"The battle" between halls of residence and private apartments (Price and quality of life)

In my last article, I explained what you needed to do once you had been given an Erasmus placement for the upcoming year (check it out here); The last point I made was on the topic of accommodation. This point likely left you with an over-arching worry about making a rather quick decision between renting aprivate apartment or a room in a hall of residence. Since I'm living in a hall of residence in the Polish city of Łódź and I also know several people who are currently renting an apartment in the same city, I thought I'd give you the advantages and disadvantages of each of these options, a "battle" of accommodation, if you will. We'll scour the battlefield to find every advantage and disadvantage to help us clarify the winner.

Of coursethe thoughts and opinions given here won't be deal-breakers or clinchers for everyone, sinceeveryone has different priorities. Howver, I'll hopefully explain each point in an objective way (pfff we all know objectivity is a complicated subject) so that everyone can make their own minds up about how important they consider each thing to be.

Before beginning this next battle, I should mention that the contract we sign with the University when we accept our Erasmus placement specifies very clearly that "it is the responsibility of the student to find accommodation for the duration of their Erasmus stay". Though, of course, it also refers to help that can be found from the various Universities. So, without further ado... here are the fundamental points that will help you arm yourself during this... "battle":

1. Price:

Halls of residence: as a rule of thumb, the price of living in a student hall will be cheaper than that of an apartment.

How much will the difference be? It all depends on the halls of residence and apartment you're looking at, , but if we consider a typical twin room in a hall, and sharing an 70m2 apartment with two others; you may pay about 100 euros more for the apartment, so you might end up paying a lot more than you would for a room in a hall of residence.

For me, in the Erasmus city of Łódź, a room in the halls cost 85 euros, whereas an apartment meeting the description of the one given above cost about 200 euros, and that's at the absolute cheapest. That's to say, it costs more than double what the hall of residence does.

Apartment: generally more expensive, you can find bargains worth taking a look at if you think you'd prefer this option.

What's the trick? When it comes to finding a well-priced apartment, including those with prices which more or less match those on offer in the different halls of residence in your destination city, there are basically three tricks to follow:

The area: the worse the area, the lower the price You can, of course, find some apartments in a not-so-bad an area for a pretty good price. However, bargains are few and far between and the only chance you might have of paying less than you would for a halls of residence, is getting an apartment in the so-called "pits" of the city. That's to say, if you live in one of these areas, you should probably treat your neighbours with a lot of respect. I repeat, I'm talking generally here, and of course there are exceptions.

-Condition of the apartment : if the condition of the apartment is very bad, rest assured this will be reflected in the price. If you find a spacious apartment, in a good area with a price that seems unusually low, it's more than likely because of the condition of its interior. Go and look at it, but don't be surprised if the bed is older than you are, the cupboards are "somewhat distressed" or if it actually comes with no furniture at all. All this will of course cause the price to drop exponentially, but it still might be as cheap as a residence.

But don't forget something that can also make a difference is the fact that while the residence normally includes light, heating and water bills in the price, apartments normally only include water at best. So you'll have to add on the cost of bills to the price you pay each month. Your monthly expenses can rise considerably if you're one of those people who take half an hour in the shower or who feel the cold easily and have the heating on inside everyday. In fact, this could be your downfall. If you're someone who's quite wasteful, or perhaps "clueless" is a better word, then my advice would no doubt be to choose a hall of residence, unless you have enough money to afford to pay 400-500 euros a month for your living costs.

Score out of ten for this aspect?

Residence 9 vs apartment 5

2. Quality of life:

What do I mean by quality of life?

Well I've considered lots of aspects of living. Quality of life doesn't just include the things we have to enjoy our home, though these things are, of course, a part of it. It also includes things such as being able to be alone in our room and forget about the world outside, or simply being able to talk quietly with our partners, and being able to do these things without any issues.

I've also included things like being able to enjoy various appliances such as a refrigerator, TV, microwave, oven, or simply not having to share a bathroom with a lot of people.

Residence: clearly at a disadvantage compared to an apartment. Let's see why.

negative reasons? The reasons become obvious as soon as we enter our residence room. Let's take the standard room shared with one room mate as an example; at first glance we'll notice that you can't fit a ping pong table in there even though you've played tetris your whole life. No one's saying that your quality of life is dependant on you having a ping pong table, of course it's not. But I'm bringing it up as an example of how much space you'll have, there's no room for a ping pong table in this sort of room. In fact, if you have two beds, a wardrobe and a desk in your room, consider yourself lucky if you can walk from one side of the room to the other without having to contort your body to squeeze past the furniture. If you happen to be a messy person, this will be easily seen in a residence where there's little existing space.

On the other hand, if you have a friend who's a bit like an extra room mate and spends twenty hours tucked away in your room, just like my friendly Polish neighbors, then there's more of an issue when it comes to space, and also a problem in terms of privacy. You can forget about having intimate conversations with your partner or chatting freely with you parents. Maybe you'll be able to once or twice, but believe me it will always be near enough impossible, so it's better to just accept it and cut your conversations a bit short, otherwise someone might end up hearing something they shouldn't or start listening in on your partner's conversations (honestly, it might be more than one person listening, too).

Also, if you don't get along well with your assigned room mate, you'll hardly be able to avoid them. You don't usually get to choose who you live with, you just get given a room mate and there you go.

Finally, with regard to the quality of life in a hall of residence I must say that forget about having a microwave, oven or television. If you get a refrigerator then rejoice, because not everyone enjoys this "luxury". Again, it puts the residence at a disadvantage, although there are also positive things regarding the quality of life in a hall of residence.

Positive things about residence with respect to quality of life?

- Everything is closer: are you lazy? Perfect, because living in a residence you won't have to put a lot of effort into be able to catch public transport or do things. I mean, you can get the clothes you're going to wear, chat with friends and make breakfast all from the same bed. The key is to strategically place your bed between the fridge, closet and desk. If you have a bathroom nearby then you could even pee without leaving your bed; everything is possible with just ten square meters.

- Your voice will remain intact: you won't have to shout too much to get your room mates attention, or the attention of someone across the hall. What's more, being wall to wall with your neighbors means that you can get hold of them with a simple "knock knock". Also if you're someone who likes everyone else to hear your most intimate moments, then it's all good, because half the residence can hear you if you're one of those people who make quite a lot of noise (you or your partner). In fact, you could even call the downstairs neighbor to come up with a pre-discussed password and a pair of slippers on the floor. Quick and efficient, no question.

- cleaning: say goodbye to cleaning the floor once a week and getting tired when you sweep the house. In fact, in as little as five minutes, everything will be ship-shape. As its only ten square metres big, you don't have to worry all that much about how it looks to be honest. Maybe you'll have to make the bed every day, because if you have people over they'll see you've not made it (but if you don't care then it's all good, right?) and that you have stuff everywhere. But doesn't take long to tidy up, so there are more advantages than disadvantages in this respect. What about the dust? The dust.... pfff in such a small house, there's almost no space for dust to accumulate, so you'll probably only have to dust the shelves once or twice a year.... which isn't bad at all.

What about the quality of life in an apartment?

Well we'll take a look at that in the next post, this one is getting a bit long and readers will appreciate a change of page.

To be continued...

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