<p>Hey I was wondering if anyone is planning to live off campus, or currently does? Does anyone have any suggestions on where would be a good place to live? I'm looking for something relatively social, obviously close to campus, and where I could have my own room. Thanks!</p>
<p>help please!</p>
<p>Have you asked on the Berkeley FB group page? Current students at Cal are pretty helpful in answering questions about housing there. </p>
<p>Co-ops
<a href=“http://www.bsc.coop/”>http://www.bsc.coop/</a></p>
<p>disregard the message if you are rich, if that is the case live wherever you want</p>
<p>@Dagoberto </p>
<p>No I’m definitely not rich. I would be a little worried about it making it hard to study if I lived in co-ops. Do you have some type of experience with these?</p>
<p>@music1990 I have a friend who lived in the co-ops for 3 years. He hated it his first year (mad real world) because he did not get along with his housemates. the other years he had great and lived in the apartments and had great roomates. It all depends where you are assigned. </p>
<p>The co-ops look so weird, honestly. Lol someone on here mentioned that they were told it’s going to be hard to focus on your studies if you live in the co-ops. I think it was @socaltransfer</p>
<p>Hope you guys don’t mind me crashing the party but I was wondering if anyone has insight on on-campus housing. If I go to Cal I plan on living on campus for the first year but I’ve heard some of the dorms aren’t that great and that I could potentially get housed with first years… Anyone have any insight/advice?</p>
<p>Thanks :D</p>
<p>@AnthroFlo </p>
<p>I’m still considering on campus too. I filled out the application last night. Some of the on campus apartments (well technically they’re off campus, but they’re university owned) are for upper division students. I’m going to wait and see if I get a room I can live with. Otherwise I’m living off campus.</p>
<p>@AnthroFlo The apartment-dorms are pretty nice, if you can get into those I’d say go for it. Unless you find something else cheap/nice near campus. I’d say put in a housing app and see where they put you. If you get Wada/Martinez, great. If you end up somewhere else, re-weigh your options then… see what else is open, compare costs and space, etc.</p>
<p>Not sure what’s the point of paying $1000-1100/month without food for dorms/university apartments and live in the same room with somebody else. For this money, it’s a complete rip-off. You can get a single room for $800-1000/month outside campus. The advantages living outside campus are huge:
- You’re not going to be kicked out during winter/summer (sometimes 12 hours after your finals). Yes, you’ll need to pack up all your stuff and ■■■■.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>You are going to have your own room, and a private bath</p></li>
<li><p>You are going to have a kitchen (some university apartments have this as well).</p></li>
<li><p>You don’t have to buy meal plan(s) (some university apartments have this as well).</p></li>
<li><p>You are your own BOSS, and there are no RAs to tell you what you can or can’t do in your room.</p></li>
<li><p>For sure more quite environment suitable for studying (or sleeping, which is more important).</p></li>
</ol>
<p>@Moshe1010 Playing devil’s advocate, just for the sake of it…</p>
<p>Chances of finding a one bedroom/studio for that price are pretty low. Someone else linked to this the other day: <a href=“https://calrentals.housing.berkeley.edu/flyers/Typical_Rent.asp”>https://calrentals.housing.berkeley.edu/flyers/Typical_Rent.asp</a>
It’s also much less hassle than trying to find off campus housing, and you know the rooms are nice and safe. You also get furniture with it, great internet, and cleaning/maintenance services.</p>
<p>And you’re not stuck paying for an apartment all summer if you’re not living on campus. This is the time of year when many students are scrambling to find subletters, and if they don’t they still owe rent whether they’re in Berkeley or not.</p>
<p>RA/roommates can be a good thing, too. I didn’t know anyone when I first got here, and the idea of living alone was kinda scary. And then I ended up with a nightmare roommate anyways… but having an RA and campus housing meant I wasn’t left to deal with it alone. Off campus housing, your options are to deal with it or to break out of the contract and move somewhere else. But having roommates/floormates means you get new friends, and sometimes study buddies that live right next door. I haven’t heard many stories of students in non-campus housing making friends with their neighbors.</p>
<p>Kitchen, no meal points, and private(ish) bathroom are definitely a plus, the apartment-dorms have those too. :P</p>
<p>So, depends on what you’re looking for. But I think both are viable options.</p>
<p>Late 1970s-mid 1980s, I lived northside on corner of Euclid and Le Conte, a block from campus, one bedroom. Rent was $150. </p>
<p>Read it and weep. </p>
<p>Ok @lindyk8 - You know you’re my new buddy, BUT… Let’s compare apples to apples. In 1978 the minimum wage in CA was $2.65, vs today at $9.00 (which goes into affect July 1). Comparatively it was still cheaper back then, but I just wanted to throw that out there :)) </p>
<p>Great, I’m glad my thread got revived. Thanks for all the answers everyone, it really helps. Feel free to continue to respond because I love reading all the different input.</p>
<p>@failure622 You’re more than welcome to check CL and you’ll see that most of the prices for an apartment up to 5 blocks from campus is around $700-900/month (not a sublet, but for the entire year).</p>
<p>@Moshe1010 </p>
<p>Do you have experience with any of these apartments? Any recommendations or anything? Thanks.</p>
<p>Yeah @2016Candles, but I got in right after a citywide rent rollback and freeze went into effect. Standard rents should have been about $250, but some greedy landlords were getting $400, so the rollback. I was in a building, a cliche: it was owned by a little old lady who was undercharging. She got the shaft. I started at $150, a few months later the rollback. Mine went to about $135 and they could only increase by a very small fraction yearly, so when I left about 8 years later (1986?), I was only paying $185. In comparison, the large studio I moved into in the Hollywood hills was $600. </p>