[box] Making the move out of the dorms [/box]
Stroll through any part of campus over the next few weeks and I guarantee you’ll hear the frantic conversations among freshmen regarding next year.
What is all this buzzing about, you ask? It’s about nothing else but the hot topic of housing for next fall.
With housing on our minds right now, next year is all we can think about because the upcoming school year is when we get to choose our own place and live with people we actually want to live with. If that’s not exciting for a freshman to think about, I don’t really know what is.
However, as much as it is thrilling to begin the process of looking for housing, it can be stressful. Especially when freshmen basically have no idea what we’re doing because it’s the first time any of us have had to look for housing on our own.
All we know for sure right now is that we have to find people to live with — unless you choose to get your own personal place — and we know we have to find somewhere new to call our home for the next year. But other than that, we’re pretty clueless about the process of the house search.
So with the help of one of my lovely resident advisers (RA), here are some tips and tricks for the difficult housing process.
As of right now, I hope you know who you’ll be living with next year. Or at least have a really good idea of who you’re living with. If not, start looking and proposing the question of housemates for next year, now. But don’t rush this decision because you don’t want to live with someone just because you feel like you’re behind schedule. Not a good idea for obvious reasons.
After you’ve gotten your roomies situated, start researching. Look for houses, condominiums, apartments —whatever floats your boat. You probably want to ask yourself and your future housemates whether you prefer on-campus or off-campus housing. There are pros and cons to each one, so this is a personal preference.
If you’d rather have the ease of getting to and from the main campus in just a few minutes and would love some light housekeeping services (who doesn’t?), go with Poly Canyon Village (PCV). If you want to get away from campus and explore other parts of town — at least the closer-to-campus parts — then search for off-campus housing.
While PCV has already accepted applications for next year, many places off-campus have yet to hit the market. Many begin to surface mid-March and April, so keep your eyes open online and just while you’re walking through neighborhoods. Craigslist has become my most visited site in the past month, just because I check it daily to see if see if some new housing has popped up in San Luis Obispo. I first thought it was a sketchy site and didn’t really trust it, but it’s definitely helpful when it comes to housing.
Also, keep in mind that when looking for housing off campus, you’ll probably pay more the closer you are to campus. With that said, it’s important to establish how much you and your housemates are willing to pay for rent to avoid any future problems.
And think about parking. My future housemates and I went to drive by the surrounding areas of a condominium complex we had our eye on just to check out their parking. Because all of us will most likely have our cars next year, parking was a deciding factor in whether or not we liked the place. You don’t want to have two spots guaranteed by the complex and then have to find another two spots for your housemates on the street when it’s normally busy with cars or the nearest parking is eight blocks away.
I wouldn’t have even thought about this if my RA hadn’t mentioned it, but remember that you won’t just be paying for rent next year. There are groceries to be bought (so you don’t starve yourself), furniture (if it’s not already furnished) and cleaning supplies (yes, you’ll actually have to clean your own bathroom next year).
Needless to say, I’m excited for this happy, exciting, stressful, difficult process we call housing. Because at the end of it all, we’ll all find our lovely place that we will be able to call our home next year and that’s the most exciting part of this process: knowing we’ll be living with people we want in some sort of housing. What more could you want to start off next year amazingly?