What College Students Should Know When They Decide to Move Off Campus

By William Sharon on September 30, 2013

College adjacent real estate is an economically skewed market (To hear me rant about it, click here). Thus, I must preface my advice with a disclaimer: there are no good deals on student housing. Students need to live close to campus, most don’t have cars, and most are essentially forced to pay whatever real-estate companies ask. Thus, the price-tag on off-campus houses is usually higher than the buildings are actually worth (essentially basic economics). There is however, a distinction between the values of these houses, which is not necessarily correlated with their prices; in this case a “good” house refers to a relatively good house, but nonetheless, relatively good beats relatively poor. These “good” deals can be difficult to find however, and many students are taken advantage of, beyond the expected degree.

By bjgr on Flickr.com

But what do students recommend?

In the hope of offering what is the ideal picture of an off-campus life, I spoke with Ohio State junior, and two-year off-campus-dweller, Bennett Wildey. Wildey is in the minority when it comes to real-estate satisfaction, claiming of the leasing process that it was “pretty straightforward, easy, and not confusing at all.” Indeed, Wildey’s satisfaction with the minimal difficulty he experienced in his efforts to move off-campus came as a norm-shattering surprise, and begged the question, “what was different about his case?”

You might just get lucky.

First of all, and perhaps necessarily, luck played a key role. “We got lucky and our friend invited me and a few others to live with his buddies,” says Wildey, “we didn’t really even have to look at all.” Obviously not everyone has readily available potential roommates who have already done the house shopping for them. To these people, Wildey says to “start looking early,” noting that “if we hadn’t gotten lucky, it would likely have been too late to find a good house.”

It isn’t always that easy though.

On the other end of the spectrum, Ohio State senior, Chris Pierce has had less to celebrate. He has lived off-campus for two years now, in two different houses, with a combined 13 different roommates. “The companies that own the houses have a corner on the market,” he says, “they can charge unfairly high prices and there’s nothing we can do.”

Both Pierce and Wildey stress the importance of doing research, and Wildey offers the tip, “don’t take the first house you find. Explore a bit, do some shopping.” Pierce suggests “looking early and often to get the best deals, as the process is essentially a yearly first-come-first-serve.” Moreover, Wildey notes that finding a quality house is only a portion of the process. As college student are frequently first-time lessees, there is a gap between their level of their desire to live independently and the extent of their knowledge of real-estate law and financial investment. Ohio State Student Legal Services managing director and attorney, Molly Hegardy tells students to “read everything, if [they] are renting a place, [they should] read the lease. Line by line. It’s totally boring, but really worth it.”

Don’t forget, it’s more than just money.

While the financial and legal aspects of renting an off-campus house are important, there are additional intangible facets of lease-selection. Wildey tells those looking to move off-campus to “make sure [they] can trust [their] roommates.” As he says to prospective lessees, “someone who didn’t seem very responsible when they lived in the dorms might be the type to skimp on rent and that’s going to affect you when the eviction notice is on both of your doors.”

Ultimately, one would be hard pressed to find a good deal on student housing, but there are ways to minimize losses. As Wildey and Pierce advise, the smart lessee will look early, do research, explore multiple options, and know his or her roommates well.

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