Living Accommodation Help

[Guest All Good Names are Used]

Hello fellow Albertans,

 

I've got a slight problem! I put my name in for residence at the U of A for the upcoming school year. The problem is is that they say that if I dont hold my spot by paying rent for july and august chances are good I wont have a place to stay at all. This seems odd not only because I feel like i'd be waisting money but because I wont even find out until July whether or not i'm even accepted to U of A! If anyone can give me any recommendations it would be greatly appreciated!

 

AGNAU

[Guest summervirus]

Residence often has a long waiting list.

 

Here is my suggestion. It's only a suggestion. I was in a similar situation too when I first moved into Newton Place. So, what I did was I applied to move-in in September. But, in late June, when my plans were confirmed, I phoned up the housing office and asked them to change my move-in to August to increase my chances of getting a spot. (There is no fee or penalty for changing your move-in date). If the move-in date is August, then they would have to tell me if I have a spot or not one month in advance (i.e. July).

 

I happened to get a spot for August. If, however, by the first few days of July, they didn't offer me a spot, I was prepared to look for accomodations somewhere else. It would have given me 2 months before the start of school, which is enough time to find a good place.

[Guest chemgirl]

Hello there,

I just wanted to recommend that if you are looking at newton place, another great (non-res) place to look at is Concord Tower on 82 ave. and 111 Street (780-433-1676). It is similarly priced to newton place, a bit more expensive (one bedrooms are $690 and up, not sure of the price on bachelors) but it is renovated and has a dishwasher

 

I lived in newton place for two years and concord for two years, unfortunately I had to move out this past month, it is too pricey for me without the double income that we will lose in the fall, so I just wanted to offer that suggestion to you. I found my current place on the housing registry, the url is http://www.rentingspaces.ca and it will ask you to select which school you are going to.

 

ETA: Woops, I just saw that you are looking more for advice on what to do with residences since you are not sure if you have been accepted yet. I don't have much to add on that front except for what summervirus said, but I'll leave my (irrelevant) advice up here in case it will help anyone else looking for a place, I know how stressful it can be.

[Guest klukyboy]

This is a common problem in the university area, even with non-res housing. Many landlords help out existing graduating students by allowing them to get out of some of the summer portion of their lease by forcing new occupants to move in early.

 

There are a couple spots opening up in our house for September. It's not as close as Newton Place (tough to beat across the street), but it's still walking distance to the hospital. Rent is cheap (~#385/mo, all util included). If you're interested, PM me and I'll give you more details and contact info for my landlady.

[Guest All Good Names are Used]

Thanks for the help!

 

 

AGNAU