Horns of a Dilemma

silvercar

How, I wonder, are students who can't get jobs or don't have parents to support them able to manage?

One option is to choose a uni close to home to avoid the rental costs and to provide continuety between holidays and term time in job searches.

I also suspect that students may spend more time looking at the living costs in different areas when choosing their unis.

treliac

silvercar wrote: »

One option is to choose a uni close to home to avoid the rental costs and to provide continuety between holidays and term time in job searches.

I also suspect that students may spend more time looking at the living costs in different areas when choosing their unis.

As things are, it is even more important to choose the best course/uni that offers a place. But I take your point... providing the local uni runs the course a student wants.

It's now, as he goes into his second year in a shared house with a private landlord, DS's costs have risen. Last year he was in halls and his loan covered his room. I believe his loan has reduced this year, which could be because DD is finishing her masters.... that's if they took that into account in the first place.

LydiaJ

wageslave wrote: »

Thats a real problem. Or will be.

I can't use my Da's money for the brattetes but I can't make a difference.

I have these imaginary discussions with my father. He was the kindest of men but blood was everything to him.

I have years before I need to worry about it so I will worry tomorrow.........

Siblings do not need to have equal money. What they need is to feel that they are of equal value, equally loved, and equally wanted, in the eyes of the person or people who matter most to them.

Your little girls will cope just fine with a situation in which the brat has more financially than them, just as long as they know that making that difference wasn't YOUR choice to discriminate, but your respect of your Da's wishes. The more clearly you can keep that money separate from your own money - keep it in different accounts, that sort of thing, and refer to it as "Granda's money" or whatever - the easier it will be for them to understand that this has nothing to do with whom you love the most.

silvercar

treliac wrote: »

It's now, as he goes into his second year in a shared house with a private landlord, DS's costs have risen. Last year he was in halls and his loan covered his room. I believe his loan has reduced this year, which could be because DD is finishing her masters.... that's if they took that into account in the first place.

Interesting, for my DS it was the reverse, rentals were cheaper than halls. Anecdotally, I was talking to DS's letting agent last week and he said they were busier than ever after results day. Suggesting that many first years are motivated by price to forego a year in halls and rent.

LydiaJ

silvercar wrote: »

Interesting, for my DS it was the reverse, rentals were cheaper than halls. Anecdotally, I was talking to DS's letting agent last week and he said they were busier than ever after results day. Suggesting that many first years are motivated by price to forego a year in halls and rent.

I would imagine that the cost of living in halls doesn't vary across the country anything like as much as the price of privately renting a house share. Thus halls will be cheaper than renting if you go to uni in London or Oxford or some other cities with high house prices and consequent high rents. However, if you go to uni in Hull, renting will be a lot cheaper than London, but halls will only be a bit cheaper than London, so the balance will swing the other way.

Disclaimer: I picked Oxford and Hull for my example solely because when I was a student (more than 20 years ago) I remember hearing an Oxford student complain about a friend of theirs who was moaning about rental prices in Hull until they discovered they were a fraction of what the Oxford student was having to pay. Nothing further should be read into my example.

lostinrates

LydiaJ wrote: »

I would imagine that the cost of living in halls doesn't vary across the country anything like as much as the price of privately renting a house share. Thus halls will be cheaper than renting if you go to uni in London or Oxford or some other cities with high house prices and consequent high rents. However, if you go to uni in Hull, renting will be a lot cheaper than London, but halls will only be a bit cheaper than London, so the balance will swing the other way.

Disclaimer: I picked Oxford and Hull for my example solely because when I was a student (more than 20 years ago) I remember hearing an Oxford student complain about a friend of theirs who was moaning about rental prices in Hull until they discovered they were a fraction of what the Oxford student was having to pay. Nothing further should be read into my example.

I alays found the comparison of prices of halls facinating. The three rooms dh as in, and I've seen them all, were larger ....even the one in the ne block, and the period ones were really amazing...and HALF the price of a room at my college (the standard ne room ith the corner wet room and a desk down one side opposite a single bed). My sil had the most amazing room we stayed in once....it was actually three rooms linked, alone on a top floor with plus a shower room, an actual proper shower room, all beams and dresisng rooms and gorgeous leaded windows ....she had been exceptionally lucky in the room lottery and this ''room'' would better have suited a Phd student with a wife! She paid something like £45 quid a week for it....extremely lucky! (I would have stayed there for post grad stuff just to try and keep the room!)

i think some of the very old universities have a different situation with funding..I'm guessing they don't necessarily have to borrow to build new halls, and there fore provision is cheaper, but I guess a converse aspect is that planning restrictions might make building more expensive in some cases.

My experience alone would lead me to think it would be easy to find a flat share cheaper than halls, but compare to sil's room and it seems an unbelievable bargain to be in halls!

atush

Pimperne1 wrote: »

In the current climate I don't think I would be getting into property. I certainly wouldn't be giving the dosh to the older girl when I had two others on the way up either (although I might subsidise her a bit for the next two years)! Don't think I can say more than that (except if you are risk averse perhaps you should just try and invest it longer term in an account that will hopefully keep up with inflation).

I agree with the above, too short a time for property, and to give it to her leaves you with nothing to fund the rest thru life.

Invest it.

vivatifosi

lostinrates wrote: »

i think some of the very old universities have a different situation with funding..I'm guessing they don't necessarily have to borrow to build new halls, and there fore provision is cheaper, but I guess a converse aspect is that planning restrictions might make building more expensive in some cases.

A lot of the newer halls are built as PFI projects and are far more commercial as a concept than halls of old, also older halls are managed under PFI deals. Its been happening since the early 2000s afaik. Unison wrote a paper on the impact way back when and its been going downhill ever since:

http://www.unison.org.uk/acrobat/B308.pdf