Is there a place to go to buy student used dorm stuff?
The University sponsored MicroFridge deal is a bit of an overpriced option. Granted you get a microwave in your room, but $179 a year for a refrigerator that you can buy new for $139 seems a bit much. I’m hoping that someone is selling a used one or I’ll buy a new one, but didn’t want to truck it across the country.
Does your community have Nextdoor.com? That’s a great place for this, in our suburban area students post all the time for dorm/first apartment type stuff and typically someone offers it at very low cost. Maybe the college area has nextdoor as well, you would just have to find out how to join.
You could also try Craig’s list in your area or the college’s area, or your high school parent/other community based facebook page.
A somewhat related question - for those in doubles - do they usually share a micro fridge or each have their own? My daughter’s first choice dorm is Max and the rooms appear fairly tight.
@CUandUCmom , My impression is that they usually share freshman year. Then depending on who owned it, they could end up with extras or none the next year. This depends on the size of the room, among other things.
@BrianBoiler , At some schools, they have a big sale of left behind items in the gym during move in days. Stuff is cheap! Sofas, fridges, rugs, lamps, wall art… You might want to see if your school does that.
Things may be changing now in many different ways, but in the past most Hyde Park leases ran June-May, so most of the stuff being sold was sold in the spring. Dorm rooms didn’t tend to have sofas, etc.; apart from the mini-fridges, the market was almost entirely people living in apartments off campus.
I think there’s some kind of e-bulletin board for the University of Chicago where people might post stuff for sale now and in the fall: http://marketplace.uchicago.edu/
@BrianBoiler one disadvantage of owning a microfridge is that you have to store it. There is storage space allocated at each dorm - very nice! - however, it’s tight. D lives in BJ and didn’t even have room for her super-sized fan (so she brought it home!). Collegeboxes.com is always an option but that costs money over the summer. Plus, the microfridge company has it set up in your room at the beginning of the school year and carts it away at the end. D got her deposit back (and applied it to rental for the next year). As long as your son has a dedicated friend in HP willing to hold onto it, it might be better to skip the hassle and just rent.
“As long as” should have been “Unless”
You should wait til you get to campus and see what you need. Other than bedding, little actually has to be brought from outside. My kids didn’t need a mini fridge.
My son has medicine that needs refrigerated or he wouldn’t need it either. We’ll find out Friday, but he believes he will get into Campus North (choice 1) or Max P (Choice 2). He turned his deposit in November, about 3 weeks before ED1 came out, so depending on the number of Gap Years and how many picked Campus North… Anyway, both say they have room to store fridges + 4 trunks/student.
post in your house fb page once you get your housing assignment, though a lot of people clean out at the end of the year
in addition to marketplace there’s a fb group in the UChicago Community called “Free & For Sale” where a lot of people try to offload their stuff. The group ID is 279055445511955 (find it with you-know-what-url/groups/279055445511955)
I think we’ll go the way of renting a fridge because having the company set it up and carting it away sounds great. Although I guess we’ll have to wait to see who his roommate is and maybe work out who’s got a fridge, or who is renting a fridge.
@CUandUCmom my DD was/is in MaxP and she kept her mini fridge in the foyer area.