The Real Reason College Dorms Have Gotten So Expensive

[@ThatLittleTexanWoman]

The universities brag about fancy dorms but ignore the reality that most students just want a basic room they can afford without going into debt. I started college almost 20 years ago when these new “apartment style residence halls” were just starting to take over. The older dorms I lived in had vibrant social communities because you couldn’t help but interact with other students. The newer style buildings were always much quieter and people kept to themselves. Aside from affordability, people seemed happier and more social in the cheap dormitories because the design encouraged students to leave their rooms during the day and go to common spaces.

[@DiceMaster740]

It's tough to simply blame high rooming costs on the shift from dorms to apartment style units. The traditional dorms are often only a couple hundred dollars cheaper per month than the on-campus apartments. The on-campus apartments often still have shared bedrooms, whereas my college roommates and I were able to find a spacious, 4-bedroom apartment off-campus which was dramatically cheaper per person per month than anything the school offered, even with each person getting his own room. And we did this living in one of the most expensive cities in America.

[@liam.k.]

I work in university housing. The community you mention is definitely more prevalent in our traditional dorm style housing. However we have noticed the demand for this housing declining significantly whereas the demand for our suite and apartment style housing has skyrocketed, we are consistently sold out of these rooms while dorm styles routinely have vacancies. We definitely don’t have high end or fancy dorms, but even despite slightly higher pricing students continue to gravitate towards the more modern offerings. Most schools are really just conforming to market demands!

[@christophercripps7639]

My dorm room was bare concrete block walls, a couch-bed, a desk, chair & lamp. The college experience was in fact hanging with others in my major and the mix of others on the floor, in the TV lounge or in the dining hall.

[@robbiem4624]

i feel it's also the kids themselves and no one talks to each other anymore unless your from the same hometown and sometimes from the same high school. From what it seems to me and csu Chico was everyone was from the bay area, or la or southern California. People moved there with their friends from high school in a 4/2 or 2/1 and moved around in the years then go home to their parents or lived with their high school friends in apartments like the university dorms. I graduated with my bachelors finally after trying off and in for nearly 18 years but graduated when the pandemic hit in spring 2020.

[@advancetotabletop5328]

@l : Had better be students who paid their way through college and not gone into debt.

[@jasonschwartz8507]

The overall housing supply shortage in these college town and cities is a huge part of the issue. The low supply of off-campus housing drives up the cost of on-campus housing. The president of Virginia Tech said explicitly in the State of the University address that they will be limiting admissions specifically due to the lack of housing.

[@__________5737]

I am sure it is but these issues long proceeded current market conditions.

[@evilkingstanley]

I like how you clearly didn't get past the first 10 seconds where she said, "It isn't because of the housing market."

[@sathdk79]

@@evilkingstanleyit is though. If they had to compete with off campus housing the price would be more affordable

[@ParadiseVids]

There isn’t a shortage. More people elect to live off campus.

[@Mike__B]

​@@evilkingstanley Yet at 4:49 she says "The contractors get to set the rate for the housing, so the school can say it's not their fault"... which is quite literally why the cost of housing is going up, housing is seen as an investment not as a basic necessity. So what is it? it isn't because of the housing market or it is?

[@cameronglynn4860]

Imagine getting robbed and told you’re receiving a great life lesson

[@vertvlogs675]

No joke, $16,000 a year for a room at OSU? For the same price you could buy a house off campus, and sell the house when you graduate. Unfortunately that's not possible for the vast majority of students. So instead they will just get fleeced by these schools while beieng told "this is the best four years of your life."

[@SeaforgedArtifacts]

​@@vertvlogs675 idk any students who can buy a house in a college town, on their own without their parents essentially buying it for them.

[@rabokarabekian409]

Uuuuuhh, that is what nearly everyone IS going to have happen even after they die. The gold rule. "Who run Bartertown?" "It's a big club and you ain't in it."

[@resmarted]

Imagine signing up to get robbed

[@ganondorf66]

Well yeah it is a great lesson, the question is do you learn from it?

[@torterratom197]

Had to live on campus for my freshman year at Clemson. $6,000 for a shared room that was probably 400 sq ft and a required meal plan purchase of over $4,000. I wish they didn't force people to live on campus for the first year of college but I can see why they do it, but to compare, I was able to live 5 minutes from campus in a 4 person apartment for $400 a month and ~$3000 a year in food and fun costs.

[@brendakingsley8015]

I lived in doithit west for a summer for a job, beautiful room and accommodations- thankfully I didn’t have to pay the prices for it. They still tried to push an overpriced meal plan to us though (that we would have to purchase)

[@TheScrubmuffin69]

They do it to charge you 4 grand for a meal plan😂😂😂

[@mrggy]

I graduated college in 2018, but a big thing at my university was that a bunch of high rise "luxury student apartments" were being built. They had really aggressive marketing and managed to convince people that paying $700 for a shared room was a good deal. I remember hearing my Freshman year that a regular shared student apartment was like $400/month each. It was actually really hard for find roommates for a regular apartment because so many people fell for the high rise marketing. I've heard it's only gotten worse in recent years.

[@jon3nnb646]

​@mrggy Did you guys go to school in the middle of nowhere? How'd you get an apartment for 400 a month? I attend UCF, 30 minutes away from Orlando FL and the shittiest student housing with car fires and stabbings costs 600-700 a month

[@mrggy]

@@jon3nnb646 It was a mid-sized city in the Midwest. The key detail here though is that I was a college freshman nearly 10 years ago. Rent was just across the board cheaper then

[@thesalty162]

I live in a tower style dorm constructed in the 1960s, and while I wish I could have a private living space, there is no denying the fact that $700/month is much easier to stomach than the $1500+/month dorm costs that you're seeing in new-build apartment dorms at an increasingly large number of state schools.

[@britefeather]

Is it really only $700 a month alltogether? There is something similar at my school but it ends up being $1k per month that you can actually live in it.

[@TheScrubmuffin69]

​@@britefeatherthat's fucking insane. Way too much.

[@scherzva]

The dorms my first two years were the same, I started in 1988. They seemed outdated back then.

[@emmasilver2332]

My apartment-style dorm priced out to be about $700 per month when I did the math. The community style housing was cheaper on paper, but with that you had to buy a meal plan, and as a person with severe allergies there was almost nothing on campus that I could actually eat, so I'd have to shell out extra for groceries anyways. And there was no guarantee that I'd have access to the community kitchens whenever I needed them either, since they were shared by everyone on the entire floor. Which also increased the likelihood that my food would be stolen, with almost zero way to find out who did it. The apartment style housing had no such requirement to buy the meal plan, so it ended up being cheaper for me overall. Still had to go into debt for it because on campus jobs pay crap wages and I didn't have a car so there weren't many off-campus jobs that I could apply for, but the debt would've been even more if I hadn't chosen this option.

[@Sidecutter]

Yep these leases are designed to last up to 85 years...by which point, when the land returns to the university, the buildings will be practically condemned, because they were built as cheaply and quickly as possible by a developer who was basically handed free access to the pockets of the students by the school that is supposed to be bettering them.

[@robert1200]

Not really, the incentive of the developer is to build them with an 85 year lifecycle, however once you get that far into the future it's hard to perfectly optimize a building to last 85 years and then start falling apart after that.

[@barvdw]

Probably not that bad, but absolutely, by then, a major refurbishment would be needed.

[@richdobbs6595]

Well, there is an issue with basic demographics, that in even 40 years, there is a good chance that many current universities will be defunct, especially if they don't have any special status.

[@TheOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO]

​@@charlesandrews2513 how long are the buildings designed to last? I can't imagine many buildings being designed to last for close to a century

[@OgdenM]

Yah I said the same thing

[@mstmompj]

As a child, I used to live in a university-owned campus apartment at LSU that was later torn down to build the Nicholson Gateway facilities. The apartments were aimed at married students and students with children (who obviously couldn't live in dorms), as opposed to the general student population. Rents for a 3-bedroom apartment, with utilities included, were under $200/month. Yes, the apartments had basic cinder block walls and linoleum tile floors, but they were *affordable* and convenient. Of course, back then, students still lived in un-airconditioned dorm rooms in the football stadium building itself!

[@privatesnowball3032]

I'm a current LSU student- most people have to live off campus and commute now and the bus routes do not go out that far. They are building apartments hand over feet, managed poorly, and the current infrastructure pushed out most grad students out of dorms they traditionally lived in to make room for more incoming freshman. Most dorms are supposed to have some space open in case people transfer to the university- 95% full with 5% reserved- and LSU hasn't honored that rule the last few years just to be sure they get as much freshman as possible. There are a lot of issues with the current housing infrastructure.

[@AGILISFPV]

Publicly funded universities need to be student oriented, not profit oriented. Ridiculous.

[@kingchillcali]

Too many MBAs are holding critical roles of University Leadership. In school they learn to run a business that appeals to shareholders and MBA heavy universities run the school to appeal to Donors first before students

[@critter30002001]

You are right, they should be cheap, scholarly oriented, and available to the state’s citizens first.

[@UserName-ts3sp]

i mean these are what a lot of students want. to an extent

[@showcaseSampa]

It is cuts in Public Education, trickling down funds since Reagan.

[@lgarcia67]

I have two kids in college right now. They are in different cities. What I have noticed is two things both campuses have in common, one, the lack of new construction around the campuses they are in. Not IN campus; but around, where students can rent. Two, the new dorms inside the campuses look more like a resort than a college dorm and somebody has to pay for all those amenities. Competition has created that. Colleges competing for students have created this new standard and parents keep paying for it. So of course prices continue to jump.

[@popcorn8153]

It's a tough environment when kids have been conditioned to believe a degree is a guarantee-for success and stability. It's also tough that the trades are full of toxic assholes. Not a lot of alternatives that give people a sense of lasting worth.

[@barvdw]

Demand created by higher demand? Or by investment firms who want the higher ROI from more expensive lodgings? They're still building luxury condos where I live, most of them will sit unsold and unrented for months, while there's a severe lack of affordable housing options who don't get built because there's no money in them. I'd have to assume that it's the same for student accommodation when all is being built by private equity...

[@TheRealEdStoner]

@@popcorn8153the trades are full of toxic assholes? Please share your research.

[@TheScrubmuffin69]

​@TheRealEdStoner uhhh go be in a trade for 5 minutes and half the people you'll talk to are horrible people. If you don't see that and you work in a trade then... here's your sign.

[@hungcapitalll]

​@@popcorn8153that is just a load of provincial minded BS. There are hundreds of trades you know nothing about

[@dearthditch]

Because tuition and books weren’t gouging enough. Congress needs to look into all of this. Why do we keep saying “oh, well the kids will get loans or something” ???

[@DS-wo8wr]

They caused this….

[@pauls4522]

I guess the argument is that students are investing in their future. But that argument falls flat when maybe about half the students will graduate, and then out of that half maybe half of that will actually get a high paying job out of college. I enjoyed the the on campus university owned apartment I lived on my last year in school, but that did cost me like an extra 2 grand. I make really well into my 30s at this point, but I'm thinking of all the other students who either had to drop out or are barely getting by with their degree even years after college.

[@shinnam]

How about going to fee free higher ed? Even poorer EU countries can do it, don't know why the richest and "greatest" country in the world can't do that.... oh yeah got to buy arms and insure a constant supply of recruits that can't afford college. 😢

[@safeandeffectivelol]

Congress caused it with taxpayer-backed student loans. The colleges figured out they could charge as much tuition as they wanted and the loans would be there to pay it. The ones who suffer are the students and taxpayers. Tuition costs have skyrocketed compared to inflation.

[@jacobkarlin6147]

Big daddy government can fix all problems!!! Especially the ones it causes my creating perverse incentives

[@MrKevmomoney]

Virtually everything in university has gotten expensive. One of the main reasons is because administrative staff somehow realized they need to make $500K a year. Not faculty we’re talking administrative.

[@marilena7848]

And the number of administrators has multiplied nearly tenfold since the 1960's.

[@texaswunderkind]

Very few college administrators make that kind of money. I work at one of the largest universities on the planet, and there are only two executive-level staff in my entire department that make over $120,000 a year. Most managers and professional staff still make less than six figures. Not every university is Harvard.

[@shinnam]

​@@marilena7848While schools have done away with receptionists, and secretaries for academic departments and professors.

[@brianmeegan6384]

Can you please identify administrators other than presidents making half a million in salary.

[@Praisethesunson]

That by design. After the successful "civil unrest" of the 1960's-1970's your overlords deliberately turned higher education into a debt trap. Massive debt is a great tool to keep the poors from using that book learning to successfully challenge quo.

[@antonnnn464]

I studied in Russia, Germany, and Canada. In early 2000th, a typical room on campus in a large city in Russia cost about $30-50 (you read it right), in a university city in German about 200-300 euros, and in Canada (Montreal) around $400-500. FYI: higher education in both Russia and German is either free or almost tuition free. In Canada, it was around $2000-2500 per year for Quebec residents (aka in-state) at prestigious McGill University. Tuition in the US is insane.

[@johnyarbrough502]

The models at 4:54 have washers and driers! No sharing machines in the basement with a handful of quarters and either sitting there for a couple of hours or hoping you still have clothes when come back.

[@skyak4493]

I started at OSU in 1981 and most dorm rooms looked more like prison cells compared to even your "before" pic. After my freshman year I was allowed to move to private "off campus" housing. I rented a basement bedroom for $60/mo and it was tolerable because I had access to an efficiency apt (arguably the best in the house) I shared with my brother. We both had engineering CO-OP jobs so we worked out of town every third Q. We had to swap to keep this sweet $130/mo apt. The real mind blower looking back is that both of us could work our way through school! While I was at OSU my parents and some of their friends considered buying rental houses near campus for investment. Even with the low rents, these houses were great, cash flow positive investments with incredible tax advantages. This didn't go unnoticed because soon a large outfit (DeSantis) began buying over 90% of properties for sale in the area, then started working on buying houses that were not for sale. You guessed it! After mild upgrades, rents started rising exponentially.

[@kni9ght]

Hey went to OSU myself, had to live campus last number of years or my loans would be crazy, can’t even get a job with my two degrees

[@arevolvingdoor3836]

My university has insane tuition before grants and aid, about 45K per year, the one thing I will give it credit for is that they give us decent housing options well below market rates, around 6K per year, versus local market rate of 11K plus summer fees of around 3K. In addition the dining options are reasonable as well at around 2K, rather than the 2.8K at my local state school. Neither food nor housing were costs I considered when I was applying, but in the end even if the tution was more expensive, I think it might've been about even with some of the more local state schools for me, due to the lower housing costs. I don't know if this comment will reach students who are choosing their universities, but make sure you know the full story when picking your university, when it comes to cost there is more to it than just the tuition fees, DO YOUR Research!

[@sup8668]

American campus communities is associated with UCI, and they literally just raised their prices another 200$ a month, despite the original statement from the university saying it was a form of “affordable housing”

[@sup8668]

Side note they also only do 11.5 months for their leasing term, when a majority of students only stay for 9 months for the school year. I’m pretty sure they only do this so they can leech more money from students, while the university housing for 9 month is 5k cheaper, but extremely run down.

[@ninjaydes]

Deleted comment since it read more like a pointed attack than a food for thought observation.

[@AlexanderGreensmith]

morning brew could literally cover a topic on anything and make it interesting

[@jpvoodoo5522]

There should be no notion of a "high end" dorm. Everyone who stays in dorms gets the same dorm. You want luxury, stay off campus.

[@texaswunderkind]

No one wants to live in a 12x12 cinderblock box with a shower down the hall today. Just facts. Colleges are only responding to market conditions. They can't maintain those huge old buildings for the bottom-basement rents they would have to charge to convince someone to live there.

[@michaelsasso13]

Absolutely….rich kids and poor kids get the same door room. Last thing an 18 year old needs is luxury, or lack of it and then be reminded every day for 4 years that some of their classmates are better than them. I was only reminded of this fact when I went home for Christmas break and hung out at my parents house for 2 weeks, while some rich kids went to Vail.

[@LaitoChen]

The high end forms are for the kids of the foreign nationals and Saudi princes who want the "American college experience". It's not made for middle class Americans

[@jpvoodoo5522]

@@LaitoChen , F* them. They can stay in a dorm and eat Ramen noodles or not go to school. That's the American College Experience. At least for most Americans.

[@pierrex3226]

That's anti American though. How much more money could we charge? Yes

[@justin_time]

College is such a sham. And this is coming from a person with two degrees. I'm curious how colleges will cope with declining enrollment rates and after that, declining birthrates. I hope the taxpayers don't get stuck with the bill for subsidizing developers losses when they inevitably start complaining and try to exit their contracts with the universities because there aren't enough students to fill the dorms to pay rent because college becomes too expensive for folks to attend or the students simply don't exist to fill the slots. A lot will change over the next 65 years in terms of higher education if current trends continue.

[@stevechance150]

Dude you didn't get the memo? Gen Z is the smallest generation EVER, the birthrate has already been declining. The replacement birthrate is 2.1 and we're at 1.66 for last year. Corporate America has succeeded in making life too expensive for young couples to afford to have kids.

[@beyondwhatisknown]

Immigration rates will be increased to replace all the people that corporations prevent from being born. That's how Canada operates.

[@wilsonwijaya.design]

U know what will happen? They're gonna start scamming more people from india and Pakistan to come to their 'prestigious' university or colleges while in reality these students are gonna start breaking their backs and barely have time to be an actual student just to pay their stupid $20-30k first semester. If they manage to survive good but most will either get sick and go back or actually die. Look at Canada already doing that.

[@ninjaydes]

@@stevechance150 There will always be enough students to fill dorms due to international students and immigration, which can be more easily increased than a country's birthrate.

[@DS-wo8wr]

Both my kids… gen Z’ers, declined college… there is simply no way to justify the cost, and by extension, the debt.

[@alyssapowell1799]

My dad went to college in the late 50s and lived in a barracks style building that was set up for the GIs. There were 20 guys to a room with bunk beds, a desk and cabinet. That was it. To study, they went to the library. But I don't think any Millennials or Gen Z would be willing to accept the crappiness of the dorms me or my dad that were incredibly bare bones with lots of issues - no AC, heat that barely worked, noisy, etc. I was in one of the dorms built in the 60s that were rather spartan, but not quite as spartan and the dorms for the GIs. But the competition to get kids to attend would also probably limit those wanting the basic dorm I had in the late 90s.

[@johnyarbrough502]

And everybody on the floor shared the plumbing that was at the end of the hall.

[@terradoom8503]

Honestly, I would if it was priced accordingly, even if you want no frills for cheap rent it's barely possible

[@nunyabidness3075]

I went to school in 1983. I chose a single room in dorms that were built as temporary housing after WW2 for GI Bill students. I could have saved a little by choosing the men’s only, no AC, dorms which were architecturally superior from IIRC the 1910’s. Cinder blocks and linoleum was probably the wiser choice.

[@duncan8437]

My grandparents post war germany had a 10qm room for themselves, nowadays 15-20qm for max 500€ is the norm. America is a 3trd world countrie for most of its citizens…

[@nunyabidness3075]

@@duncan8437 If you had a point, it must have been lost in translation. In what way is the US a third world country for most of its citizens, and how do you know this besides buying into clickbait nonsense designed to keep people down in the US?

[@reviewreactindulge4635]

UMass Amherst’s new dorms are grossly over priced as they were initially advertised for graduate students who are often among the poorest students. The prices were so high that they were unable to fill the rooms for a time and were advertising these “luxury” dorms to incoming freshmen( this part is anecdotal and second hand). Along with this a lot of the preexisting dorms are extremely old and out of date besides two seperate areas that are accessible to the honors college or the only university owned apartments which both are significantly more expensive that the base rate dorm

[@steelcitysportsfan1436]

You're better off commuting to your college classes than paying for room and board. If possible. And for those 1st 2 years go to Community College. You'll save so much money.

[@Billhatestheinternet]

Oklahoma State University...... I was certainly expecting them to make this list, but not be the first mentioned. I have stories to add to this clip that would horrify most. I arrived at OSU fresh off of an Iraq deployment; was a student and a building maintenance tech. This was during the T Boone Pickens era of attempting to terraform Stillwater to (the only obvious reason) own all real estate within a 10 mile radius in order to monopolise housing, to include demolishing off campus housing... The only other reason to do what OSU did would be in preparation to host the Olympics. The quality of housing and other issues, I could go on forever. Long story short: I did not fit in, could not see why (other than for OSU, a non profit state entity, to actually earn a profit) OSU deliberately would reduce housing in general, let alone affordable housing, and anything new was a rat nest with malfunctioning equipment.

[@MrZed411]

My biggest problem with current housing prices is the "low" end. Why is it that 2 people get put into a room the size of the room shown at 0:44 and each person is paying ~$1,000 PER MONTH?!?! What logical reasoning is there for charging $2,000 total for a room the size of ~100sq ft? If you google "100 sq ft apartment nyc" you'll see articles talking about people living in 100sq ft apartments for about $1,000 in NEW YORK CITY not in some random college town. Why do colleges get to charge double one of the most expensive cities in the world for the same space sized area? This conversation should also include meal plans. To pick an example talked about in this video, University of Kentucky requires students living on campus (other than those staying in the most expensive resident hall) to have a meal plan. These meal plans START at $500 a MONTH. A MONTH?!? And at that $500 a MONTH you get 10 meals a week. So pick 2 meals a day for only 5 days. Yes, you are getting better food options and don't have to make meals yourself, but to think that is an acceptable MINIMUM amount is crazy to me. Students that are trying to save money could easily pay less for meals by shopping at grocery stores or going to cheaper restaurants. For the price per meal of the meal plans you could paying almost $10 per meal and close to the same amount as the cheapest meal plan.

[@gregb6469]

I'm glad that when I went to college I went to a university in my town, so I commuted from home to class every day, and never had to mess with a dorm.

[@ma66ie]

I’m living in a $1,500/month on-campus apartment next semester. It has a pool (that no one uses), a movie theater (that no one uses), its own gym (even though it is a 5 min walk to the main campus gym), and a made-to-order burger restaurant. Most people think they add these things so they can charge us more, and I can’t disagree. No college student was ever going to use all that.

[@celieboo]

I interviewed for a job in a small college town in Ohio. The job sounded decent and I like the partners, but I declined the offer. When I was looking at housing options for my family, there was very little for sale and even less for rent. I imagine this has a lot to do with the skyrocketing housing costs on campus.

[@Knox2go]

. I'm a landlord and I can tell yyou they are making great money off the rentals. They also don't fall under rent control laws in California. How do property taxes work at public University housing. The colleges in California are in the rental business and they are raking in the money.

[@Julian-tf8nj]

Colleges in the US have become such a racket.... So sad! 😬

[@tokyojon4344]

Back early 1990s when I went to Arizona State, in-state tuition was $500/semester. Paid for it delivering pizza a few times a week and some computer programming. My housing was a 2BR / 1BA small apartment across the street from the university at around $165/month each plus utilities. And back then, they had this thing called "J-O-B-S." I can't fathom how today's younger generation will survive.

[@FGH9G]

Damn Private Equity all to hell.

[@__________5737]

Contractors working on leased land was a short term cash jolt, but is a revenue loss long term.

[@scottlarson1548]

Those dorm rooms are *huge* compared to the ones I stayed in during the 1980s which were about eight feet wide. They also didn't have actual stud walls. They simply slid single sheets of 5/8th inch drywall into tracks in the ceilings and floors between the rooms. You could poke a nail into the next room by hanging a picture.

[@Primarilycarbonbasedlifeform]

It's been a pleasure to watch the growth and refinement of your content, and I'm impressed, proud of, and happy that you are succeeding in this space!

[@antoniogoncalves705]

Student from Syracuse University. The only thing I don't agree is forcing me to live in a dorm and than making me pay an unfair price for this. I live in a single dorm room, the classic style, and I pay almost the same as if I lived in a Studio or a 1 Bed Ap which pisses me off because if I refuse to live on campus during my first 2 years, I can't get my degree.

[@ian-hm6cx]

2:19 actually so weird seeing the window that im sitting right next to in a video lmao

[@relentero8547]

You’re a lucky mf to have such a nice dorm room 😭 what state is that in?

[@jeretso]

The reason is students borrowing too much money and parents living beyond their means bidding up prices. My friend's kid is paying $4,000 a month for rent in the middle of nowhere small town campus. Fortunately, he has 3 roommates so that's $1,000 each. All 4 kids are cosigned with their parents.

[@blesdpersn]

Left CA two years ago after 30 years; regular people don't talk/care "overregulation", that sounds like a think tank talking point. They also don't care about over policing, even though I think they should, since police make up a MASSIVE part of major city budgets and prisons a meaningful chunk of the state budget with no measurable effect on crime. Homelessness comes from folks being priced out of their homes and then CA spends on policing and incarcerating them. "Affordable housing" programs there are disingenuous and not actually affordable; they've got senators that are heavily invested in real estate. CA is only progressive in a shallow sense; it's still a playground of the rich and powerful - but there are residents there working to change that.

[@dajcomputer6514]

I worked at a big uni system on policy and let me tell you...the contract agreements and strongarming power that food suppliers have to force universities to agree to high caffeteria meal plan prices is crazy. Goes hand in hand with room and board costs. Both are not as regulated or within the power to control as much as tuition.

[@ricksarvas6563]

This is going to backfire in a huge way for these private equity firms as universities will be facing ever decreasing enrollments due to more and more people choosing to not have kids. Less students will result in lower demand for student housing.

[@dylanlough5234]

I work in student housing and this is pretty accurate BUT One thing to keep in mind is that the increase in price is reflective of the housing market as a whole. Also, more building means more supply and should force prices down. Also, universities aren’t experts in construction like the big 3 private student housing developers. This is a huge advantage for the universities that have the lease/build agreements and why they are so popular.

[@michaelchen3631]

I went to UMass right as construction of Fieldstone (the new private apartment complex) completed. I can say with pride that they’re having so much trouble renting out the exorbitantly priced rooms, that they’ve taken to giving one month of rent away for free. Even then, they’re far under capacity.

[@dudeonbike800]

"We can't have FREE college!" Um, we certainly can and did. Back when we realized educating a big chunk of our young adults was an excellent investment in our future. New Deal politics taxed the rich and made sure EVERY AMERICAN had economic opportunity. (And yes, many minorities were excluded. That's fixable. Unaffordable education for all is untenable.) Restore American prosperity!

[@ninjaydes]

Surely the amount the wealthy get taxed does not need to be increased, as the US already collects too much tax from every worker in the country. Rather, there are too many loopholes to reinvest what should be tax to the gov't to one's own business, so wealthy business owners effectively pay a lower % tax than their employees.

[@anakinalvarez7106]

When I went to college in a small town, I ended up getting very close with a local my age. Within their family there was someone on the town council, someone who owned a substantial part of the town real estate, and someone who ranked high on the local police force. Unfortunately it became clear there was a united effort in that town to take advantage of college students and jacking up prices where possible. The locals had always resented students and acted in their favor against the students whenever possible.

[@stevechance150]

America.

[@stevechance150]

I bet they attended the local church every Sunday too.

[@aliannarodriguez1581]

Towns vs gowns, a tale as old as colleges it seems.

[@MegaLokopo]

The problem is a lack of competition. The solution is building more housing. Prices only go down and they always go down, when supply is so much higher than demand building owners loose money from the massive amount of empty units. So long as demand is higher than supply prices will always go up. Who owns the property doesn't matter.

[@g.s.3450]

100% accurate. This video is well-researched, thoughtfully analyzed and has an excellent presentation. I previously worked for some of the companies you mentioned and I also put a kid through Arizona State University (ASU). Most universities use the dorm profits to fund new stadiums which are unnecessary. Great video! I cancelled my charitable contributions to universities and now send my money to technical schools.

[@Joe-ij6of]

I’m not sure why a large university can’t work directly with the general contractor, architect and engineering firm to commission construction of the exact same units but then own it outright, especially since this is just the same few unit types repeated many hundreds of times. Obv this is crazy and disappointing for young people to go further in debt.

[@mavinajfan]

I went back to school, at 32, to get my masters. My mom was like why don’t you live in a dorm instead of living in an apartment. I paid $8,300 a year for my studio apartment, a 15-20 min walk to campus, which was much nicer than the $12,000 I’d have spent living in the dorms for 9 months which sort of suck and I’d have to share a tiny room with a random roommate, no thanks! I live in a 2 bedroom apartment now and only pay $2,000 more a year for 4-5 times the space a normal dorm room has plus I don’t have to share a bathroom and have my own kitchen and garage. Why would I choose to live in a dorm, it’s such a ripoff! At UW Green Bay, they had apartment style dorms which were so nice, we all had our own rooms and bathrooms, that being said, they were so expensive, living in an apartment would’ve been cheaper. The campus is so far away from anything and public transport sucks though, so if you didn’t have a car, you really couldn’t access the campus and had to live in the dorms.

[@mahlwal]

I went to a top 10 university and paid $10k a year for the no frills dorm with no AC in 2015 :(

[@edfhobbies556]

I'm making my mission to get all three of my kids through college without debt ..zero zip nada. One Dr. One data scientist and one one IT operations developer. This predatory profiteering is unnecessary and is hurting the country as a whole

[@dekufan-f7i]

honestly might be better to go to a foreign uni at this rate

[@edfhobbies556]

@@dekufan-f7i We've checked them out, tuition is 5000 a year for Barcelona Uni outside of Eurozone..... A YEAR !!

[@edfhobbies556]

@@dekufan-f7i Barcelona Uni tuition outside of Eurozone is 5100 a year !!!

[@wisenber]

Most schools were seeing reduced demand for on campus housing. Demand for on campus housing actually increased when the more expensive options were available. It's also worth noting that students at LSU, Alabama, Kentucky....have been coming from wealthier families on average over the last 50 years as tuition inflation hit. They were the ones paying for off campus housing with new appliances, gyms, pools and tennis courts. 10X12 dorms with two twin beds and a bathroom down the hallway are still around, and there have been fewer and fewer takers.

[@mgutierrez2351]

Its funny how Iowa State, the school I go to doesn’t really have big housing issues because 1. There in Iowa but 2. They pretty much have created an absolute arsenal of housing option with all the land they own around the university which previously used to be cornfield. Ranging from 4 people dorms with or without a/c, 2 people dorms with or without a/c, solo dorms, larger solo rooms, suites, apartments, townhouses, all across dozens of buildings and ranging in all prices. And not limiting the freshmen to live in a specific hall or apartment which is great too. Widens their options vastly and this doesn’t even count the off campus options.

[@somedandy7694]

I love how you guys have info-bites and skits.

[@dilwraththedestroyer]

Interesting video, but I feel like you've oversimplified an extremely complex system of problems. I work in real estate development for a major public university. Thus, I have direct experience with this issue. The implication from this video is that student housing costs have sky rocketed due to partnerships between schools and greedy developers. In reality, like all housing, student housing costs have sky rocketed due to market competition and extremely high construction costs. In fact, a benefit of the public/private partnership between a school and a private developer is that the developer can build the project for a much lower cost than the school. There are a lot of reasons for this fact, but much of it has to do with regulations and bureaucracy that exist if a school does the project. The public/private partnerships as shown in this video are a response to the bloated costs. I can promise you with 100% certainty, schools teaming up with developers have NOT led to unnecessary bloating of costs. Quite the opposite. These partnerships are slowing the exponential growth of costs for education. An outsider looking in will think the costs are a result of developer greed. However, this assumption is made in ignorance.

[@TheOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO]

At UIUC, based in rural Illinois, housing was quite cheap on campus. Dorm housing, however, was extremely expensive. I personally also really do not like dorms because they don't have ktichens and dining hall food is awful everywhere. One would say that you could simply chose to not live on campus. But UIUC came up with a rule that incoming freshmen had to stay in the dorms for a year. You had to somehow get a special exemption to avoid staying in the dorms.

[@andrewdiamond2697]

1:42 Says "big state school" and shows high rises from the Ivy League University of Pennsylvania. Since Penn is in the City of Philadeplhia, it had to build up, because it couldn't build out without bulldozing a lot of real estate.

[@FirstNameLastName-gh9iw]

Im so thankful for my scholarships with these current prices

[@scottweisel3640]

As fewer people choose college, colleges are competing for the shrinking pool of students. Just as college football programs recruit by showcasing their training facilities, the colleges are recruiting students with higher end housing facilities. I have seen state universities in my home state that should probably close, instead embark on a desperate (IMO) gamble of building brand new dormitories to try to attract students so they can stay afloat.

[@Kevin_Rhodes]

There are jail cells nicer than the dorm room I had my freshman year in 1987 at University of Maine Farmington, and we were THREE to a room that should have had two. But room, board, AND tuition was $4K for that first year. Kids today have NO idea how good they have it, but they sure do get to pay for it for a long, long, long time.

[@eyeseer1]

October 2016 to May 2019 I was a student apartment nightwatch guard of 140 apartments with 3 tenants per unit. Parking space was $600 for 6 months.

[@adamr4198]

One of the best financial decisions I ever made was living with my parents during grad school. There were times when it was less than ideal. Overall I was so busy with school and work that I had little time to party. It worked out well and helped me keep my debt down. I actually paid off my grad school loans years before I paid off my undergraduate loans.

[@DKREALFEEL]

I’m a contractor and we build a TON of college dorms in CA. Building costs had a bigger jump than normal last year and this year. That accounts for a bit of the change.

[@ReadingDave]

It use to be (in the 90's) dorm prices were on par with the cheapest rents in the city.

[@james_halpert]

It is crazy that $7000 per year for a shared dorm room is seen as reasonable. When I studied in Germany a few years ago, I paid less than half of that for an appartment style dorm (not shared and with my own bathroom and mini-kitchen corner). What is going on with these prices?

[@mustang8206]

My dorm is an apartment complex owned by the school and while it is more expensive I love it. I get my own space to live in instead of a tiny room with two beds like I had freshman year, where I had to share a shower and only had a microwave to cook with

[@christianlibertarian5488]

I still believe that the decade of “free money” has created these issues. Blackstone would never have considered investing in student housing two decades ago; the return would not have been there. But if the money is free, any return at all is an infinite ROI. But this has stopped, IMHO. 5% interest is here to stay, and students won’t be able to spend the kind of money that such implied ROI demands.

[@tjcihlar1]

But with interest rates going back down, private equity will have the free money to buy up everything and rent it back to us at extreme prices.

[@christianlibertarian5488]

@@tjcihlar1 “Back down” is not zero (or less). Inflation rates of 3% are 50% higher than 2%.

[@poncho6784]

ASU has totally become a real estate holding company that happens to also run a university. Housing costs are crazy. It’s not just dorms that cost so much. ANY apartment within walking distance to campus will set you back at least 1,200 per month PER STUDENT.

[@hbt739]

It is just about the fact that a university these days is a cooperation not a institute for learning. It is why we have bullsh*t degrees, tuition higher then everywhere else and these expansive rooms. When u have investors from quatar then they just want money

[@loganlopez1617]

The dorm I started in was $550/mo and it was the second to last year that it existed because it was an ancient building. It was in the NYT as one of the country's worst dorms. My boss went to school in the dorms, and was horrified when he told me which building and he's like "yeah it's long been torn down I bet..." And I'm like "no I have a friend living in that dorm". They replaced it with this brand new dorm complex which had amazing amenities but doubled the price, I was off campus by then and the most expensive dorms previously then became the cheapest option after.

[@themoose70]

Wow! Great piece! You are a fine journalist!

[@christopherwaller2798]

It's worth highlighting that in the UK, shared rooms are almost unheard of (one of the comments refers to a shared 400 sq ft room. In the UK we would just have two rooms, each less than half that size!), and most universities are barely able to provide enough housing for first year students and also have a significant cohort of local students (so the idea that you could be forced to live in "halls" without a waiver is unheard of); but that en-suite rooms are relatively novel, and whilst common in newer "PBSA" (purpose build student accommodation), are rare in the privately rented shared houses and flats that many students live in.

[@jayspeidell]

I went to Virginia Tech and in 2007 the cost of an apartment was way cheaper than a dorm. And you get windows, a private bathroom, mail, etc. $350 ($700 for both) for a 2br apartment with a roommate but your own room versus $450 ($900 for two) for a tiny shared room with concrete walls and a small window with not much air circulation.

[@p07a]

You guys should make a video on college textbook reselling (im)potentials,” and digital textbook licenses. It’s one of the things that made me livid when I was in college knowing I can’t resell a book that teaches 300-year-old physics and maths because they shuffle the questions and chapters around.

[@chungo4800]

ok state student here, it was cheaper to pay dues and live and eat at the fraternity house freshman year than it was to live in the dorms and have a meal plan, isn’t it supposed to be the other way around?

[@jbux9128]

I worked for one of these companies and (surprise) they didn't pay well at all. They also received money from the school for not filling the building. It's an insane grift.

[@Rose-ec6he]

The fact the university doesn't put a price cap to keep their dorms affordable in the as a condition of their contracting, it shows that they're complacent. Willingly taking advantage of young adults and never telling them they're being overcharged is not a lesson; mallace is not a lesson in itself

[@folumb]

I went to a middle tier state school in Texas and even there, 10 years after my graduation, they have 40% of the housing as luxury student housing and just about everything off campus is luxury apartments. Tuition has marginally risen since I left (thank goodness) but there's no way I could afford to be a student again. UT Austin where I almost went had similar tuition yet the true cost of attendance was so high it kept me out. Thankfully my life has turned out great without having gone to UT but it's unfortunate that 10 years ago I couldn't attend the best public school in my state due to what amounts to rent money and 10 years later that problem is way worse.

[@Caldaron]

Western Nations are really deserving of their people's loyalty

[@12345wwww]

Go to another U where housing is priced by the market, rather than by a monopolist. The U doesn't care. It could have regulated prices (adjusted for inflation) and lengthen the lease. Normally the condition of the buildings before handing over is specified and independently verified.

[@bmona7550]

Watching this gave me relief that I studied abroad. It was tough but at the end if it all I saved a lot of money and avoided crippling college loans/debt.

[@AlphineWolf]

Best of all, international students in civilized countries like Canada get access to universal health care. Just gotta pay full price for the public health insurance, and it kicks in after 1 semester

[@mindfullymellow2323]

My son was an international student in the UK. Wonderful experience, made lifelong friends. And it was cheaper than sending him to a state university. Graduated debt free.

[@Marvin-ii7bh]

​@@mindfullymellow2323For Master degrees you can also go to other European countries, even if you don't speak the language. This made possible because many Master programmes are taught completly in English in Europe. The potential benefit are even lower to no tuition, possibly lower living expenditures than in the Uk and even more international exposure.

[@mindfullymellow2323]

@@Marvin-ii7bh - good to know, thank you! More American students should look into an international education. My son enjoyed every minute of it, and I went over there twice myself during his studies.

[@samuelross9884]

I attended Western Governors University. 3k per 6 month semester, 4 class minimum with no maximum, no housing costs (remote classes), sequential classes (take one class, complete, move on to the next class, complete, repeat until finished). Good deal all around.

[@kouheimassey]

And despite the dorms being overpriced and overfurnished, there's still somehow asbestos in two dorm halls, and black mold in another. Underpaid profs and overpaid admin, overpriced dining hall food and an increasingly disconnected social life. Truly the best time ever for college students

[@fulcrum1575]

I was an RA at a “new-Ivy” and we had whole presentations about the new buildings they bought out and would be renovating. My uni was also something like 40% international students. *Wealthy* international students. The rest of us (I went on full scholarship) can’t keep up:

[@merelk.9530]

Lived on Stanford campus with my partner this last semester. Windows didn't close properly and the walls were so thin I could hear people talk outside (we were on the 8th floor). At least the equipment worked and repairs, when needed, were done swiftly. I believe we paid about 2400 USD per month for a 1-bedroom.

[@camslumlord]

I remember dorm at Stetson University in Florida. Had no private or semi private bathroom. ( Just communal shower and toilet). No A/C ( even though this was Central Florida). This was in 1969.

[@rahuliyer7456]

My nephew attends Minot State University in North Dakota. It is surprisingly affordable... even the dorms. Additionally, if you look at university in India, you will find it very affordable by USA standards, and they have good quality.

[@Chasing-the-outdoors]

They are preparing students for the “luxury apartments” they will have to rent when they graduate. Because that’s what people want, a fancy countertop, not affordable housing.

[@RohitSharma-mi8gt]

Education in the US needs to take a chunk out of defense budget !

[@vernacular1483]

“College” keeps looking more and more like a scam… or at least a poor ROI choice. Ppl are getting milked.

[@yesimemoin0935]

4:11 if the school takes over in 40+ years, they're on the hook for the most expensive long-term maintenance. These dorms are most profitable when the developer is getting his cut. Just a ripoff at student expense.

[@redwolfexr]

Yeah, and they lease PER BEDROOM. One common area and 4 separate bedrooms were common at the school I went to. Thankfully I was both GI Bill and old enough that I could live off campus. It was WAY cheaper to get a 1BR off campus than a shared apartment on campus. And that was 30 years ago, TSTC Waco was a "pioneer" in private equity provided housing.

[@diontryban5645]

I go to a university in Florida and the dorm rates are much cheaper than other state schools. ~$4,500 per semester for the nicest room on campus, which is a 2bedroom 1 bathroom apartment style with a kitchen and utilities near the center of campus. Florida tuition is also much cheaper. I would love it if someone did an investigation into why Florida higher education has stayed so cheap while other states have had their education prices skyrocket.

[@justinegerhazi6829]

This is interesting. In southern Ontario it’s the complete opposite. Dorms are incredibly competitive with the outside housing market most of the time. So much so that they will get filled up really quickly and most students don’t get the chance to get a dorm and have to either commute or find somewhere to rent. However, there are instances where families are opening up their basements for students housing so that students don’t have to pay like 2-5k a month for a one bedroom. (Dorms are around 2-4k per semester). All in CAD$

[@grandamericantravelblog3421]

My senior year I had the luxury dorm that had air conditioning unlike all the other dorms on campus. Not only did it cost extra, but it also was only turned on for 4 weeks of the whole year. In the spring semester my dorm room would be 83 degrees inside. And it would be about 80 outside as well. They waited for about a month of the weather being like that until they turned on our AC.

[@sadbiomedicalengineer]

I feel like something that should be mentioned here is that the "low end" dorms that now cost as much as the "high end" dorms used to are literally still the old low end dorms in a lot of cases. Idk what it costs now, but the really old cinderblock shoebox dorms where I went to undergrad cost something like $3k/semester AND you couldn't be an RA unless you'd already lived on campus for a year.

[@tallrocko7010]

As a college student the dorms where I go to school don't seem to be that bad for the price to quality because my dorm which is one of the nicer ones on campus is $1700 a quarter for a large room for two people and a private bath then there's the old traditional dorms but I don't remember how much they cost and some new traditional halls along with some on campus apartments mixed in. In summary there's a mixture of everything.

[@neroxfrostbyte7461]

At that point, you're better off trying to find a nearby apartment to rent out for cheaper, even if you have to commute sometime away from campus. There was a story of a Canadian College Student that flew twice a week to the city where his College/University was located to just attend his classes for those 2 days and then flew back home because the plane tickets were cheaper than paying for an apartment/housing at or near the University campus itself

[@Brigasimon]

It’s about time dorms improve in quality. When I went to college over a decade ago dorms were complete dumps and still were more expensive than off-campus housing that had all the best amenities. I’m very happy to have only lived off-campus while in college.

[@ryans7097]

Higher education has become such a money making scam in America. I used to be all for it with both my parents and multiple family members in education. The cost of education has gotten completely out of control and don’t even get me started on how much of a scam college loans are. Things need to change and they need to change drastically.

[@awsomo53]

This is wisconsin is amazing. Our state institutions dont charge nearly that much. Room and Board for a semester is 2k. Super cheap and great instruction.