While some students will stick to living on residence following first year, the majority will strike out on their own to find housing off-campus.
For most of these students, it will be their first experience living in a state of almost total independence, and navigating through the flurry of leases, roommates and rent can be a dizzying ordeal.
Roommates are an important thing to consider when house hunting.
“The majority of students want to get an apartment or house with friends they met in first year,” said Wanda Bochert of Carleton’s department of housing and conference services.
Though this is a reasonable option, she suggested that groups create a roommate agreement that maintains each person’s commitment to next year’s lease, since many unexpected things can happen while planning.
Once the group is established, it’s time to hunt.
The most popular areas for Carleton students are the Glebe, Centretown, Old Ottawa South, Hog’s Back and South Keys.
While everyone wants that perfect place with a grocery store down the street and a bus stop at the front door, the most important thing to remember is that opportunities come and go quickly.
“If you’ve got a big group, like four or six people the best time to start is now,” Bochert said, since most of the big houses go around February or March.
However, smaller apartments and single rooms are added all year round, even into the summer.
Bochert encouraged students to keep an eye on the Carleton Housing website, which is updated daily with local houses and apartments for rent.
Rob McGregor is a caseworker at Housing Help Ontario, a government-funded but independent organization that assists people looking for affordable rental accommodation, and said their site has listings not found anywhere else.
He also suggests Ottawa-for-rent.com, which combines multiple sites like Craigslist and Kijiji as good places to begin.
Though the Internet is the best resource for house/apartment hunting, McGregor stresses the importance of viewing and making agreements in person.
“Some people sign or agree to a lease without ever seeing the place,” he said, also stressing that sometimes apartments shown in a building aren’t the ones actually being leased.
“People realize students are renting for the first time and can sometimes take advantage of that,” McGregor said, calling attention to the fact that landlords will show their property in the best possible light — literally.
Most viewings happen “around noon or two in the afternoon” he said, “but I suggest if you’re unfamiliar with the area go back between 6 to 10 at night to see what it’s really like.”
Though there certainly are many challenges to finding the right place, it’s all worthwhile when moving into your first ‘real place.’