They want how much? The price of student accommodation
It seems like every week in the news there is another horror story about someone being shown around a property that can be best described as uninhabitable, for an extortionate amount of money. Case in point, one house hunter in London recently went to see a bedroom only to be shown a mattress in a cupboard under the stairs, a “room” with so little space it would make Harry Potter feel claustrophobic. The asking price for this bedroom? £500 per calendar month!
Today at CPS Homes we’re taking a look at the cheapest, and also the most expensive places to be a student in the UK. Somehow, we have a feeling we’ll be seeing even more students coming to Cardiff by the time we’re done!
Luxury accommodation
'Luxury accommodation' doesn’t always mean preposterous monthly rents for the privilege of being locked in a room where other people store their jackets, there are some accommodations that charge what can seem like expensive fees and you actually get to live in a fab property!
For example, there are some new student flats that have opened in Liverpool, which come with a price tag of £232 per week (yes, that’s a monthly cost of £936!), but offer amenities such as a cinema room and shared gym. If you’re feeling particularly flushed with cash, there’s the Fountain House block of student flats in London, which, though being undeniably attractive and close to Hyde Park, come with the less palatable monthly rent cost of £21,000 a month – ever so slightly out of the budget of the average student.
The most expensive places to live
Recent research by HSBC took a pool of the 20 cities with the largest student populations, comparing various metrics to see which city was the most expensive and which was the cheapest place for students to live. The data used by HSBC included weekly essentials, weekly rent, weekly bus pass and the cost of five pints of beer and two bottles of wine which was added together to make a total weekly living cost. The research also separated Freshers, who would most likely be living in student halls, and second and third years, who would generally be living in private-rented housing.
For Freshers, the priciest place to live was Oxford, with Oxford University students paying roughly £323.60 weekly. The other universities which found themselves to be the most hard on the wallet for students were UCL/Imperial (£317.83p/w), the University of Birmingham (£295.78p/w), the University of Sussex (£285.30p/w) and the University of Warwick (£262.03p/w).
Unsurprisingly, 4 out of the 5 universities that were most costly for Freshers were also the most high-cost for second and third years. The University of Oxford (£276.35p/w), the University of Sussex (£264.50p/w) and The University of Birmingham (£252.78p/w) all appear in the top 5 most high-priced universities for second and third year. Joining them was the University of Cambridge with an average weekly cost of £250.28.
The cheapest places to live
On the other end of the spectrum, the cheapest place for Freshers to attend university is Leicester, which has a weekly cost of £192.02, while Cardiff comes third, costing students only £225.85 per week - almost £100 less than Freshers in Oxford! Finishing the top 5 are the University of Nottingham (£212.00p/w), the University of Edinburgh (£227.79p/w) and the University of Leeds (£228.25p/w).
One of the biggest surprises to come from the cheapest accommodation for second and third years is the University of Warwick (£197.53p/w), which was one of the dearest universities for Freshers! Unfortunately, Cardiff didn’t rank in the top 5, finishing 6th behind the University of Manchester (£198.38p/w). However, the fact that there was only a 47 pence difference between Manchester and Cardiff (£198.85p/w) makes us think that Cardiff deserves an honorary position in the top 5! The other universities in the top 5 were the University of Nottingham (£182.24p/w) and the University of Leicester (£178.87p/w), with the University Liverpool taking the top spot with a weekly cost of £174.48.
If you’re looking for high-quality student properties in Cardiff then CPS Homes is the lettings agent for you! To book a viewingcontact us online, email us on: enquiries@cpshomes.co.uk or pop into our Cathays branch on Woodville Road.
