<p>For those that have children attending schools out of state, how did you or they find places to live off campus? I know a few websites that I can use to find apartments and/or places that are looking for roommates. I also know its usually best to go check out these places and talk to prospective roommates in person. BUT, if one lives out of state and due to cost and budget constraints is unable to personally visit the apartments/houses (visiting during orientation week would be possible but not sure if that would be cutting it close), what’s the best process to go about finding a place?</p>
<p>The best I could think of would be using Google Maps and just use street view to check out the surrounding vicinity and the actual apartment/condo/house itself but I would like to know more about it than just through such venues…</p>
<p>I’m confused if your child is already living in college area, in a dorm, or moving to a new city.
I’ve done this a few times, using college site, aptfnders, craigs list. I had an idea of streets and distance. I also called realtors and/or managers of these sites. Never considered anything without pictures.</p>
<p>If possible, try to get someone on CC to check it out for you.</p>
<p>I checked craigs list daily for updates. S’s current apt is a 2 bed/2bath condo, next to his lab. He called his future rm/mt to check it out ASAP. It was too much $$$, but they kept in touch with owner. A few weeks later, he dropped the price.</p>
<p>I’d be very leery of signing a long term lease with unknown roommates. Even if your child spoke to the roommies on phone about rules about overnights, cleaning, cooking, you can’t be sure what the reality will be.</p>
<p>It was a nightmare process for me finding an apartment but it eventually worked out.</p>
<p>I looked through the summer several years ago and couldn’t find anything near the campus that wasn’t a dump. I considered buying a place but there was little for sale and what was for sale was multifamily units and I didn’t want to deal with a large property. I found a place that wasn’t optimal - it had been flooded and renovated and it was in the basement of a house converted to apartments on three levels. The basement apartment was available so we did a tenancy at will. It was a bit far from campus and there were bugs there and I didn’t like the idea of being in a basement as there was only one quick exit from the apartment.</p>
<p>There were new apartments very close to the campus but I couldn’t figure out who owned them. They were also all empty (eight units). I placed a bunch of phone calls but was only able to make some progress after I rented the other place. I eventually got a hold of the property management company and tried to rent it but they kept putting me off and I couldn’t figure out why. I finally asked them if there was a problem and they said that the property owner didn’t want to rent to freshman students - they wanted grad students, professors and upperclassmen. I arranged a meeting with my son and the head of the property management company and everything was smooth after that. They have a lot of problems with students not taking care of properties and this property owner didn’t want that to happen to his property.</p>
<p>We then moved everything from his previous apartment to the new one and this is his third year there. It is in a fantastic location, across the street from the police station and near food, a bank and the campus. Parking is a headache but he doesn’t have a car.</p>
<p>In the previous apartment, one of the tenants was a police officer and that was a plus. His school is in a high-crime area and have a policeman for a neighbor (he had lots of visits from other police officers) was reassuring.</p>
<p>I did look at several places that were currently occupied by students and disgusting describes what I thought of how students lived. But I guess that’s something that maybe parents shouldn’t see.</p>
<p>I did use the electronic tools but there’s no substitute for looking for apartments on the ground. I walked around the neighborhoods and talked to people in nearby condos, phoned telephone numbers on the signs of apartment buildings and checked out the safety of areas. One other concern for me was fire safety and relative security. Many student apartments leave the main door open so that the interior hallways and stairways are not secure. The place we have has sprinklers and multiple exits from all but the bathroom. It’s completely up to code with CO and smoke detectors.</p>
<p>Usually, students moving off-campus already live in the college community for most of the year in on-campus housing. They find apartments the way everyone does – through online listings (Craigslist or landlords’ web sites) or newspaper listings or through listings in their college’s off-campus housing office – and they make arrangements to visit apartments and check them out before signing a lease. </p>
<p>My daughter did this during her sophomore year. She and several friends hunted for apartments in October and November and signed a lease for the following year before Thanksgiving. A year later, when one of her roommates decided not to continue to live in that apartment for senior year, she and her remaining roommate found a substitute and made the necessary arrangements with the landlord for the new person to replace the one who was leaving – again, before Thanksgiving. My son had it even easier – his off-campus housing found him. He had a friend who was sharing an off-campus apartment with three other people. One of the others wanted to move out, and my son’s friend asked whether he wanted to take that guy’s place. He did. </p>
<p>But there are situations (notably, first-year graduate students) where a student has to find off-campus housing while living in a different part of the country. Decades ago, my husband solved this problem by obtaining names and phone numbers of local landlords from a friend who attended that college, calling those landlords, and setting up multiple visits to apartments in the college community during a three-day visit to the college town. (Yes, this was expensive, but it was better than not knowing what sort of apartment he would be getting.) More recently, my son solved the problem by avoiding it altogether. He went to his prospective graduate school community two months early and stayed with a friend whose roommate was out of town for a summer internship. He expected to hunt for apartments while staying with his friend, but he had also put his name on a waiting list for on-campus graduate student housing, and he got a room in the on-campus housing within a few weeks.</p>
<p>Call the housing department of the school that the student will be attending. Usually, they are very helpful regarding finding off-campus apts. Sometimes, they list available apartments online. Sometimes, they will give you a few names of apartment complexes that seem to cater to college students.</p>
<p>We are in the same boat. Son will begin grad school in the fall, yet he is busy at his undergrad school completing his senior year studies. Because of the distance and the need to attend classes at his current school, he can’t take the time right now to look for an apartment near his future grad school. In order to get a decent place with relatively easy accessibility to the campus, one must find and commit to a place sooner rather than later.
He called the housing office at the school and they gave him the names of a few apt. complexes near the school. Everything else was done online and on the telephone with the signed lease being sent through the mail (certified mail/proof of delivery). </p>
<p>Sure, it’s a bit risky to commit to something before seeing it in person but sometimes one doesn’t have a choice. In our case, the college’s housing department gave us some suggestions and we went with one of them. Understanding that they deal with students who need off-campus housing on a regular basis, we trusted their suggestions.</p>
<p>Actually, I am the student doing the moving, and since I am transferring, it will be from one part of the country to another, and I probably will not know anyone from the school to be able to room with. I guess I can look at the neighborhood when I am in town for the campus visit. I actually have been looking at Craigslist, among other places, I was just wondering if there are other ways to find good off-campus housing besides the usual methods.</p>
<p>p.s. Calling Housing would be a great idea, so I will definitely keep that in mind.</p>
<p>Calling the housing department at the school is the best first step. Also, check out the housing link on the college’s website (specifically related to “off-campus housing”). The housing department should be able to steer you in the right direction.</p>
<p>The college’s housing department may be an especially good place to look if you want to live with roommates. They may have listings of students who are looking for people to share apartments. You can save a great deal of money, in most locations, by sharing a two-bedroom apartment with another person (or a larger apartment or house with multiple other people) rather than living in a one-bedroom apartment by yourself. Often, there are students who have leases on apartments but have had a roommate move out – because of graduation, dropping out, study abroad, moving in with a boyfriend/girlfriend, or whatever. These people are looking for new roommates like you.</p>
<p>You may also want to start a thread on the specific college’s forum here on CC and let us in the Parents’ Forum know what college you’re talking about, too. You might get some useful specific ideas about places to look. Make sure you mention whether or not you will have a car; it makes a big difference in terms of where it is practical to live.</p>
<p>Have you contacted the school’s transfer student department (dean) to see if they could help you out? Off campus housing department is also a good resource. When my daughter was looking for housing, I did call on her behalf because she was studying abroad. The director was very helpful in letting me if a landlord was good or not. I also asked her about few provisions in the contract and she gave very good advice.</p>