<p>If the rent is $1000/month, and students are paying for nine months of the year, then it’s only $1000 more than it costs to live in a suite on campus. Personally, I have neither the money nor the interest in living in one of these luxury apartments, but I know people who would. But 277 of them? I’m not so sure. There are students who live at the luxury apartments downtown (Waterplace, the Westin), and I wonder whether they would prefer to live closer to campus if nicer housing were available, or whether they like the distance/proximity to downtown. I have no idea how many students live downtown.</p>
<p>So yes, there are people who would pay $1400/month for housing. But I’m not sure whether they would want to live in the Thayer complex.</p>
<p>I also think that such housing has the potential to be extremely divisive, more so than the suite-non suite breakdown already is. Entering the housing lottery is difficult enough as is, but it’s an even bigger issue when half the group can afford to live in New Dorm and the other half can’t. As an RPL, I’ve seen a lot of students freak out about upsetting their friends vs. getting the amenities they want. These more exorbitant prices mean even more students will not be able to live there, and the gap between the haves and have-nots grows.</p>
<p>tl;dr: this is a bad idea.</p>