DD applied to a school over the weekend. They wanted a non refundable room deposit before even being accepted into the school. How common is this practice? Not a fan
No common at all. What college?
I have never heard of such a thing. It seems excessive!
A large southern state university. I found a article linking the same school to the practice. They make 100k per year on this practice per the article.
Article is “some dorm room deposits unethical” at insidehigered.com only found the article after we applied and it said to submit your deposit as soon after the application as possible. Interesting read. Sorry can’t link.
you meant this one ??
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/03/14/some-dorm-room-deposits-are-called-unethical
I googled and found some old threads with discussion on being “pressured” to send a housing deposit before May 1, here is one
If it refundable, if dorms are full with some less desirable options and deposited students will get more desireable housing and if assuming the application is because it is a good choice for the student, I would pay it. But non refundable is a questionable practice indeed.
I assume it is a technique to Get you to psychologically think about attending there…if you feel it is something scarce (get it now before it is gone!) then you tend to put more weight on it. Also if you have put a housing deposit down then you have anchored your thoughts to attending there.
Also they may make money this way.
If there is not enough housing or there is less desirable housing, then this will allow you to claim housing.
But I think this a dubious practice!
If your student is serious about attending the school be aware that NOT paying the housing fee can either leave them without housing or with the dregs.
At the University of Texas, there is a shortage of on-campus housing, so in that case, you would WANT to put down a housing deposit asap.
To be clear, what the University of Florida does before applicants are admitted is ask them to pay a $25 housing application fee if they want to live in university dorms if they enroll. Applicants who wouldn’t live in the dorms don’t have to pay. And the basic application fee is also $25. A student applying for admission who would live in a dorm if he or she is accepted and enrolls pays $50 (absent fee waivers).
The same student would pay $75 to apply to the University of Texas and $70 to apply to the University of Georgia. (But only $30 to apply to Florida State.) That makes me feel a little less hostile about this. It’s essentially an application fee break for local applicants and applicants who can’t afford to live in the dorms.
Later on, they give admitted students the opportunity to pay an only-partially-refundable $175 deposit to get in the queue for dorm assignment. I think that’s actually sort of common, although I think most universities refund the full housing deposit if the student decides to go elsewhere by May 1.
UF does not refund the whole housing deposit should a student turn down the admission offer. We walked away from $125 (maybe more but I think that’s right). 33k undergrad students and housing for only 8k. Kind of crazy. At an event we attended prior to admission the head of housing actually said “Housing at UF is really confusing” and explained why you need to pay the $25 right after you apply or you won’t have a chance at housing. Then upon acceptance, you fill out a housing contract and deposit something like $250 to reserve your spot on campus. If you turn down admission, they keep $125. Ridiculous but I consider that my contribution to our large flagship. That made for a lousy first impression and actually had a lot to do with us looking elsewhere. FL has some massive state universities. The state needs to figure out how to allocate more resources if the schools are to keep up with other top public universities.
On the other hand, great opportunity for off campus apartment developers to make a fortune!
FYI: UF’s application fee is $30, plus a $5 processing fee. All 12 Florida public universities charge $30, with UF and FSU each charging the additional Coalition App $5 processing fee…
The $25 non-refundable housing fee is used to secure your place line for room selection. However, if you have a roommate, they can make the selection and then “pull” you into the room. Also, since UF reduced the number of accepted Freshman in 2017-2018, they had more than enough rooms available, so most late applications where able to select a room.
I think the current “Housing advance rent payment” is $225 (up from $175) and is partially refundable. It’s due a few weeks after admissions acceptances go out (which is the 2nd Friday in February).This payment is used to secure a room. You can miss the due date, but then there is no guarantee of a room. When I did this, back in the 80’s I ended up in a temporary triple. This year they had available rooms, so it wasn’t too much of an issue. Of course, there is no guarantee that UF will not raise the number of incoming freshman again, in which case space would be much more limited.
Of the 12 Florida public universities, 10 require a “prepayment” and/or fee for housing. In some cases the fee goes toward your rent (prepayment) in others it’s just a fee. For example, FAU has a $100 nonfundable application fee, while UNF has a $200 pre-payment + $100 processing fee.
Bottom line, UF is in line with the other 11 public universities in Florida. With some minor variation (like the $5 coalition app fee).
Same goes for yearly tuition. With the exception of Florida Poly (which charges $4,940 for 30 credits), the other 11 schools charge from $5,844 (FAMU) up to $6,570 (FIU) with UF at $6,380 and FSU at $6,516.
Off campus housing is plentiful in Gainesville (UF). In many cases cheaper options are available off campus. That includes “dorm like” housing that’s next to the campus (a popular choice for a lot of incoming freshman).
Now, don’t get me started about parking…
This may be highly practical but it’s also sleazy and unethical. I wouldn’t want to attend a school whose administration has such poor problem-solving skills that they can’t even manage to sort out their housing issues after they know who will attend.
Just … wow. Sadly, families will continue to pay it, so the school will continue the practice.
It depends on how competitive the housing situation is, and how likely your child will go there. When faced with that, we paid housing deposits at my son’s top two choices, which was necessary to make sure he got a spot in the dorm (at a large southern state university). Not having a guaranteed spot would certainly have impacted his decision on whether to go there, so we looked at it as part of the overall cost of making the best college decision for him.
BEFORE acceptance, though?? How on earth is it okay to take a non-refundable deposit if the student might not even be accepted?!
It’s not OK @kelsmom, and it’s specifically against the rules all NACAC member schools agree to.
But, they get away with it, so they do it.
I did end up paying. I know it was not a lot of money to some on the boards. It was the principal of the request that bothered me.
I sure hope that school does a first come/first served dorm choice. I definitely see your point about the principal.
UW-Madison has a housing lottery so a student applying late has just as good a chance at getting their top choice dorm as the early bird. U- Minn (with reciprocity with WI so similar pool of students) has the first come/first choice (or they did awhile back) so it paid to get the dorm deposit in earlier. I believe both schools did refunds up to a spring date. So- specifics matter.
In this era most UW freshmen will choose the public dorms (there are some private dorms close to campus) while most beyond that will go to apartments (small Greek numbers). Campus culture varies with schools. As do costs. In my day off campus mainly meant being further away, now there is a lot of private housing contiguous with one or another part of campus. But that decision comes after a student has been on campus for a time.