Housing Options and the Growing Unaffordability of being a UNR Student
Alexandra Rush and Rachel Jackson look into the housing options available to non freshmen students at UNR. With rent prices soaring higher than ever, especially near campus, students are struggling to find where to live while also being able to get to campus and afford other basic necessities.
Where Will We Go?
UNR non freshmen have no easy choices as they search for affordable rent off campus. Simply put, nowadays, they must choose between close range to campus or keeping more cash in their pockets.
The 2019 Argenta Hall explosion sparked a chain of events that only worsened the current student housing crisis in Reno. Argenta was a freshman only dorm with a reputation of being convenient with campus dining inside.
Since then, students have been shuffled from Circus Circus, to Whitney Peak, and now to Canyon Flats and Uncommon apartments to fill 1,300 beds that were once in use in the freshman dorm.
These freshmen have access to full kitchens, while simultaneously being forced to buy a meal plan due to university policy. These new luxury apartment options are only available to freshmen, leaving upperclassmen with few options for affordable housing.
“We do not have any plans to build residence halls in the near future. Right now, all our time, energy and resources are tied up into bringing Argenta Hall back online,” Chris Carver, the Assistant Director of Support Operations wrote back in an email after we requested an interview. Her position includes the “operational aspects of residence hall and meal plan assignment processes, prioritizing housing assignments that maximizes recruitment, developing internal policies and procedures for departmental and housing operations” and many more job elements according to her LinkedIn profile.
Canada or Bust
Tristen Taylor, 19, moved from Las Vegas to Reno in the fall of 2019 for their freshman year. They were assigned a room in Wolfpack Tower at Circus Circus, the temporary housing UNR had secured in place of Argenta Hall. After the pandemic began that March, they were sent home. Tristen moved into Canada Hall for their sophomore year, when they were given the notice to not come back to campus after Thanksgiving break. They only had two options: move home to Las Vegas, or stay in Reno to keep their steady job at a sandwich shop. They chose the latter, ending up living in Uncommon Apartments for the time being. They now live in Canada Hall again, and have not secured housing for the upcoming school year.
Built in 1993, Canada Hall serves as the only upperclassmen-only dorm on campus. One suite includes three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living area, and a kitchenette, all suitable for six students to live in. Sierra Hall also accommodates upperclassmen, but houses freshmen as well. Non-freshmen can live in either of the two, as well as Great Basin Hall if you’re a STEM major, and the Learning Living Community, if you wish to room with others in your shared major. Peavine is also an option. However, none of these other dorms feature the one thing an upperclassmen without a meal plan needs: a kitchenette.
While you can have a mini fridge and a microwave in any other dorm, the two-burner stove top is truly irreplaceable when it comes to cooking cuisine like ramen noodles.
Filtering out to “Luxury” Buildings or Further Away
With five floors and eight rooms per floor, minus the RAs’ rooms, that totals at 40 rooms. Multiply that by six residents per room (at full capacity), and you have about 240 upperclassmen housed. The rest filter out to Sierra, Great Basin, LLC, Peavine, and Juniper, where freshmen also reside.
“I would’ve liked to stay in Uncommon, but when I contacted Residential Life, they said that it was a freshmen-only building and if I wanted to, I could be put on a waitlist, but I most likely would not get in,” Tristen said. They’ve also had difficulty finding a shorter lease, since they will be leaving to study abroad in the spring. This was an issue last year, when students were stuck in year-long leases as the pandemic hit, who could no longer afford to live on their own.
Tristen then looked to Canyon Flats for a room, because, “It would be tuition paid, the same way that Canada Hall is, whereas YOUnion, Highlands… all of those are year leases only, and we once again need that six month lease.” They were denied housing there due to their upperclassmen status.
So that gives upperclassmen two options for on campus living: kitchenette or no kitchen. While single-room rates run higher than doubles, Canada Hall ranks fourth, tying Sierra Hall’s large double room for $3,630 for fall semester. Though it falls on the cheaper end, less than 250 spots are guaranteed for upperclassmen.
Amenities at a High Price
Meghan Frasier, a 21-year-old journalism student at UNR, is just one of many who end up in a bad living situation after falling for the promised amenities of ‘luxury student apartments’ near campus that just aren’t worth the price. Meghan has been living in ‘Identity’, one of those same apartments located just across from Lawlor Events Center since August 2019.
The apartment building prides itself on its close proximity to the campus and its amenities such as a vending machine, a rooftop meant for socializing and grilling, and computers for researching, typing and printing. With the COVID-19 pandemic limiting amenity options, it seems unfair to pay the same rent for just living in a small bedroom without the option to even walk to campus.
Many Students are Unhappy with Limited Options Near Campus
The fact that Identity continues to leave expired orange juice and watery coffee beans in their amenity area for months on end is concerning to Meghan as well.
“Mainly, I think their pricing of amenities should change if they aren’t gonna be of use. No reason to charge students hundreds more for a rooftop area that closes at 7 p.m., a coffee maker with no coffee in it, and a vending machine that has expired orange juice in it half the time,” Meghan said.
Meghan pays around $800 in rent and $100 for a general parking pass each month, plus utilities.
“The biggest issue that I’ve had with Identity was that I was charged over $800 in late fees for a redecoration fee. I wasn’t told that I needed to pay it by a certain time after signing a lease, especially because I wasn’t going to be moving into this apartment for another half a year,” Meghan explained.
Luxury & Late Fees
When Meghan switched rooms within her own apartment in order to have her own bathroom, Identity had added on fees without ever mentioning it out loud or in the lease agreement.
It was over half a year when she resigned and was only moving into a different room within the same unit. Meghan uses auto-pay when paying rent so it didn’t dawn on her that there could be possible fees for moving two doors down.
One day she checked her account balance and realized there was over $800 in fees for not paying what they called a ‘redecorating fee.’ Though there was no date listed on the lease agreement, previous emails or information from management, there had apparently been a certain date when she needed to pay her fees, and once it had passed, the late fees started.
Meghan was unable to pay it off in sections once she learned about this. According to Identity, it must all be paid off at once. Otherwise, every single day more late fees are added making it almost impossible to pay off without an entire month’s rent at hand.
Since then, she has fallen victim to Identity’s fees and debt multiple times. Though the luxury apartment advertises themselves to students at UNR, it seems that they offer no help to the same people they want to house.
As more people learn about the fees behind Identity and similar luxury apartments marketed towards students, many students like Tristen realize living close to campus comes with too many burdens to bear and must find housing further away.
However, living further away brings about its own problems too, including paying for a car, an expensive parking pass on campus, gas money and a surplus of parking tickets to those who can’t afford parking or expensive student living.
Long Commutes to Campus
Natalie Newman, a recent transfer from Western Nevada College and a junior at UNR, is saving her money by living at home. She is currently living in Minden, and travels on Tuesdays to her only in-person class from 7:45 to 8:45.
She uses about half a tank of gas to get to and from class. Her pass for parking near the football field is $180 for the semester. From there, Natalie longboards to class.
As for the upcoming Fall semester, she only has two in person classes twice a week, so she will continue to drive from home. With only one year left of attending college, she hopes to commute for the rest of her time.
“If I could move out, I would because I would like to, but I don’t have the money saved at the moment to just leave which is why I am commuting. I think I would enjoy living in Reno but I also enjoy driving,” Natalie said. Moving out would mean having to get another job in place of her current two that are close to home, which is not plausible for her.
Tristen will continue their search for an apartment further from campus to save money, while Meghan tries to find a lease elsewhere for the upcoming school year. Natalie is going to continue her commute next year, when she will graduate without living in the city her classes are in.
While these issues also involve freshmen gaining access to university partnered luxury apartments in place of Argenta Hall’s unexpected absence, they do leave upperclassmen in a bind. Those who aren’t lucky enough to score the queen sized bed and stainless steel appliances are jam packed into double and triple suites, as UNR runs out of dorm space to rent.
