<p>So I am trying to decide between colleges and my parents are really worried about the housing situation at UPenn for after freshman year. Is it really hard to get on-campus housing in your upperclassmen years? Any comments regarding housing are appreciated and any advice to calm my parents would help a lot. Thanks.</p>
<p>About 50% of non-freshmen at Penn live in university housing (and, of course, virtually 100% of freshmen). Most of the remaining 50% of non-freshmen live in frats/sororities, larger private dorms immediately adjacent to campus (such as [The</a> Radian](<a href=“http://www.theradianapartments.com/]The”>http://www.theradianapartments.com/) ), or large Victorian rowhomes (typically shared by 6 or so students) located in the 3 or so blocks immediately west of campus. You should note–and tell your parents–that the Penn Patrol Zone, the area patrolled 24/7 by Penn Police and security, extends well beyond the Penn campus and includes the areas where the vast majority of off-campus undergraduate residences are located:</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/UPPD/]Penn”>http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/UPPD/]Penn</a> Police Department Penn Public Safety<a href=“scroll%20down%20to%20see%20and%20download%20a%20map%20of%20the%20Penn%20Patrol%20Zone”>/url</a></p>
<p>I haven’t been a student at Penn for many years, but my impression is that the current balance of on- and off-campus housing pretty much satisfies the needs and desires of the overwhelming majority of upperclassmen. That is, those who live off-campus (and again, off-campus in this context generally means the immediately surrounding 2 or 3 blocks) want to be living off-campus, while those who want to live in university housing can generally be accomodated. This balance has worked very well for Penn for many decades (and even centuries :)), and very few–if any–upperclassmen feel disadvantaged by Penn’s residential system.</p>
<p>Hopefully, some current students and recent graduates will jump in and give their perspectives on this.</p>
<p>Our experience re upper class housing is that there is currently not enough housing on campus or nearby off campus for the current class size. As inventory is too low, prices are very high. There are three beautiful buildings (the Radian, the HB and the Domus) but prices there are $15,000 to $20,000 per bedroom. Cheaper are buildings like Hamilton. But these apartments are NOT nice, and they will still cost $10,000 per bedroom. There are old homes around 41rst street rented though Campus Apartments and other realtors. They become available mid November for the next June year, and are snatched up immediately. In fact there is a listing party one night at midnight when the apartments are released and some students sign leases site unseen, as they know if they wait, it will not be available tomorrow. Four Bedroom apartments here cost $10,000 to $12,000 a year.</p>
<p>The Off Campus leases are signed in November but the On Campus housing lottery is not until the end of January. Most sophomores want to live On Campus in the high rises. Again there are not enough apartments for the students… The apartments are assigned through lottery, and MANY sophomores do not get housing. These students have to take whatever is left.</p>
<p>Sorry, I am having trouble with this site. I want to clarify-the 41rst street Off Campus apartments are $10,000 to $12,000 per bedroom. The whole apartments are $40,000 to $50,000 for the year. You can sublet for the summer months and recoup some of the rent, but in the summer there is a glut of apartments and rent is low. Rooms in 6 or 8 bedroom houses are not much cheaper.
Students who secure an apartment on 41rst are very happy. Considerable less desirable are apartments closer to 43rd.</p>
<p>Choose Harrison. It is honestly the best. We have no mice. What more could you ask for?</p>
<p>I want to correct parental unit 3… There are price ranges based on where you live off campus. The large homes in the area bounded by Locust Street, 40th Street, Spruce Street and 42nd Street are more expensive and average $750-$950 per month. If you go south, you will see cheaper places… The 3900 block of Baltimore averages around $700 a month, and the 3900 block of Pine averages around $800 a month.</p>
<p>Also, with regard to subletting… I did that for three summers, and I was able to recoup about 60% of the summer cost of housing. During senior year, I paid $741, which included rent, water, heat and internet. Other utilities brought the total cost of living to $775 a month, and I wound up paying around $8,000 total - a significant savings over the high rises, which were $10,500 my senior year.</p>
<p>The more expensive places are listed through leasing agencies; you can find cheaper housing by looking at apartments directly leased. You also will find that a lot of campus groups have their own off campus housing, which is passed down from class to class and helps to keep rent in check.</p>
<p>Just to add to chrisw real quick,
I’m in a student group, and next year some of us will be renting out a house near 41st and Baltimore. Some of us are doubling to save money, but if nobody doubled, it’d only be about $500/mo per person, with about $30 utilities. </p>
<p>It DEFINITELY depends where you’re trying to live. If you’re renting an apartment by yourself or with one friend at the Radian or HamCo, it will be expensive. If you’re willing to take on a couple roommates though (or even just look further south than Locust), prices are right in line with what chrisw said (~$650-$800/mo).</p>
<p>I will add, as a long-time resident of University City (though back in its “bad” period, not recently when things are nicer), that undergraduates tend to fetishize street number, and to not be willing to look more than a couple blocks west of 40th St. or south of Locust. Some of the nicest areas of University City to live are in the mid-to-upper 40s between Baltimore and Spruce, or around Clark Park. Those are easy walks to campus, and the rents (especially for houses) are more like $500-$800/month per bedroom.</p>
<p>Three other points:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>This all sounds very mysterious and threatening if you are contemplating it from your parents’ living room far away. But when you get there you will meet tons of people living off campus, and when you are ready to do that (usually going into your junior year) you and your friends will probably know seniors who will be leaving, and be familiar with their houses or apartments, and be in a position to “inherit” from them. The whole process isn’t completely painless, but it’s not as awful as you may imagine.</p></li>
<li><p>Penn students who live off campus in University City or the western part of Center City are not “commuters”. Their lives remain centered on the Penn campus, they are there all the time, they live with other Penn students mostly, and they participate in all kinds of university stuff. They just don’t live in dorms, or have RAs. They can have meal plans, but usually don’t want them. What they do have is a lot more space than the dorms, and kitchens.</p></li>
<li><p>If your parents are using this as an argument against Penn, what is the alternative? It’s not like there are that many colleges on Penn’s level. Only some of those really house students in dorms all four years, and most of the ones that do are in rural or suburban areas, not an urban campus like Penn. If you are looking at elite colleges in large, exciting cities, after you get past Harvard , MIT, and Columbia, I don’t know what college houses all its students for four years. And Columbia has some negatives, too, among which is that people don’t love its housing so much. Brown houses most of its students for three years, but that’s because it won’t permit them to live off campus if the dorms won’t be full. Rice requires students to live off-campus at least one year. After that, I think everyone else pretty much resembles Penn. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>You shouldn’t decide to go someplace suburban or rural, or to a more limited college, just because it offers four years of housing on campus. If you are choosing between Harvard and Penn, and want to consider Harvard’s four-year housing a plus, that’s fine (although you should recognize that most Penn students would probably tell you it’s a negative for Harvard, not a plus).</p>
<p>My brother lived in the Quad all four years.</p>
<p>I spent two years in dorms, then went into an apartment. That was about 40 years ago. I’m still in the neighborhood (several apartments later) and won’t move. There are neighbors who’ve lived here since Eisenhower was president. There are newcomers to the neighborhood and newcomers to this country. </p>
<p>You can stay focused on Penn and just live in the neighborhood, or you can get involved in activities and events that are plentiful and welcoming. Full disclosure: earlier this year I revised and added to our local community directory, called Close at Hand. It’s online. Let your parents look at it. Look yourself. We can keep you engaged for a lifetime.</p>
<p>high rises are easy to get into, just do community living</p>
<p>I heard UPENN security (and Drexel next door) is really bad. I am applying to UPENN but my ONE lone issue is the bad security. During our tour this year we saw a lot of homeles people walking around and SLEEPING on campus. We saw more homeless than we saw security. Plus, when we started the tour the FIRST topic was security and a speech about the blue lights. </p>
<p>How concerned should I be about the security on campus since we didn’t see hardly any while we walked around. I heard that 20 or so years ago a security guard killed a girl on Drexel’s campus. I alos heard a LOT of crimes go unnannounces because there are soooo many!! </p>
<p>We drove through campus over the holiday to visit the UPENN bookstore and not a guard was in site!!</p>
<p>^ IGNORE PSTRETT–he/she is a ■■■■■ with a one-track agenda. Just look at all 9 or his/her posts in his/her short time on CC, and you’ll see the alleged dangers of Penn’s campus mentioned in each and every one of them (regardless of the topic of the thread).</p>
<p>His/her purported observations are NONSENSE.</p>
<p>Thank you, 45 Percenter! </p>
<p>I WILL tackle pstrett’s concerns really quickly, just for the sake of information. Penn security and Drexel security are crazy tight. There are crossing guards at big intersections during the day and night. There are phone boxes all over campus and you can call for a walking escort or a ride from Penn Transit from your cell phone. There are Philadelphia police on campus (in cars and on foot), there are Penn Police, cops on bikes, AND there are Allied Barton guards at every library and residence hall making sure that only students can get in. Plus Drexel police share some of the same turf as the Penn Police. </p>
<p>Sometimes homeless people do show up on campus, but this is the real world in a real city. It really doesn’t happen very often though. They’re not going to hurt anybody or rob them; they’re just people looking for a place to sleep every once in a while.</p>
<p>In regards to the claim that there were no guards at the bookstore over the holiday, let’s keep in mind that it was a bookstore. And a holiday. </p>
<p>Take your information from actual Penn students, or better yet, visit all the security links the campus offers (linked below). If you have any questions about security, feel free to post them, but don’t take answers from people who pander rumors about unannounced crimes and murder conspiracies. </p>
<p>Penn Public Safety department:
[Division</a> of Public Safety Penn Public Safety](<a href=“http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/]Division”>http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/)</p>
<p>Penn Police Department:
[Penn</a> Police Department Penn Public Safety](<a href=“http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/UPPD/]Penn”>http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/UPPD/)</p>
<p>Collaboration with other departments:
[Safety</a> & Security Partners Penn Public Safety](<a href=“http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/about/safety-security-partners/]Safety”>http://www.publicsafety.upenn.edu/about/safety-security-partners/)</p>
<p>According to Penn security, the most common crime is theft of unattended property. Go into a store and see who leaves open purses in shopping carts while browsing or talking on cell phones. It isn’t homeless people.</p>
<p>In addition to the other comments, the tour guide specifically told us that the security here is really tight and with the Philly police, there’s no reason for you not to feel safe. I really doubt that such a highly regarded university would overlook safety for the students–especially in Philly. </p>
<p>Anywho, any comments on the Quad housing (i.e. Riepe, Fisher, and Ware) individually?</p>
<p>@Elouie</p>
<p>I live in Fisher, over near the western point of the Quad (colloquially known as “The Nipple”). The room sizes and layouts vary from building to building, but the most common dorms (at least in Fisher) are either doubles (one room) or triples (which have a common room and two bedrooms attached). Some of the rooms come with sinks, but they’re randomly distributed. Lounges are well outfitted and people spend a lot of time in them–some have sinks, a couple have kitchens, and most/all have televisions, snack machine(s), couches, tables, whiteboard space, etc. The halls are usually pretty tight knit (and that goes for ALL of the Quad); RA/GAs organize a lot of cool trips and events and meals and lots of floormates go on to room with each other in the year or two following their time in the Quad. Some floors are themed (“residential programs”) and so they have different policies, events, and occasionally guest speakers on their subject of interest. For example, I applied for, and now live in, the “Substance-Free Living” residential program, where all of the residents agree not to come back to the hall under the influence of any drugs or alcohol or bring anybody over that is in that condition. Our living space is cleaner, quieter, and generally less party-oriented than some of the other halls, which is nice. There aren’t exactly many events that relate to sub-free, per se, but it’s still great to be within a smaller community in the house.</p>
<p>There are 6 laundry rooms in the Quad (free laundry!), a handful of small workout rooms, some music practice rooms, a few bigger lounges with pool tables and other games, and several computer labs with fully outfitted desktops. I don’t know about the rest of the Quad, but Fisher has a 24/7 silent study lounge which has desks, tables, couches and carrels. There’s also a quiet library at the top of the Memorial Tower where Fisher meets Ware.</p>
<p>McClelland is the building under the balcony in the middle of the Quad and it has a limited dining hall, a small grocery store, and lots of space to study and meet. It’s open at all hours (though dining isn’t) and the package room that services the whole Quad is in the basement. The dining is based on the “Meal Equivalency” system, which means that you get an entree, a couple sides, and a drink with each swipe; it’s not all-you-can-eat like the other larger dining halls. There’s a salad bar all day and they usually serve distinct breakfasts, lunches, and dinners which range from grits and pancakes and sausage in the mornings to sandwiches, stirfry, noodles, etc. in the afternoons and evenings. The choices are nowhere near as diverse as the other dining halls, but if you’re not a particularly picky eater, the convenience more than makes up for it.</p>
<p>All in all, I love living in the Quad. It’s beautiful, close to the academic buildings, and very freshman-oriented. The other buildings (highrises, Du Bois, KCECH, etc.) are fine for freshmen, but I feel like the Quad is definitely worth shooting for.</p>
<p>Penn security is excellent and I have never walked more than a block without seeing a security guard or police officer.</p>
<p>I am actually glad to have rattled some folks on here including the great and omnipotent ‘43 Percenter’. Its truely an asset to have everyone’s opinion on the campus’ security. Lets all meet at the White Dog to discuss. UPENN’s security is a very important topic to me personally.
--------------------------------
Perhaps this site will help you understand the crimes at UPENN. There is a lot of theft, assualt, burglary and robbery. I wish the site would break down the types of robbery but alas, no luck there. </p>
<p>[Philadelphia</a> Crime Map - Showing Crime in University of Pennsylvania, PA - Crime Statistics - Crime Alerts - Crime Stops Here](<a href=“http://ucrime.com/pa/university+of+pennsylvania#]Philadelphia”>http://ucrime.com/pa/university+of+pennsylvania#)</p>
<p>I am willing to concede the secutiy team does a good job but they need to do a GREAT job on a campus with this history and esteem. It would be nice to have Yale’s walls around UPENN or at least on the far western side.</p>