Warwick in top five for late rent repayments

New statistics obtained under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that Warwick is in the top five of universities with students in rent arrears.

According to the data uncovered by the Liberal Democrats, about 17,300 students across UK universities living in halls have fallen into rental arrears in the past year, which is a 16% rise. The number of evictions has also more than doubled, with 97 students having their tenancies cancelled last year, compared to 40 in the previous year.

The statistics were based on responses from 90 UK universities, 21 of which had evicted a student or cancelled their contract due to failure to pay rent on the time in the past five years. The data also showed a 13.6% rise in the average university hall fees from £4,583 a year in 2012-13 to £5,208 in 2016-17.

Warwick explained its high level of arrears by stating that as a campus university that had chosen to continue to own its accommodation, it had a “great many more students renting accommodation from us than other universities”.

Between now and the last academic year, rent at all the halls on the Warwick campus, apart from at Redfern and Whitefields, rose. The steepest price increases were seen at Bluebell and Sherbourne, both of which had £195 added to their overall yearly fee.

A first-year student living in halls at Warwick commented: “My maintenance loan doesn’t cover the total cost of my accommodation fees and so while looking for somewhere to live next year I need to find somewhere with lower rent than what I pay now in halls.”

My maintenance loan doesn’t cover the total cost of my accommodation fees and so while looking for somewhere to live next year I need to find somewhere with lower rent than what I pay now in halls

– A first-year student

To tackle the problem of rising rents and to prevent the number of students in rent arrears, a number of measures proposed by Sabbatical Officers in the Student Rents Working Party were agreed upon in November by Warwick Accommodation for the 2018-19 academic year.

It was decided that Whitefields and Redfern halls will be decreasing in rent, while Westwood prices will be frozen at their current rate and that the number of undergraduate lets that can be paid for entirely by the minimum maintenance loan will be retained.

The planned increase of 3% upon all Warwick campus rents was also negotiated down to 2.59%.

Brunel, York, Leicester and Leeds also joined Warwick at the top of the list of universities with students in rent arrears.

A spokesman for the University of York cited similar reasons as Warwick: “The University of York manages the majority of its student accommodation, unlike some institutions which contract a large proportion of its services out, which makes like-for-like comparisons difficult to measure.”

Brunel University London said that no students had been asked to leave and that it offered support for those who found themselves financially overstretched and an advice service to help students plan their spending. The Universities of Leicester and Leeds declined to comment.

The data revealing the situation of student rent arrears has emerged during a time of debate in government about how best to support students with financing their higher education.

Calling for the government to reinstate grants for students from low income families, education spokeswomen for the Liberal Democrats, Layla Moran stated: “This is a deeply worrying situation which will no doubt have contributed to some students dropping out of their university courses altogether.”

She added: “I cannot believe that it is sheer coincidence that the number of students evicted or having the tenancies cancelled has doubled in the last year since the Prime Minister scrapped grants for students from the most disadvantaged backgrounds.”

Izzy Lenga, vice-president of the National Union of Students, said: “Rather than falling into the easy temptation to label these as cases of rent avoidance, we instead need to urge the government and the higher education sector to wake up to the reality that students are being priced out of their education.”