From personal experience, living in the dorms isn’t always the most pleasant experience, and many students choose to move out of the dorms after their freshman year. There are a lot of benefits to getting an apartment, including more privacy and your own room and kitchen, among other things. In addition, apartment living can give you more independence and freedom, since you can have friends over and do what you want without having to deal with the often overzealous campus security officers.
To that end, I’ve put together a short list of resources and tips if you are thinking about living off campus that will definitely help you save money and live more comfortably during your new adventure.
Finding an apartment. Thankfully, many schools have an office set up expressly for the purpose of linking students up to find apartments or as sort of a roommate matchmaking service. At Suffolk University, my alma mater, it was called the Off Campus Housing Office (OCHO)… your school probably has a similar name, and if you look on their website it should be relatively easy to find. In addition, there are a ton of websites online devoted to matching people together for roommate situations and apartment searching, including Rent.com and Roommates.com. Craig