A St Andrews student slept in a tent and another believed she may have to drop out as a housing crisis in the town continues.
One second year student from Kent camped overnight in St Andrews for the beginning of term after searching since February for a place to stay.
Another second year considered taking a gap year before securing accommodation at the last minute.
The mother of the 19-year-old student who had to camp asked not be named but says trying to find housing has been a “nightmare”.
She said: “My son is quite used to camping so that’s why he made the decision to go back to St Andrews to find accommodation and take his tent because he literally had nowhere to stay.
“He wanted to be with all of his friends but also he needed to get on with his academic work this week.”
The psychology student applied for student accommodation in Spring but was unsuccessful.
The university said the student hadn’t applied for any of their available Dundee accommodation options offered in August, and wasn’t on their small waiting list for places.
After posting a desperate appeal on Facebook, a friend of the student’s mum reached out to help.
‘He shouldn’t be in this situation at university’
She said: “A friend phoned around a lot of people she knew in the area and managed to find someone who owns an Airbnb who has agreed to let the property out to my son for this year only.
“If this doesn’t work out is he is going to sell his car and buy a campervan which is not what you should have to do if you want to study somewhere.
“If my son does get this place today, I’m going to be paying more money for his accommodation than I am for my mortgage.
“He shouldn’t be in this situation at university.”
The student’s mum pointed out the crisis is not isolated to St Andrews and said she is now contemplating whether to send her daughter to university at all next year.
‘A really draining experience’ finding housing in St Andrews
Another St Andrews student, Aby Isaac from Manchester, said she was seriously considering taking a gap year due to the stress of being unable to find a place to live.
The 19-year-old said: “I had been searching since December last year and you keep on hearing people say ‘have hope’ or ‘keep faith’ but it’s near impossible to keep that after eight months of constantly looking for housing.
“It got to the point where I was considering doing a gap year because I can’t be bothered with the stress.”
Aby has now been offered accommodation in Dundee after her case was raised by The Courier, despite failing to secure a place to stay there previously.
But the situation has proven extremely stressful for the financial economics student as she said she considered dropping out altogether.
She said: “It has been a really draining experience.
“My studies are the last thing on my mind right now – I wasn’t even sure if I was going to be there.
“If I wanted to live in Dundee I would have applied to be a Dundee student.
“You apply for St Andrews, the place, as well as the university.”
Aby estimated she applied for around 25 flats while looking for accommodation and described rent prices as “outrageous”.
Why is there a housing crisis?
The university says a “range of external factors beyond their control” have impacted the private accommodation sector, including:
- A cap on the numbers of Houses of Multiple Occupation (HMO) imposed by Fife Council
- An increase in private landlords choosing let their properties out as holiday homes
- The Open golf tournament increasing the number of visitors and tourists this year.
- The Scottish Government deciding to award A-Level and Higher exam results in 2020 and 2021 by teacher-assessed grades leading to larger numbers of students.
A university spokesperson said they were “sorry to hear a student felt he had no option but to sleep in a tent”.
They added: “Our residences team has worked enormously hard over the past month to support and help offer accommodation to the 130 students who told us at the start of August that they’d been unable to find a place.
“Of these, 120 have either accepted offers from us, or been able to find accommodation elsewhere.
“With a week to go before term starts, we have 10 returning students left on our waiting list.
“Nine of them have decided not to apply for a place in our Dundee residence.
“That is their choice, but we will continue to offer them this option if spaces become available.”
Conversation