<p>The colleges my kids attend(ed) - Stanford, Kenyon, Swarthmore - do not have fancy housing by any stretch of the imagination.</p>
<p>Same here motheroftwo--at least two of mine were in dorms that wouldn't have been new when I was in school and really hadn't been updated since then---take that back, one did have A/C!</p>
<p>Unfortunately, fancy dorms (along with state-of-the-art athletic facilities & other upscale amenities) are one reason why tution is so high and getting higher all the time...</p>
<p>This old fart thinks that living 'poor' should be part of the college experience, but what do I know....</p>
<p>I don't know that anyone is building very fancy dorms. The article is talking about students (i.e., their parents) buying upscale condos for those college years. You see that a lot around here, and it's been a big boon to the condo market within a mile or so of the Penn campus. There's one building right across the river from Penn that might as well be a dorm.</p>
<p>And of course (barrons will appreciate this), more often than not they've been making their money back when they sell a few years later. Net, it's often cheaper (if riskier) than living in the dorms.</p>
<p>Oh, there are lots of fancy dorms being built -- everywhere from Berekely to Boston; Cal and Northeastern are two schools I can think of right away that offer great new dorms with prices to match.</p>
<p>There maybe a few schools with fancy dorms. Almost all of the ones that I have seen have been small and sparse. The charges of about $10k/year for room and board seem excessive. I am not surprised that apartments are competitive. My D has been in the dorm for two years. I think we have paid a lot for a small cinder block room. My D just got her apartment for next year. Her share of the costs for a much nicer 4-bedroom apartment will be $350. She could eat every meal in a restaurant and still come out ahead when compared with the dorm costs.</p>
<p>JHS, considering Penn (I believe) still has some student "housing" in High Rise Sheraton, it's probably worth the cost to live in the Left Bank apartments.</p>
<p>The Madison, WI article talks about condo-style apartments for rent off campus. Housing costs are entirely separate from tuition and fees; I suspect increased technology has something to do with increased tuition costs compared to my generation- think computers and networking. Eons ago many students lived in old houses that made up the slums of Madison, from what I've seen, most of those buldings still exist. The old dorms have received major updates in tech wiring and bathrooms since my day; that with locations on campus and a pay-as-you-eat food service with good food the dorms still fill. Air conditioning is still only a Sept and May use thing- free heat is a much bigger deal. Including cable tv, local phone/service, electricity, high speed internet access, cheap in dorm laundry, big screen tvs in lounges, pianos, bathroom cleaning, small refrigerator... under $7,000 a school year plus the cost of cheap good food close by ( $1200-$1500, depending on how many delivery charges for those late night pizzas and subs from the dorm snack bars one adds) for the average double when your life is spent everywhere else on a nice campus is not a bad life.</p>
<p>hey, back in the day(da 60's) our dorms had maids who made our beds every day M-F, vac'd the floors and cleaned the bathrooms. On our floor we absolutely adored Ruthie and she would even wake us for midterms/finals if we asked nice.</p>
<p>Payback came when there was a union strike and we assigned a few students to the picket lines throughout the day.</p>
<p>Those prices aren't actually all that high compared to some of the regular housing options (apartments, rented houses, etc) at some campuses. I pay 1k + utils a month for a regular room in a rented house, and I know some who pay more.</p>
<p>Who'd have thought that my old dorms would now have AIR CONDITIONING? And that the former traditional cafeteria for freshmen ("don't eat the cassaroles in the green dish") would now feature a wood burning brick oven stove for pizza? Parents, we can only blame ourselves. Once one school gets amenities, people flock there, and everyone else plays catch-up. And we all pay the price in room/board fees! But boy, my son's school has a really nice fitness center with climbing wall....</p>
<p>The dorm mentioned in the article - the Statesider - is a private dorm. The UW has nothing to do with it. An interesting sidelight - Back in the 70s and early 80s the Statesider was called Allen Hall and was a residential facility for chronically mentally ill adults. At one time, it had 120 residents.</p>