Accommodation cost impacting university choice - very troubling for institutions like mine

[Tulipgardens]

Name changing for this and wondering whether any one has stats. My sixth form students used to put down unis like Bristol, Bath and Exeter but, over recent years, no longer. Newcastle, Sheffield and Leeds now top choices. London unis nowadays a complete no-no. It has been a marked shift...

As student accommodation is so expensive, I wonder if living as a lodger could be considered more. The student would obviously need to be the calm, respectful type as partying would need to be done away from their digs. Could probably get a room with all bills included other than food for 500 a month.

It is definitely something my son and his friends are considering. They are hardly going on open days. They are just looking at job prospect in the university location fof saturday work and housing costs.

I know that much of europe goes to its home town but I dont think tuition fees themselves are as high. We have this odd situation where basically all courses are nearly 10k a year but some courses / universities are a much better brand so the roi on that 30k is better. Our local uni is good enough but you can't study lots of subject there at all anyway.

Absolutely. My oldest son has a first class degree from our local not especially respected northern uni. Still struggling to get any kind of job but that’s more to do with the fact that the IT field is making redundancies left right and centre at the moment and that the uni sorry to say hasn’t been that supportive of graduates unlike more renowned ones.

Wow! DC1 paid about £6k for student hall in London in 2020/21, although it was in North Acton, which is not the best.

DC1's hall was owned by the uni and there was no requirement to pay over the summer holidays.

DC2 was in student hall at another London uni last year but the hall was not owned by the uni. It was owned by a private company called Unite Students. Unite demands payment for 50 weeks and it came to £13K!!!! The only thing you can say is it was in Kentish Town which is much central and more expensive than where DC1 was.

DC2 is now in a flat share in a wonderful location- 5 minutes from Regent's Park and that is £12k per year. Student load is £9k. Earns £significant working as a lifeguard and exDP and grandma give £3000/year.

Oh mine know London is out. We're barely above UC limits of income so really stretched.

We're on the south coast and she's very bright so had been considering exeter and Bristol and Southampton.

I hadn't realised these were as expensive.
She doesn't want to go up north as she wants to be able to get home relatively easily if she needs to (additional needs)

I honestly think we're going to struggle 😬

I know kids in London universities, yes it expensive but they worked to top up loan. Lots of jobs offers in London. One was charging £15 to £25 per hour to read with primary school kids from overseas attending private schools since the parents didn’t understand the UK and English system (phonics) with some basic Maths. Another was taking photos and listing products on e-commerce platforms or social media. There are online job boards for the London universities.

I am adding Edinburgh too.

My DD pays £800 a month, one of five students in a flat. One bedroom made into two, living room also a bedroom, leaving a kitchen big enough for just a two seater sofa as the only communal living space.

On the positive plenty of jobs in hospitality and Edinburgh is pretty walkable ( flat to uni, flat to work).

Support for students has not kept up with accommodation costs.

We visited York uni which helpfully put the weekly prices on the door of each room.
Some were I think £220 pw 😣 otoh Warwick’s cheapest were £120 pw and no discernible difference between the most expensive (apart from being catered I think). At Durham we asked some of the students how much they were paying and they didn’t have a clue.

Um where is cheaper in the south or are we just doomed 😬

When the children were little we knew an Imperial student who worked as a au pair/nanny. She spent the whole of her four year degree with the same family, doing school pickup and looking after the kids till the mother got home, after which she was free. I assume they found a solution for half terms, that she could use the after school club when needed, and that she was available during the holidays.

She, and a second student looking after the children of another family, were fantastic. Bright, mature and responsible. The second opted for living with a family when she realised that her hall of residence (London Southbank University) were too noisy to study in.

We live in the SE (Bucks/Oxen). DS has just finished an amazing 3 years in Sheffield. He chose it as he knew it was an affordable city with a great reputation.
Private accomodation cheap, plenty of cheap nightlife geared up for students but not for ripping them off. Lots of part time jobs.
He has stayed there and found a graduate job and a shared flat. The alternative was coming back home and living with mum and dad - who wants to do that after 3 years of freedom?

DS is at a London university. He gets the minimum loan and we have to provide the short fall. His rent is £850 a month, it's crippling us.
He has a job but it it's only enough to pay his transport costs. He rarely goes out.

The whole situation is ridiculous, he is seen as an adult, no university engagement with the parents, but we are expected to fund him.

What do you mean by “south”?

Cardiff is v good value
Southampton and Portsmouth are cheaper than Exeter and Bath
Norwich is reasonable

MyDD2 just completed 4 years in York and loved it. House share £750 pm only 2 bathrooms 7 students. Pluses were no need for any transport other than home visits and lots of varied jobs available in addition to beautiful city and endless choice of entertainment. It is a place where it is easy to get to from other major cities. Could not fault it.

University experience is best as a growing up experience living away from home and with peers and joining clubs and societies.

Commuting in to lectures from parental home a couple of days a week only worth it for a degree for a specific career.

Most unis we looked at ( including Bath) had cheap halls as options.

Please check the bursaries on the university pages and she may qualify for the full loan if your income is so low. She might get more than you think.

There’s a lot of kids on minimum loans due to parental income but the parents can’t top up, so they can be really struggling.

Wow. DD rented a lovely 2 bedroomed flat in Whitley Bay just a 20 minute walk from the beach for £600 a month until this summer.

Obviously, it wasn't student accommodation, but it shows how different the rental market is everywhere.

Her ensuite halls accommodation in Newcastle during 2019/20 was £134 a month. It is now £178.50 a month. Their cheapest university managed undergraduate accommodation is £129.50 a week.

I agree. Living away from home has been invaluable for DD.

The problem is those cheap accommodation choices are in such high demand that many students get given much more expensive rooms that they didn't select as one of their choices. It happens in a lot of places and there can be a huge rent difference. (Durham is one particular example.)

Mine are just starting to look and think about uni. I am heavily pushing for them to look at ones they can live home for. It’s shit, we rent and I have no idea how we would get through affordability for them on a second rental.

It really depends on the individual city. York is very expensive compared to Sheffield or Lancaster. Also, on the verge of bankruptcy if the rumours are true, I think I’d be as worried about that as much as accommodation costs at the moment.

It's not only cost but availability of housing which is a concern.

DS1 went to Exeter - he was our first child at uni and we were clueless as to how expensive accommodation would be. He was in the cheapest halls in first year, then a house share with an expensive rent which we had to be the guarantor for ( never again!)
Competition for decent housing was fierce.

By DS2 we'd learnt our lesson and he went to a commutable uni and lived with his brother for a bit, so had a cheaper rent and also helped out DS1. Luckily he wanted to go to the uni that was closest but we looked at places like Bristol and the accommodation situation really put me off.

I do think that the maintenance loan amounts need to be increased. The lowest loan outside London and away from home is £4767.

However, we had a savings pot to cover university top up so Ds could choose whatever he wanted. Both Dh and I went to uni so we knew there would be something to pay for the children. We had older friends with children at uni way before ours so were aware of the potential costs way ahead of time fortunately. The biggest factor for both my children was distance from home.

@Leniriefenstahl there is no catered option at Warwick, cheapest accommodation for first year would be anything with shared bathrooms, more expensive ones are en-suite. Ds is en-suite and approximately £200 pwk.

Ds1 was at Durham, @Misfitkickedoutonthestreet there is a blanket charge for accommodation at Durham and the differences are catered and self catered, shared bathroom or en-suite. The cheapest would be self catered shared bathroom which is £174.50 per week or £6805 for the year. There is a reduction for a shared room (it makes me shudder to think of trying to sleep with some random stranger in the other bed) most students do not want this option. It is only in certain colleges.

Was definitely true re Oxford 20 years ago and I can't imagine it's changed much. It was massively dependant on your choice of college though. I went to a rich college (by luck. Didn't know it when I applied) which provided subsidised accommodation for everyone. My friend at the poorer college opposite could only live in college accommodation for the first year and had to find private digs for the other three years, which was significantly more. I remember talking about it and it was as bad as London prices, possibly even worse.

DS is at Lancaster, partly for this reason.

He turned down his offer from York, as we could only afford the cheap accommodation, it was in short supply and there was no guarantee he’d get it.

If he’d been allocated the £220 a week he’d have had to decline his place and start the whole ucas process again or grab what he could in clearing and hope he could get accommodation at a sensible price.

He gets the minimum loan as we’re just in the top bracket once overtime is considered. We live in the SE for commuting to London and have 3 Dc. He works to supplement his income and we help with living costs but there was no way he could do rent that was 1.5times his loan before you even thought about living costs.

What shocks me is the number of parents ok WIWIKAU, that haven’t looked into this in advance and then post saying their child has their first choice uni but the accommodation costs aren’t covered by the loan and what should they do.

How awful, your kids might have to study in <shudders> the north….. 🙄