Tips for Students Moving into Halls of Residence

By Student Cribs | June 14, 2023 | Reading Time: 5 minutes

Congratulations! You have secured your place at uni and have moved onto the next step. Finding student accommodation. With many questions pondering through your head such as…

Do I choose ensuite or brave shared?
What the hell do I bring?
Do I work or not?
Help!

No fear, this article will cover the basics on what you need to know to ensure the best year of your life is smooth-going.

Ensuite or shared?

During my experience, this was the topic that clouded my head and everybody elses!  

Choose ensuite and enjoy the luxury of having your own toilet and privacy, but suffer the consequences when you pay the steep rent.  Choose shared and embrace the social aspect and money saving costs, but suffer the risk of living with messy flatmates.

Typically, with shared accommodation the bedroom will be bigger, thanks to not having the ensuite. However, with ensuite there will be no fighting over who gets the shower first in the morning. Nonetheless, the battle continues so draw up your own preferences, match it with your budget and voila, that should help.

How to make friends

Regardless of how much of a social butterfly you are, it is normally quite daunting moving somewhere new, especially if you have travelled hundreds of miles and nobody knows who you are (que tragic violin music).

The golden secret? Leave your door open. This is a friendly way of saying:

“I want to make friends, you want to make friends, let’s say hi!”

Create a facebook or whatsapp group chat with everyone involved, and suggest nights out together, dinners and trips to McDonald’s if you’re feeling lazy.

How to spend your money wisely

OK so flying the nest also means finding out the shock horror of how expensive cheese is. And it sucks.

To delay this, what I can advise is to look at how much student loan you are getting and what is left over after paying rent, bills and any additional outgoings. Whatever is left over you can allocate to your weekly food shop, nights out (obviously) and anything else.
Sometimes, I would get £30 and that would last me the week. By the way, £30 in student economy is worth like £5 million. Honestly.

To job or not to job…Unfortunately, a student loan cannot help with every excessive expenditure. If budgeting ahead has scared you and your bank account senseless. Consider a part-time job in your area to keep your finances afloat. Like everything, there are pros and cons. Pros to being hired is ordering Jӓger Bombs with ease. Cons can be balancing those dreaded assignments with work. Luckily enough, StudentJob lists plenty of flexible jobs meaning you can still attend those 9am lectures (well try to, anyway).

Do you bring everything including the kitchen sink?

2019 has already started and if you’re reading this, then good on you for being one step ahead! However, students are known for being procrastinators, meaning come August you will be running around the house trying to cram everything into boxes.Best advice? Write a list, divide it into sections of rooms you will need to furnish. For example, if you are moving into halls of residence you will need things for the kitchen, bathroom and obviously your bedroom. B&M will be your lord and mighty saviour when it comes to buying cheap furnishings. FYI, most things will end up being lost, broken or stolen, so keep the spending to the bare minimum.

Megan is an Online Marketer at StudentJob UK. Looking for a job to fund your student lifestyle? Register for your free candidate profile now.

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