<p>My daughter and some other students have rented an off-campus apartment for next fall where they will have to pay for utilities separate from the rent.</p>
<p>If your kids did this, how did they arrange for the utilities to be turned on? How did they get the necessary information about what companies to contact, and what did they have to do so that everything would be turned on when they arrived at school in the fall (or shortly thereafter)?</p>
<p>It has been so long since I moved that I have forgotten about how this process works. I'm not even sure I remember what all the utilities are -- electricity, heat (whatever kind you have), water, cable TV, internet, telephone -- can you think of anything else?</p>
<p>Son is doing the same in the fall–a total of 5 guys in a 5 bedroom apartment very close to the campus. The lease states that the kids are responsible for the electric bill and rent. The owner of the rental property is very used to renting to college students. The kids will pay their rent with separate checks because each kid signed their own lease. In other words, in our son’s case, each kid pays separately a specific per semester rate. They will have to turn on and pay for a cable/internet package and probably have to purchase a router so each kid can log on to the internet wirelessly (they’re not expensive). </p>
<p>I’m planning to sit back and let these guys figure it out by themselves. If they have any questions, they can ask the property owner, make the necessary phone calls, or talk with their current off campus friends. Think of it as a learning experience. I suggest stepping back and letting them try to figure it all out on their own. I know that it’s difficult to do but I’m going to try my best to not get involved (other than transferring the cost of rent and his portion of electric/cable/internet bills into his checking account).</p>
<p>My D and a roommate just rented an apartment in an apartment complex at her school. They will move in next month. The complex had them each sign a contract (they are used to college students) and they actually have a web site that tells them what the lessees are responsible for and how to contact the service (electricity, cable, etc) to set everything up, what the deposit is, etc.</p>
<p>Will they need to be a certain age (21) or have previous credit history before utility companies will offer an account? Or, will a parent have to co-sign?</p>
<p>Our son and roomies just called the utilities and asked for the “new customer” rep. Each of them also pooled money into a pot to pay for the hook-ups and deposits. Their apt had three-4br units which opened up all at once so he had 10 people to share the costs. They also made arrangements to pool grocery cost for those who chose to forego the college dining plans.</p>
<p>He saved about $4000/yr by moving off campus. He paid $450/mo for rent, utilities, internet and groceries vs $9200 freshmen year cost.</p>
<p>Another advantage was that he had housing available during breaks and summer. That really was an advantage when he was working on a research project with one of his profs during the summer following soph year.</p>
<p>This is very location-dependent. Recommend you have the kids ask their apartment manager. In helping my daughter work this out for next year, I was surprised to find that Memphis consolidates utilities so they pay one bill for gas, electric, water and sewer. Not like that where we live.</p>
<p>Well, there is merit in that. But not if any of the arrangements need to be made in person and the kids fail to do so before leaving campus a month from now. All three of the kids who will be sharing this apartment live at least a six-hour drive from campus, and all three will have full-time jobs this summer. A summer trip to the college community to deal with utilities issues would be a major hassle for any of them. Given that, I think that asking for total independence is flirting with disaster.</p>
<p>Also, my daughter said a while back that she and her roommates consider talking to me to be their first step in doing the necessary research – which is not unreasonable, because ours is the only family of the three that has had an older kid live off-campus. However, my older kid lived in an off-campus complex where all the utilities were included in the rent, so I may not be as useful as they are expecting. </p>
<p>In any case, my daughter and her roommates will inevitably call me, and I don’t want to sound too ignorant. I also don’t want to refuse to advise them if they ask. My own father did that to me once when I was a young adult (I asked him a question about bank accounts, and he told me that I should figure it out for myself). I was so angry at him for refusing to give me the information that I never asked him for any kind of advice again for the rest of his life.</p>
<p>originaloog, I’m jealous. Our son’s off campus apartment swung about that much in the other direction in terms of cost. However, he is consuming more housing since he has a room to himself (4 kids in a 4-bedroom apartment). The 3 months in the summer were totally wasted since he wasn’t around campus. We were able to make it not our problem by agreeing to pay as if he had stayed in his old dorm apartment and had a full meal plan (using this year’s rates and our previously agreed upon 90%/10% split). The extra cost of living in an apartment is therefore coming out of his pocket–hence he is working a lot AND drawing down his savings. I put it down as a learning experience. He will be abroad this summer and next fall. For spring 2010, he plans to look into a short-term sublet from somebody after he gets back. While abroad his intent is to just show up and check into a Hostel until he can rent something locally to his liking. That certainly wouldn’t be the way I would do it, but he has traveled a lot and stayed in Hostels enough that I guess he knows what he is doing. If it ends up costing him more going that route, it is once again his problem, not ours. We will pay as if he is in a dorm this summer at college.</p>
<p>The kids figured out the utilities on their own, so I don’t know how that works.</p>
<p>I would start with the landlord first. I would find out whose name utility bills would be under - landlord or a kid? If it’s going to be under one kid, then you will need to decide who that is going to be. If it’s going to be my kid’s name on the utility bills, I would ask other parents to put up some money in escrow because I wouldn’t want to have to chase people for money every month. I would opt not to have a phone, or if you do then don’t get long distance. With all the people coming and going, it would hard to track down who actually made the calls. </p>
<p>You should have someone come to read the meters before utilities are turned on - electric, water, gas, or oil (how full is the tank).</p>
<p>oldfort, you know what campus community I am talking about.</p>
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<p>They are considering this, I believe, but they don’t know how good the cell phone service is to their location. Their apartment is not in the usual student neighborhood adjoining the campus. The kids may be forced to get a landline if cell phone service is poor. But not getting outgoing long-distance might be a good idea because they can (and probably should) make their outgoing long-distance calls from their cell phones, even if this means walking a few blocks to the campus to do so. It’s not that sorting out who made which calls would be difficult (they don’t call the same people), it’s more that it’s much less expensive to make your long-distance calls from your cell phone.</p>
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<p>In this particular instance, I’m not concerned. It probably will be my kid’s name on the utility bills (because she’s the only one with an accounting background, so she will probably be the one paying the bills). But the three kids involved are extremely responsible, and I trust the parents (I know one set of parents, and the other set must be similarly responsible in order to have produced such a responsible kid). Also, two of the three kids have plenty of money anyhow. But if it had been my son and his former roommates a few years ago, I would have shared your concern.</p>
<p>I would start by asking the landlord. When my oldest rented a house she turned on most of the utilities via phone. I know at least one of them required a deposit that she paid via credit card. The internet setup was expensive. But I think in her case the house had never been set up for internet before. For those of you whose children are in a house they might have to get trash service.
When my D moved into an already occupied apartment she was shocked at the utility cost. It turned out that the other occupant of the apartment had premium cable TV.</p>
<p>If you think this is hard, my daughter is heading off to Sydney U, trying to get housing for them over the phone with 15 hours time difference, arrgggh. The school does not provide housing.</p>
<p>As long as roommates are responsible, that’s half the battle.</p>
<p>Who ever said being a parent was easy! Marian-I can feel your dilemma. One experience I had when living with roommates was that I had all the utilities in my name-I thought it would just make it easier. When the bills came in I would tell my room-mates what was due and ask for a check. Sometimes I would not get a check by the due date-and I had to pay the bill to protect my credit. What I came away with was the idea to have each roommate responsible for one utility-that way everyone understood the need to pay on time.</p>
<p>I’m not worried about this issue this time around – these are three kids who have known each other for at least two years (two of the three have known each other for six years). They wouldn’t cheat each other, and if one of them had a cash flow problem and couldn’t pay a bill right away, the others would be willing to help out temporarily.</p>
<p>However, I suspect that after graduation, all three of them will be moving into shared apartments with people whom they do not know so well. In the current economy, getting a good enough job to be able to rent an apartment on one’s own seems unlikely. So you’re giving them very good advice for the future, when they may not know their roommates as well as they do this time.</p>
<p>I think I’m going to suggest to my daughter and her roommates that they read this thread. There is a lot of sound thinking here.</p>
<p>My DD was happiest when she and her roommate each took on one utility bill and they evened up each billing cycle, this protected them both from bad attitudes and mistakes. Each could pay the bill that affected their credit, each was building up credit so future utilities would not charge a deposit and it worked out well all around</p>
<p>In my experience, the utilities aren’t generally ‘turned off’ between tenants, the billing is just transferred to the landlord temporarily. Often the landlord will have a welcome/info packet telling the tenants what they need to do to change the billing. </p>
<p>Many apartments in college towns – Cornell is the one I am familar with – are set up so that internet and cable tv are included in the rent. Watch out for the rules about trash pickup – it can either be included in the rent, or be fairly expensive!</p>
<p>cnp55, Cornell is the school my daughter attends. But the apartment she and her roommates have rented has all the utilities separate from the rent. They obviously need to call the landlord’s office and ask a lot of questions – and as you say, they will probably get some easy answers to many of them. They may not necessarily need to deal with the utility companies directly.</p>
<p>Hey, I have a really stupid question. D and another girl are moving off campus next year and have just started looking for an apartment. In general, how early will a landlord know when leases are turning over? Is this city- (or location-) dependent? When she asks her off-campus friends when they “found” their apartment, she gets answers ranging from “two months” to “two weeks” before their move-in date.</p>
<p>I last rented in the Dark Ages, so my experience isn’t of much use…</p>
I also don’t want to refuse to advise them if they ask. My own father did that to me once when I was a young adult (I asked him a question about bank accounts, and he told me that I should figure it out for myself). I was so angry at him for refusing to give me the information that I never asked him for any kind of advice again for the rest of his life.</p>