Finding the Right Home Away From Home Just Got Easier
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 6, 2012) — If you are among the vast majority of University of Kentucky students who plan to live off campus in the future, there’s a special event planned Tuesday just for you.
The UK Office of Off-Campus Student Services (OCSS) and Student Government Association are sponsoring their first Off-Campus Student Housing Fair 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 7, on the Student Center Patio or the bad-weather location, the Small Ballroom. A highlight of the Tally Cat event will be UK’s first, recently released Off-campus Housing Survey, the 4-1-1 of moving out of the residence halls and into the wider Lexington community.
Students will be able to collect enough information to make a virtual visit to most of the city’s apartment communities without having to drive, bike or walk to a single one. Many of the student-friendly apartment complexes will have information on their pricing, leases, roommate options, etc. OCSS will also be there providing educational information about tenants’ rights, safety and the results of the landlord survey.
“All students who are thinking about living off-campus next year should attend the OCSS-SGA Housing Fair,” said Tony Blanton, director of OCSS, a division of Student Affairs.
“First, I hope students will get a better understanding of the myriad of housing options that are available to them,” Blanton said. “I also hope students will gather information that will help them narrow down those choices.”
The UK Renters’ Guide 2011-12 was undertaken by SGA and OCSS in order to provide information about the rental properties available near campus, enabling students to make more-informed decisions in the leasing process, which result in an easier, more successful experience. The online publication provides students with data and comments on property management companies/landlords who rent to large numbers of students.
“The survey was originally suggested by the LFUCG Student Housing Task Force a few years ago, as part of the recommendation to create the Office of Off-Campus Student Services,” Blanton said. “The results will help students and parents make more-informed decisions about off-campus housing and also create a greater sense of urgency among landlords to provide better service to their tenants.”
The survey results could be considered sound. The survey was emailed to 5,000 students, 23 percent responded.
“I really wasn’t sure what kind of response we’d get since this is the first time we’ve done such a survey, but I was happy to see that students really seemed to see the importance of sharing their experiences with off-campus housing.”
The survey indicates that there are many very good landlords in Lexington who seem to treat their tenants with respect.
“We unfortunately learned that there are also some landlords who don’t,” Blanton said. “Hopefully, over time, the survey results will put pressure on under-performing landlords to provide better services to the students who rent from them.”
The survey results will be published on both the Off-Campus Student Services website (www.uky.edu/StudentAffairs/OCSS) and the Student Government website (www.uksga.org).
The relatively new Office of Off-campus Student Services has helped thousands of students streamline the process of finding off-campus housing. Last year, during its first year of operation, nearly 8,000 people used its Housing Locator website to find housing. Users viewed over 100,000 pages. This year, they are already 1,000 users and 10,000 page-views ahead of last year’s pace.
With survey completed, OCSS is currently working on a roommate-matching system that will accompany the Housing Locator website. Users will complete a profile regarding their desired living habits and post it on the site. Then they can search others who have posted their profiles in order to find potential roommate matches. Blanton said he hopes the roommate-matching system is operational by the end of February.
MEDIA CONTACT: Gail Hairston, (859) 257-3302; gail.hairston@uky.edu