once so maybe there were other options too..

What a lot of people do is parents pay the rent and the students live off the maintenance loan, so the rent and loan don't need to dovetail as such. With dd's first year rent there were various dif options from all up front to termly to 8 monthly chunks. It is all pretty alarming especially when you have more than one at uni and in 2nd year + when they have bills too.