Help finding accommodation in London!

[ScrummyDiva2]

Can anyone help as we are slowly losing the will !!
DD is going to be going to London for post grad studies this September, and she cannot find anywhere to live!
She doesn’t know anyone, so is looking for a spare room in a house share.
Has been messaging constantly on Spareroom and some Facebook groups, but either, they don’t want a student or the rooms have gone already.
Letting agents seem to deal in complete houses/flats, not individual rooms.
Is there some other avenue we haven’t discovered yet?
it’s getting quite urgent now.
Would love to live Clapham area.
Thanks for any advice anyone might have.

Does the accommodation office at the university have any useful contacts / links or suggestions for post-grads? That's where I'd look first. They may also have lists of house shares looking to fill rooms.

Try orgs like Unite Students, some have postgraduate rooms

There are lots advertised on various face books groups. Just search for London student accommodation or London flat shares etc.

If you've got millions to spend, there are places here:

https://www.mezzino.com/property/signal-house/

(But despite the prices, most are sold out, so if she's interested she'll need to move quickly)

Have you tried the Indian YMCA? https://indianymca.co.uk/

London-based MNer here. It is really difficult to find affordable rentals/houseshares etc and has been for the last few years. Basically demand massively outstrips supply and it's a sellers market in the extreme. Your DD is doing the right things by using the apps, Facebook groups etc. However it's a long and stressful game.

Some tactics might be:
*Keep Clapham as an aspiration but move the perimeter of the search outwards to areas that are (a) less well-heeled and/or (b) further out. Maybe there's an overground station but not a tube. Maybe neither. Maybe it's a bus ride to the tube.
*Use this method to find something/anything, with the ambition to find a place in Clapham or similar within a year, once she has some London contacts and is moving in the circles where she will hear about something once it comes up.
*The Indian YMCA as PP mentions or other similar hostels (there are a few about) might also be an idea, just while she gets started

There are purpose built student halls, IQ is one, and there are others. Not cheap but everywhere in London is incredibly expensive.

She needs to actually be in London - most house sharers will want to meet someone in person. Likewise lodging with someone. If she can’t secure hall of residence accommodation I’d suggest booking a hostel for six weeks and really cast her net as wide as possible - everyone wants Clapham btw…

Those prices from that link above - £2k a month for a room! (& that was the cheap one) - it’s a bloody racket. Poor students, we really have done a number on them. I can’t believe they’re mostly sold out too - who is paying that? International students?

Goodness only knows.

The spec on those rooms is amazing, hence the price. But I was gobsmacked to see that they're almost all 'sold'. Some people clearly do have plenty of dosh!

Following

Which uni will she be at, Clapham is expensive and only good for certain uni locations.

DS2 is currently in need of similar in Cambridge and I'm hoping that he won't have quite such a problem. One thought re contactin the university's accommodation office - 2nd / 3rd 4th year undergraduate house groups may have dropouts whose places they need to fill if someone is unable to continue through having failed resits? Possibly a long shot, but worth bearing in mind?

I'm an academic in London, almost none of my postgraduate students are in flatshares these days, it's either university halls or private student accommodation. If her uni can't help then the latter might be the only option and yes, she'll probably have to give up the idea of Clapham. Many of my students seem to be in Vauxhall or Whitechapel which are fine too (don't get the love for Clapham myself!)

Which uni is she going to? We can suggest good areas depending on the commute.

Your DD has my sympathies - find nice student accommodation in London has been difficult for a while and this has this year been compounded by the new Renters' Rights rules: students no longer have an end of tenancy date and a lot of students seem to be hanging on in London in their student accommodation whereas they would previously have moved out at the end of their contract.

Nice houseshares don't need or want random new housemates and your DD would be better off looking for a room through friends.

My DD's four person houseshare has had a single person move out two years in a row and so a new person needed to be recruited for 3rd year and now for Masters. It is admittedly a very nice house in a gated community with a garden, two full bathrooms and a well equipped kitchen so ideal for socializing and giving parties with a lot of safety but both years the room that became available could have been rented out 50 times over just from the other girls' friend groups.

For the houseshares that don't want students, it could be worth saying from the outset she'd be happy to pay her share of the council tax despite being a student? That's might make them more willing to consider her.

I think she also needs to be very flexible on area rather than focusing on Clapham.

Thanks everyone. She's going to King's. Which other areas should she be looking at? Unfortunately, doesn't know anyone else in London,so can't buddy up with anyone. Definitely can't stretch to £2000 a month!!! Just insane prices. Can't believe how difficult this is.

Alternatively there are private halls with studios. There is a Prestige living one near Aldwych

My DD had an issue this year with one of her housemates from last year wanting to stay on in the property but not as a student but as working person. Three of the existing housemates are going straight on to Masters degrees so this would have created a house of 3 Masters students and one working person. None of the 3 Masters students wanted a mixed house because they could anticipate the different lifestyles and timetables clashing and so the 3 Masters students told the other girl that she had to move out if she wasn't going to be a student. Not wanting a mix of students and working people is very common.

East and south are on average cheaper than north and west.
A couple of ideas as a starter for ten.
If your DD is attending the Kings campus at the Strand she could commute into Waterloo and walk over Waterloo Bridge (she probably worked this out already, hence the Clapham preference, right?). So anywhere on the overground lines or tube that comes into Waterloo. Thinking of the Jubilee Line for example, she could even live in Stratford and still get to college quite easily.

She could also get the Piccadilly Line into Covent Garden and walk down to the Strand through CG. So anywhere on the Piccadilly Line. You could look anywhere north of Caledonian Road, but past Finsbury Park and into Manor House/Turnpike Lane/Wood Green would be the most likely to yield some affordable results on the north end.

Clapham is in high demand and can be expensive. Maybe try Streatham (also in high demand) no tube but train and bus to tube good. Lewisham (DLR). She might get lucky and find a nice place near a tube.

My DD lives in Camden with students from LSE and UCL. There are lots of students there and it's a very easy walk or bus ride or tube ride into Bloomsbury.

There are rooms (single en-suite) available in Eleanor Rosa House in Stratford. This is London University accommodation. Some are still available. Some are £300 per week. I’m not sure if the ones available are £300 a week but it’s worth a try.

Southeast London will be cheapest and short commute by train to charing cross (right near KCL). Deptford is worth looking at. But have you tried the university accommodation office?