Saying goodbye to your dorm and on-campus living is a melancholic moment; it likely hasn’t hit you yet. Once that dorm room is bare, reborn and washed of the many sins that took place there, the memories will flood in. Remember when “that” happened on “this” futon?
You are sure to miss the convenience of campus living; it’s inevitable. Being able to wake up and walk to class in 5-10 minutes is a luxury freshmen do not realize until it’s too late.
Proximity to campus is an important factor to consider when picking an off-campus dwelling. Well, not only distance from campus but also places you frequent. A square regular? You might want to think about accommodations available for nightlife safety and transportation.
Transportation in general is a major part of off-campus living. If you have a car, you’ll usually be able to get wherever you want in a timely manner before noon or five o’clock traffic. Pro tip: Those are the worst traffic times anywhere, not just Oxford.
Driving through Oxford, no commute is terribly long. Still, pay attention to gas consumption and look out for deals. Kroger rewards is a personal favorite of mine as grocery shopping helps take money off my gas. This was a lifesaver last spring semester when national gas prices surged to over $4 per gallon.
If you don’t have a car, listen closely. You are at the mercy of your gracious friend who lends you rides or Oxford University Transit. The bus system is rather expansive, but buses are still huge, slow vehicles driven by humans. This means that here and there, you will be late relying on the bus. That’s an absolute.
To remedy this, you have to get time management in order. Depending on where you live, a bus arrives around every 30 minutes. You have to be ready to go, at the latest, 30 minutes before your schedule calls for you to be present somewhere.
But transportation isn’t the only thing to consider.
Stocking your fridge until it looks like a doomsday bunker ration is tempting. All your favorite snacks line the shelves, an entire section dedicated to bottled water and your favorite drinks and a fresh drawer packed full with veggies. Don’t do anything close to that. Especially not at the beginning of the semester.
Instead, consider the meal plan you’ll be on, your class schedule/workload and your finances before committing several hundred dollars to a single grocery basket too early in the semester.
If you won’t be on a meal plan, keep in mind that every student has $250-$300 in flex dollars to spend for dining on campus. That works out to about two modest meals a week depending on how you divide it.
Divvying that money over 14ish weeks isn’t the easiest when you walk through the union and the Chick-Fil-A line is actually manageable. Ironically, that’s turned into their on-campus business model. Is the line short? Might as well get it while you can; the line is usually stretched back near the building entrance. But I digress.
Some rely on flex during the first couple of weeks before school while waiting for refund checks to disburse. Others use it liberally and run out well before mid-term passes. It’s all about knowing where you stand and how well you save money.
The problem many have with grocery shopping is that they try and do too much. They literally buy so much food that much of it gets forgotten or ignored. I’m almost certain that psychology and availability play some role in this phenomenon; ideas that we want what we don’t have, and how we devalue what’s in front of us, but that’s another rabbit hole.
A more plausible, less convoluted reason is that students are too tired to cook after a long day.
At your first apartment or house, you’ll finally have your own stuff after a year of sharing everything. You’ll be particularly grateful for your own bathroom and the ability to shower and get ready at your own pace. If you lived in a community residence hall, this might be the biggest upgrade that comes with living off campus.
Picking the right roommates, the set of people that fit with your lifestyle, is vital in ensuring an ideal living situation. I’d say the best number of total people in a college apartment or townhouse is three.
This time around, securing a lease with that few roommates is rather unrealistic; the school population is considerably bigger, and space is beginning to run low. Also, the lower the number of roommates, the more expensive your lease will be.
So it’ll likely be around four people living together. At least one of those people can be your best friend, but I’d advise against staying with three best pals. Why? It’s easy to get distracted in an environment like that. Your friend is always down the hall from you, not a slightly more inconvenient two-minute drive up the road.
Once again, it comes down to knowing yourself. Can you stay focused and handle business first? How your freshman year is going is a rather good indicator. There’s still plenty of time to straighten things out, though.
Evaluating a potential roommate’s cleanliness is the most important thing to do before signing a lease together. See if you could get a look at their current room, their car or any other space they occupy. I’d even say take note of personal hygiene.
While it may sound shallow, how well these spaces are kept will help you predict how they’ll treat your house. A dirty dorm, which is significantly smaller than an apartment, could be a dealbreaker.
All in all, living off campus is the next step in matriculation for many, a time when responsibility is tested frequently.
There will be fun times, maybe a house party or kickback after a long week. There will be bad times when your roommates make you want to pull your hair out. It’s important to settle in a dynamic that works for you and helps you excel where you need to.
Good luck in this apartment-hunting chapter of life. Hopefully, you won’t have to repeat it during your remaining time on campus. Do it right once, and you’ll never have to do it again, or however the cliche goes.
