The UCL accomodation thread

Hey...so what did you put down as your maximum weekly amount?

Im in a similar situation, Id rather have a single, (maybe) catered room which close to the Uni, so basically ifor evans or ramsay hall.

I dont know whether to put 150 or 200 as maximum, if i do £150 im gonna end up in a student house (not even a hall) probably really far away, and it'll be self catered probably

ahhhhh

The student houses are halls, they're just given a different name as they aren't catered. Astor has long corridors just the same as Ramsay. Also unless you go intercollegiate, if you put catered then you have a 50/50 chance of ending up far away in Ifor - there are way more self catered halls that are super close to uni. I would say go self catered anyway, you will miss so many meals due to sleeping in/being out in the evening that catered won't be worth it.

Also re. your earlier post - put UCL halls of residence first then intercollegiate second (as they are catered), and then put catered as your no.1 priority and around £175 as your price range. That will probably get you in Ramsay or Ifor if you really really want catered halls or possibly in an intercollegiate which are more expensive, but catered and almost all very close to uni.

Ahh thanks a lot! Im gonna go self catered I reckon. I might just go for max limit as £150 a week now. But im a bit confused on whether I should get ensuite as in is it worth £190? could you help me out please? (sorry if im buggin you)

Haha it's ok ehhh I would say no. The situation with being non-en suite is quite variable as particularly in the corridor accommodation they can get a bit gross, but the bonuses are that they are all cleaned regularly for you, and I don't know anyone who's ever had a real problem waiting for showers or anything. The main downside is just that after a big night out the toilets can be kind of questionable if a lot of people are using them. I'm in a pretty ideal situation in Schafer as I share 2 toilets and 1 shower between 5 people and they're rarely anything less than clean. Plus all the rooms have sinks.

So yeah, I'd say no to en suite as you save £40 of drinking/food money a week and don't have to clean your own bathroom

Oh thanks!! a lot!

Its not much problem with toilets, its more with the shower, having to carry clothes etc to the shower.
My mates brother went to shower and the other hall students took his clothes so he had to stay in there for the entire day lol

Why are people still asking which accomodation they should choose? Have people been leaving notes on their applications this year?

What do you think I should put as my price range if I want Astor? I could put £135, but I don't want to be in Max Rayne, I'd much rather be in one of the £150 rooms if I cannot get into Astor. Do you think it would be a good idea to put '£134+' / '£134-£200'?

I did the application a few weeks ago, still haven't got a confirmation e-mail. You shouldn't expect an e-mail any time soon, the UCL accommodation team are absolutely terrible, if you don't hear back after a month, then get in touch with them.

Oh thanks for the reassurance! But I'm an international, would I be hearing back even later than UK students?

Just a quick question about the application itself, I uploaded a photo and was able to submit everything, however now when I look back at the submitted application it doesn't show me the photo I uploaded. Is this supposed to happen? Thanks guys!

Yeah. The same thing happened to me. I emailed them asking whether they received the photo, they said yes...But if you are unsure, you can ask them yourself - to call would be probably better since they are now quite overloaded with work and - obviously - will not immediately respond to your email (I waited for a reply for week and a half).

I was thinking of putting single room as my priority though. How likely is it to get a shared room, do you think?

Ultimately there's no point in stressing out too much about it - the accommodation office can be pretty random in their allocations.

Hey I was wondering whether I should write something in the "special needs" page (not the disabilities or illness page) on the application that will ensure I am placed in a single room, close to the university.

I.e. my most important factor is single room, my preferences are (first) single room (second) single en-suite. But should I write anything in the box that will facilitate this criteria

e.g. the main reason im living out is that I will not have to commute and therefore I will be grateful if I am placed in accommodation close the uni etc...

THANKS!

Believe it or not....99.9% of people want a single close to uni..... so I can only imagine that putting that under the disabilities section would really pee the admissions office off more, and they would exact their revenge by dumping you in a twin somewhere far away.

Hey I was wondering whether I should write something in the "special needs" page (not the disabilities or illness page) on the application that will ensure I am placed in a single room, close to the university.

I.e. my most important factor is single room, my preferences are (first) single room (second) single en-suite. But should I write anything in the box that will facilitate this criteria

e.g. the main reason im living out is that I will not have to commute and therefore I will be grateful if I am placed in accommodation close the uni etc...

THANKS!

I did it on the old paper application so we didn't have a special needs box, I'd imagine it's for specific circumstances only though - I mean obviously the vast majority of UCL students going into halls are doing so to avoid commuting plus Max Rayne is like a 30 minute walk or a less than 10 minute bus ride so it's really not a big deal.

I guess you could try and claim that you snore really loud or are a really light sleeper or have to get up and pray at 5am every day or something to emphasise that having a roommate wouldn't be ideal? And then just put proximity and hope for the best. Honestly I would just prioritise single room, you will probably have a worse time having to share a room than you would having a slightly longer journey to uni - plus the Camden halls have all the bonuses of being in Camden, they have a massive Sainsbury's nearby, they're way closer to KoKo/Proud etc. It's not a big deal to be further away.

Hahaha, they sound like good excuses, but I might just leave it and just hope I dont end up far. Camden may not be too bad, but I dont want to end up at Goldsmid House.

The application also asked "if you don't get a room will you want to share" and I wrote no, so I reckon Ill end up in a single room, or no room at all

Yeah they ignore that if they can't put you anywhere but a shared room but your chances are pretty reasonable for getting a single.

And yeah Goldsmid would be pretty **** - if it does come to the worst though you can always put yourself on the swap list about a month-ish into term.