is this a good idea? College Student apartment

I can see that 15 minutes could feel like a lot or a little depending upon where you live. I'm about five minutes away from the high school my girls attended, and I don't think anyone is more than ten minutes away -- it's a small district /high density in terms of population.

Regardless, I think on-campus wins in terms of convenience to classes and activities. Whether that's a deal-breaker or not is another question.
 
It’s 15 minutes, lol. Presumably a kid in college has already had a busy back and forth life the last couple of years of high school with school, after school activities and events, study groups, work etc. Maybe it’s because I live in a big city and have been watching my DD and her friends have commutes that are significantly longer but I just can’t wrap my head around 15 minutes being a big deal.

Yep. Our kids drove 15 minutes to high school. Oldest son's 4th year college classes run from 10 am until 5 PM. He's on campus the whole time sometimes arriving earlier to work out and go home and shower and come back or when a class has scheduled a testing center early for an exam.

He often stays late to study. I texted him at 9 PM earlier this week. He replied with a picture of a screen in a lecture hall where he was studying with a group of friends.

Not a huge deal to drive home- son knows his dad has a daily commute of 45 minutes each way and has ds's whole life.
 
Doubtful if you look at the whole cost:

Right now my daughter is in a dorm. It costs $2,392.50/semester, and her meal plan is $1,035/semester. Her total room and board is $6,855/year. Predictable, all-in-one cost. Furniture, utilities, housekeeping for the public areas included. She's happy, and she wanted to stay in her same dorm next year ... but she didn't make lottery, so we've been searching high and low for an apartment.

She and her roommate have found a two-bedroom apartment they like for $950/month (divided by two, of course); it's not a ghetto, but it's also not fancy -- it's a throwback to the 70s with two bedrooms /one bath /no washer and dryer in the unit. Most of the apartments in her college town run $1,100-1,200/month, and they seem to top out around $1,400/month. Anyway, you have to look at the numbers beyond the rent:

- When you rent an apartment, you're probably going to be forced to take a 12-month lease ... so my daughter will pay $5,700/year ... whereas the dorm would've been $4,785. Even if the OP's son intends to go home for the summer, he has to pay for the apartment year round.

- We are fairly concerned about taking on a 12-month lease because my daughter and her roommate will both be seniors next year. In their last semester, my daughter will be doing Fieldwork, and the roommate will be doing student teaching. Where will they be assigned? They're allowed to express a preference, but they may be assigned somewhere inconvenient for the apartment. Regardless of where they're assigned, they're committed to the apartment. Yes, hopefully they could sub-let, if things don't go their way, but they have no guarantee that would happen ... and sub-letters tend to pay less than the total rent. As I said, we're concerned ... but, having lost in the lottery, we're stuck.

- It's not just the rent: As I said, my daughter's in the middle of this right now. We had to pay a non-refundable $90 application fee and a $475 security fee, which the apartment will hold as long as they live in the complex. The roommate had to pay the $90 application fee as well, but I covered the security fee for them both (with the understanding that I get it back when they move out).

- Here's one you probably haven't considered, but we're in the midst of this problem right now: I expected to co-sign for my daughter; she has no credit. With me as co-signer, my daughter qualified for the apartment -- no problem. The roommate's parents, however, did not qualify. She's trying to find someone else to co-sign for her, but she may or may not manage to do this. If she fails, she's out the $90 application fee, and my daughter is committed to an apartment ... with the whole bill.

- The son may not be able to move in when he wishes. My daughter and her roommate need to move in mid-August just before classes start; however, the apartment complex says the apartment will be open mid-July. Their choice: Start paying rent mid-July, or go somewhere else.

- In addition to the rent, you'll have to pay utilities. Electricity, water, internet, possibly cable ... they'll add up. The apartment complex gave us a flyer with phone numbers for setting up utilities, and it states that the water department will not give college students service without a $200/security deposit, which they will keep for one year.

- You'll have to furnish the apartment. At first glance, you might say, "No problem! We were going to buy a new sofa anyway -- he can take the old one, his aunt will give him an old bed, and we'll pick up an old table at Goodwill." Yes, those are the big things, and you don't mind if he has old stuff ... but my daughter and I were just out picking up a few things for her apartment, and there's going to be more than you expect. We decided to go ahead and outfit her bathroom: She has towels, which we purchased for her dorm ... but she needed a shower curtain, liner, hooks, two small bath mats, a plunger, and soap dish -- it totaled to just over $60. Consider pots and pans, dishes and silverware, kitchen linens, lamps, a microwave, a vacuum cleaner ... even with cast-offs from family and/or thrift store purchases, it will add up. And you have to move it all.

- If you're looking at a roommate (and most college students are), you risk whether the roommate will pay his or her part of the rent and utilities.

- A couple people mentioned the time spent commuting /being distanced from campus activities. Consider, too, that when you drive to campus, you'll have to have a parking permit (which my daughter does not have now). At my daughter's school, these are about $600/year.

- This isn't a financial cost, but consider that your college student isn't doing any bathroom cleaning or cooking any meals in the dorms. Also, he isn't buying toilet paper, napkins, and other house hold goods. Consider the time /effort that goes into these things.

- Things look better when you look at the cost of food. As I said, I'm paying $1,035/semester for my daughter's meals. With 14 week semesters, this is about $73/week for food. Yes, she can cook meals for less ... or she can go through drive-throughs a couple times a week and spend more. But, yes, it's quite possible to save here.

Even if everything with this apartment goes perfectly, I am 100% certain we are going to pay more than $6,855 for her senior year housing.
Wow, that’s cheap. Coasts at state universities in Florida are much, much higher. Dorm and meal plan can run you 6000 a semester. All the student complexes here have individual leases, so you don’t have to worry about a flaky roommate.

I have one kid in dorm, one in off campus apartment. It works for them.
 
For kicks I looked up dorm and meal plan rates for my kids. Double occupancy dorms they were in before apartment is $3070 per semester. Their meal plan would be $2000.

Their rent is $325 and $75 for electricity. $50 per week for food and it's all cheaper and more comfortable than a dorm.

Oldest son gained the freshman 40-great food court type places on campus! But lost it all after moving off campus and cooking healthy.
 


If you have a place to store stuff over the summer, have your kid try watching around the dorms and student apartments near the end of the semester. A lot of graduating seniors are looking to get rid of stuff once they graduate. Some will just leave it on the curb, near apartment dumpsters, or in a dorm or apartment hallway. A friend of mine furnished most of her first apartment by letting it be known through the grapevine that she needed to furnish a whole apartment. Some of the stuff she paid for (but it much less than buying it from a store) but a lot of it she got for free. My dh got a free pool table that way too.
 
Doubtful if you look at the whole cost:

Right now my daughter is in a dorm. It costs $2,392.50/semester, and her meal plan is $1,035/semester. Her total room and board is $6,855/year. Predictable, all-in-one cost. Furniture, utilities, housekeeping for the public areas included. She's happy, and she wanted to stay in her same dorm next year ... but she didn't make lottery, so we've been searching high and low for an apartment.

She and her roommate have found a two-bedroom apartment they like for $950/month (divided by two, of course); it's not a ghetto, but it's also not fancy -- it's a throwback to the 70s with two bedrooms /one bath /no washer and dryer in the unit. Most of the apartments in her college town run $1,100-1,200/month, and they seem to top out around $1,400/month. Anyway, you have to look at the numbers beyond the rent:

- When you rent an apartment, you're probably going to be forced to take a 12-month lease ... so my daughter will pay $5,700/year ... whereas the dorm would've been $4,785. Even if the OP's son intends to go home for the summer, he has to pay for the apartment year round.

- We are fairly concerned about taking on a 12-month lease because my daughter and her roommate will both be seniors next year. In their last semester, my daughter will be doing Fieldwork, and the roommate will be doing student teaching. Where will they be assigned? They're allowed to express a preference, but they may be assigned somewhere inconvenient for the apartment. Regardless of where they're assigned, they're committed to the apartment. Yes, hopefully they could sub-let, if things don't go their way, but they have no guarantee that would happen ... and sub-letters tend to pay less than the total rent. As I said, we're concerned ... but, having lost in the lottery, we're stuck.

- It's not just the rent: As I said, my daughter's in the middle of this right now. We had to pay a non-refundable $90 application fee and a $475 security fee, which the apartment will hold as long as they live in the complex. The roommate had to pay the $90 application fee as well, but I covered the security fee for them both (with the understanding that I get it back when they move out).

- Here's one you probably haven't considered, but we're in the midst of this problem right now: I expected to co-sign for my daughter; she has no credit. With me as co-signer, my daughter qualified for the apartment -- no problem. The roommate's parents, however, did not qualify. She's trying to find someone else to co-sign for her, but she may or may not manage to do this. If she fails, she's out the $90 application fee, and my daughter is committed to an apartment ... with the whole bill.

- The son may not be able to move in when he wishes. My daughter and her roommate need to move in mid-August just before classes start; however, the apartment complex says the apartment will be open mid-July. Their choice: Start paying rent mid-July, or go somewhere else.

- In addition to the rent, you'll have to pay utilities. Electricity, water, internet, possibly cable ... they'll add up. The apartment complex gave us a flyer with phone numbers for setting up utilities, and it states that the water department will not give college students service without a $200/security deposit, which they will keep for one year.

- You'll have to furnish the apartment. At first glance, you might say, "No problem! We were going to buy a new sofa anyway -- he can take the old one, his aunt will give him an old bed, and we'll pick up an old table at Goodwill." Yes, those are the big things, and you don't mind if he has old stuff ... but my daughter and I were just out picking up a few things for her apartment, and there's going to be more than you expect. We decided to go ahead and outfit her bathroom: She has towels, which we purchased for her dorm ... but she needed a shower curtain, liner, hooks, two small bath mats, a plunger, and soap dish -- it totaled to just over $60. Consider pots and pans, dishes and silverware, kitchen linens, lamps, a microwave, a vacuum cleaner ... even with cast-offs from family and/or thrift store purchases, it will add up. And you have to move it all.

- If you're looking at a roommate (and most college students are), you risk whether the roommate will pay his or her part of the rent and utilities.

- A couple people mentioned the time spent commuting /being distanced from campus activities. Consider, too, that when you drive to campus, you'll have to have a parking permit (which my daughter does not have now). At my daughter's school, these are about $600/year.

- This isn't a financial cost, but consider that your college student isn't doing any bathroom cleaning or cooking any meals in the dorms. Also, he isn't buying toilet paper, napkins, and other house hold goods. Consider the time /effort that goes into these things.

- Things look better when you look at the cost of food. As I said, I'm paying $1,035/semester for my daughter's meals. With 14 week semesters, this is about $73/week for food. Yes, she can cook meals for less ... or she can go through drive-throughs a couple times a week and spend more. But, yes, it's quite possible to save here.

Even if everything with this apartment goes perfectly, I am 100% certain we are going to pay more than $6,855 for her senior year housing.

Oh, they exist -- my girls attend school in one of those great towns where the university and the town blend together, and everything revolves around students -- but those "student-centric" apartments are the ones at the top of the cost spectrum. Even if I had been willing to pay $700/month in rent alone (for just my girl's share), those places were already full by the time my daughter realized she didn't make lottery.

No, after a very extensive search, we didn't encounter a single place that offered anything except a 12-month lease. They were all very "screw you" on that topic; in fact, as I said above, we are required to start paying rent a month earlier than my daughter needs the apartment. If we were looking in the spring semester, we might have luck with sub-letting.

Yes, some of those at the top of the price list do come furnished. One place we spoke to offered a furnished option, but it cost $35/roommate/month -- that's crazy expensive. That same place wanted another $50/month for a parking space (in their defense, it was underground /covered parking, and my girls go to school in a snowy location.
I don't know that all college parents consider all the extras that come along with a college apartment. For example, I never considered that the roommate wouldn't be able to get a co-signer.
Yep, that was my main point: Do the math. Do the whole math (okay, that was poorly worded, but you know what I mean).

As for the "your area" part, it's absolutely true that prices vary widely across the US ... but I assume that where dorms are high, apartments are also high. And vice-versa.
See, this is what I'm talking about.

In the month since we learned we would be leasing an apartment, we've already jumped on furnishing her apartment ... and we're already halfway to "a couple hundred". We're giving her an old sofa out of our house, and my mother gave her a ratty old table she had in her storage building ... but we spent $40 on sandpaper and turquoise paint for the table ... we bought bathroom stuff yesterday that was over $50 ... she needs a bed; I've "put the word out", but no one seems to be getting rid of one. She has a decent amount of kitchen goods, but she has no glasses, no sharp knives, and no kitchen linens. We'll be going to Goodwill frequently this summer, and we're not looking for too much since she'll only be in the place a year ... but we'll need to rent something to get the furniture to her apartment (we'll probably donate it to the local Goodwill instead of bringing it home). No, a couple hundred will not furnish the place.

Yes, typically a roommate would bring stuff, but my daughter's roommate -- while wonderfully suited to her in temperament -- doesn't have much in the way of family resources, and I'm willing to take on the lion's share of the furnishing for her sake.
Eh, kinda. 15 minutes for an adult's commute is nothing, but 15 minutes for a college student is a different ball game. Adults tend to go to work and stay all day. A college student may have two classes in the morning, then need to return for an evening class or social event. That's what makes living on campus so convenient.
If I'd realized my kids would all attend the same college, I might have considered purchasing a condo in their college town -- but it is (for our state) a pretty expensive area.
This is almost exactly the life we've been living for the past year with DS. Even though on paper it seemed to make sense, there have been more costs than we anticipated, seemingly at every turn. (Not unlike everything else in our high COL area!) His lease is year round, too, from July, so everything had to be in place by June. Twice this year we've gotten eviction threats due to some of the roommates not doing what they were supposed to do when they were supposed to do it (often due to miscommunication between students and parents, or students and rental agency, etc.; everyone's been good overall). Recently they had the gall to charge DS a nightly parking fee when his car was in the shop and he had to borrow another - this on top of already paying a monthly parking fee. Attempts to rectify were useless. We also all pitched in for a washer and dryer and the washer broke a while ago, I'm not even sure if it ever got fixed. A couple more months and we're done with that, as DS prefers to commute again for his last year. There are definitely pros and cons to each. A pp mentioned how by senior year these kids on the home stretch. I agree, mine are looking forward to finishing up and beginning their careers at this point.
 
Cost for DS was more or less a wash; the dorm was more $$ per month because it only covered 10 months and we had to pay for a storage unit over breaks, but he does live on less for food, but that's because he mostly lives on ramen. (He actually loves it, has no issue eating it 3X day.) Dorm included utilities and most importantly: internet. Off-campus his standard utilities are very low for his 500 sq.ft., but the internet is steep. Since he goes to school in Florida, I furnished his off-campus apt. mostly from a hotel surplus warehouse. (Major bargain on beds there.) Kitchen things were Grandmas; she died during his senior year in HS, so he inherited lots of small housewares, towels, sheets, etc. He doesn't have his own car; he gets around by bike.

(Interesting conversation I had with his GF last year: she moved off campus to a large complex that is a 30 minute commute away, but her job is right near campus as well. DS lives in a small place very near campus that I found for him, and she asked why I targeted little buildings instead of large complexes. Easy answer: no car. The only big complexes near campus are luxury high-rises, so that was out, but going further afield meant taking on the cost of maintaining a car for him, too. Small buildings were the best option, and his rent, while high, is not insane for the area: it's $800/mo. (I would have preferred him having a roommate, but DH has always been willing to pay the extra to get him a private space. DH lived at home until grad school and never shared; the very idea horrifies him. Me, I grew up sharing a bed with a sister, so a roommate was no big deal. I shared a bedroom with a housemate until grad school.)

I think it's pretty normal to send a kid's bedroom furniture to an off-campus apartment if it's close enough to drive a rental truck to; once off campus with that lease they will probably not be taking summers off school anymore, or at least not going back home to work.

One thing to keep in mind if older kids really wish to stay in dorms as upperclassmen: look into working as an RA.

PS: Disney-related humor in this scenario: I knew DS liked the apartment that I found for him, but just to be sure, I asked him which style of building he liked better, his or his GF's?
His answer was, "Mom, ASMovies is fine for a few days when I'm at the parks, but I don't want to actually live in it." (Referencing the idea of a large complex of blocky buildings that is easy to get lost in -- not the theming, LOL.)
 
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Oh, they exist -- my girls attend school in one of those great towns where the university and the town blend together, and everything revolves around students -- but those "student-centric" apartments are the ones at the top of the cost spectrum. Even if I had been willing to pay $700/month in rent alone (for just my girl's share), those places were already full by the time my daughter realized she didn't make lottery.

No, after a very extensive search, we didn't encounter a single place that offered anything except a 12-month lease. They were all very "screw you" on that topic; in fact, as I said above, we are required to start paying rent a month earlier than my daughter needs the apartment. If we were looking in the spring semester, we might have luck with sub-letting.

Yes, some of those at the top of the price list do come furnished. One place we spoke to offered a furnished option, but it cost $35/roommate/month -- that's crazy expensive. That same place wanted another $50/month for a parking space (in their defense, it was underground /covered parking, and my girls go to school in a snowy location.
I don't know that all college parents consider all the extras that come along with a college apartment. For example, I never considered that the roommate wouldn't be able to get a co-signer.
Yep, that was my main point: Do the math. Do the whole math (okay, that was poorly worded, but you know what I mean).

As for the "your area" part, it's absolutely true that prices vary widely across the US ... but I assume that where dorms are high, apartments are also high. And vice-versa.
See, this is what I'm talking about.

In the month since we learned we would be leasing an apartment, we've already jumped on furnishing her apartment ... and we're already halfway to "a couple hundred". We're giving her an old sofa out of our house, and my mother gave her a ratty old table she had in her storage building ... but we spent $40 on sandpaper and turquoise paint for the table ... we bought bathroom stuff yesterday that was over $50 ... she needs a bed; I've "put the word out", but no one seems to be getting rid of one. She has a decent amount of kitchen goods, but she has no glasses, no sharp knives, and no kitchen linens. We'll be going to Goodwill frequently this summer, and we're not looking for too much since she'll only be in the place a year ... but we'll need to rent something to get the furniture to her apartment (we'll probably donate it to the local Goodwill instead of bringing it home). No, a couple hundred will not furnish the place.

Yes, typically a roommate would bring stuff, but my daughter's roommate -- while wonderfully suited to her in temperament -- doesn't have much in the way of family resources, and I'm willing to take on the lion's share of the furnishing for her sake.
Eh, kinda. 15 minutes for an adult's commute is nothing, but 15 minutes for a college student is a different ball game. Adults tend to go to work and stay all day. A college student may have two classes in the morning, then need to return for an evening class or social event. That's what makes living on campus so convenient.
If I'd realized my kids would all attend the same college, I might have considered purchasing a condo in their college town -- but it is (for our state) a pretty expensive area.
HS students here pay $50 a month to park in the municipal lot three blocks from school, not a bad deal considering its $100 a month for 24/7.
 
It really is different all over. DD is in an apartment complex which is about a half-mile off campus, but is for college students only. Her apartment has five beds/2.5 baths. The leases are all individual, so if one person backs out, it doesn't change the cost for the other girls. If one of them leaves, they are given an opportunity to fill the room with someone they know. But, if not, the apartment will fill the spot. It's not a super nice apartment complex. It's seen some wear and tear, but it's close to campus, clean, and suits their needs.
The lease is annual and still cheaper than the dorm. Room and board fees for the 9 months school year was $12,000. The apartment for a year was $5,000; and food is costing her about $40-50/week or $2,600 a year.
She was able to get a research job on campus this summer which is an opportunity that would have been costly or impossible if we had been forced to find/add living expenses for the summer months.
She has a car. But, she mainly uses it to go shopping and come home. There is a bus that runs regularly from campus to the apartment complex. She uses that most of the time so she didn't have to get an on-campus parking pass.
 
We were less concerned with saving and more concerned with getting DD into a more comfortable living situation. Dorm living was fun for about 6 weeks and then she hated the constant activity, noise, cramped space, and the food truly was terrible.

Room and board at her University was about $12,000 per year so we gave her a budget of $1,000 per month for rent and groceries. She was able to find beautiful new apartments right downtown next to campus for right at $700 per month.
 
Next year my dd is moving off campus into a student only apartment complex. Each student has an individual lease so if her friend doesn't pay her rent it won't effect dd. 12 month lease at $875/mo. Students can stay in their apartments during all breaks too.
Right now we are paying $14,428 for room and board at school. Dorms close during all breaks and are obviously not open in the summer. That is quite a difference in cost, and even if dd spends $4K on food during the year it is still a better option for really establishing independence, plus she'll have her own bathroom and she can have pets :laughing:
 
Next year my dd is moving off campus into a student only apartment complex. Each student has an individual lease so if her friend doesn't pay her rent it won't effect dd. 12 month lease at $875/mo. Students can stay in their apartments during all breaks too.
Right now we are paying $14,428 for room and board at school. Dorms close during all breaks and are obviously not open in the summer. That is quite a difference in cost, and even if dd spends $4K on food during the year it is still a better option for really establishing independence, plus she'll have her own bathroom and she can have pets :laughing:

This is exactly the type situation DD22 lived in for 3 years at college. The year round lease was actually an additional benefit for DD.

We live in a small city (100,000ish). Her college was in a major metro area. She had to move home after freshman year and a summer job was not easy to find and there was nothing that would advance her future job search.

Once she had the year round lease, she was able to stay in the college town after sophomore and junior year. She was able to work some at her school year job over the summer but most importantly, she was able to get internships that added some good padding to her resume and give her some great professional experience. It no doubt helped her job search last Spring.
 
Our son will be staying in on-campus housing all four years. He was in the freshman dorms last year, and upperclassman dorms this year (a bit of a step-up with 4 sharing sharing a bathroom rather than a communal bathroom for the whole floor). Most of his friends are moving off campus for their junior year. We have several reasons for keeping him on campus, and he agrees. We live 2500 from his school. Driving back and forth with furniture is not an option. Even having us fly out multiple times to help him apartment hunt, buy furniture, etc. is quite expensive. He performs in at least one show on campus per semester. That means rehearsals every night plus Saturdays, and 11 performances over a two-week period. It's better if he can get to his room quickly to eat, shower, change, etc. before shows and rehearsals. He does not have a car at school, nor does he want one. On-campus parking permits are expensive and he doesn't want the hassle of driving to and from campus each day. He uses Uber to get around, or pitches in for gas when friends drive him places. He's already set next year for an on-campus apartment. The complex is owned and operated by the university. He'll be in a 4-bedroom, 4-bath with 3 other guys he knows. They'll share a kitchen, living room and will have their own washer/dryer. The place comes fully-furnished, so we just need to send sheets, towels, etc., same as the dorms. We can toss in extra kitchen equipment if they want something special. The complex is right at the edge of campus and very close to the theater department where he spends most of his time. It's also near a dining hall, so we're going to get him the minimal dining plan so he can still eat some meals on campus. He's looking forward to getting out of dorm life next year!
 
It’s interesting to hear people refer to a 15min drive as a commute. That’s a run up to the grocery store here. My DD would kill for 15mins each way. As it is it’s 30-40mins depending on time of day. The price of living at home I guess. Even if she lived out that way she’d have a similar commute for everything else.

She does try to schedule her classes in clusters within the same time frame and her boss tries to schedule her so that she can leave from one to the other without too much of a gap. She did have a semester where there was a two hour gap but so did her classmates. They’d go to the library to study or work on a project, have lunch on campus or go to the gym. She didn’t love it but she didn’t hate it.

OP, I think if it works for your son then go for it.

lol I know!

Like I said upthread, we lived in the rural area that the new campus is near until DS18 was in 5th grade, and it was 10-15 minutes just to get to the smattering of retail big box stores at the freeway. We did have a small "grocery store" about 2 miles away that we could run into and pick up a forgotten loaf of bread or gallon of milk here and there, but it wasn't really big enough to do a full-on grocery shopping for a family of 5. Walmart? 20 miles away. Costco? a good 30 min drive. We would go once a month. My work was 45 min-1 hour, and DH commuted over 90 minutes to the big city. A 15 minute drive was like never leaving the neighborhood lol

We live in a very large city now, and 15 minutes will get you about a 1.5 miles drive during rush hour, if that. DS learned to drive here....so a 15 minute drive to a campus in a medium-sized city that's surrounded by woods and cornfields is like a walk in the park for him after learning how to battle (real) city traffic.

The apartment complex that we found is on the east side of the area (we were on the southwest side, so pretty much opposite direction!), and near the freeway, so it's an easy on/easy off, plus the area is a little more built up than it was before. There is a Walmart Supercenter near him, and a Target an exit away, plus a bunch of fast food/casual dining places. Not much in terms of nightlife, which we like, and he is used to (and craved since we moved from that area 9 years ago) the peace and quiet of "country living". It's the biggest reason he decided on that school to begin with - so he could go back "home", which he has missed dearly ever since we moved.
 
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Wow, that’s cheap. Coasts at state universities in Florida are much, much higher.
For kicks I looked up dorm and meal plan rates for my kids. Double occupancy dorms they were in before apartment is $3070 per semester. Their meal plan would be $2000.
Yeah, I know I live in the land of low prices ... but also low wages. Regardless, I don't think it matters; wherever you live, dorms and apartments are likely to either both be cheap ... or both be expensive.

This would only be an issue if you live in a low-cost area and send your child to a high-cost area for college. Or vice-versa.
If you have a place to store stuff over the summer, have your kid try watching around the dorms and student apartments near the end of the semester. A lot of graduating seniors are looking to get rid of stuff once they graduate.
Yeah, in theory this works great, but in reality my daughter will move out of her dorm in May ... and won't have an apartment until July. To take advantage of the free stuff that's tossed out, we'd have to rent a van to bring it home ... then rent it again to return it 2 1/2 hours to her college town. Or rent a storage building for it. Either way, if you're moving into a first apartment, cast-off from graduates isn't likely to work out well.
One thing to keep in mind if older kids really wish to stay in dorms as upperclassmen: look into working as an RA.
That's what I did. Not because I was in love with the idea of staying in a freshman dorm, but I was a poor kid, and the RA job gave me a free private room, 50% off in-state tuition, 50% off meal plan, and a paid phone. No cash money, but it's really one of the things that got me through college. I loved that job, and we were always invited to this or that activity or meal -- I did a lot of things I couldn't have afforded on my own (white water rafting, lazer tag, nice meals). Of course, bad things can happen too: a stranger came to my floor and committed suicide, and I was the one who had to call in the police, keep residents calm, etc.

Incidentally, I saw a bulletin board advertising for next year's RA in the lobby of my daughter's dorm. It seems that now they pay money, but it seemed to be about the same amount of compensation ... the money is about 50% the cost of total attendance.
This is almost exactly the life we've been living for the past year with DS. Even though on paper it seemed to make sense, there have been more costs than we anticipated, seemingly at every turn.
And that is my point exactly. If you and your student think an apartment is a better choice, great -- but I'm not convinced at all that it's a budget choice.
 
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On the subject of "free stuff" being tossed out by graduating students, you would be amazed at what you can find when it is a really wealthy private school. I live near one, and a lot of the kids there have more money than they know what to do with, AND live very far from here; quite a few from NYC and Northern California. They were tossing out such nice items that local dumpster divers were haunting the near-campus alleys for things to sell on Craigslist. The University got wise to it, and now they collect all this stuff from their students and have a big charity sale every spring. I know someone (an adult, not a 20-something) who furnished his newly redone basement family room that way (among other things, he got a steal on a full-sized billiards table.)
 
It’s funny, I’m guessing because of the traffic here, but driving 15 minutes to a grocery store seems pretty far, but a half hour commute seems very short. There are many large grocery stores within a few miles from me, but most people I know have at least a 45 minute commute to work (and many more than an hour to and from NYC, 10 miles away).
 
My college only had dorms for freshman and transfer students, so everyone had to live in apartments after freshman year. It was fine. Made me realize early on how to pay utility bills, deal with roommates, etc. It was a good experience and far cheaper than dorm living. People still had parties, but nothing crazy.
 
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