Rail Fares to rise again, above inflation.

[GurraJG]

In Sweden apartments are, for the most part, really cheap (assuming you don't want to live in the centre of Stockholm, obviously). I could easily find a small flat for about €400.

[EXTspotter]

You can get an entire flat for the price of my share in my house? Wow. My university house is infested with mould, slugs and ants. My share alone is £350 a month plus bills, the whole thing, a small 3 bedroom semi detached house (in a terrible state of repair) is £1200 a month.

[Chris]

Because you're a student. No proper place will take a student because they assume that you'll trash the house, hence you fork out a huge amount of money for accommodation. Of course if they can charge per person it also makes it easier to charge a higher price for the whole house than if just one person was renting.

[GurraJG]

Student housing in the UK really is disgraceful.

[doktorhonig]

A friend of mine once had an apartment for 90€ in walkable distance to a train station in the outskirts of Vienna.

[Redirect Left]

Whilst we're all talking about house prices. I found a nice seaview flat in Filey for £325 a month, nearly went for it. But in the end, decided i'd miss home too much

[Kevo00]

Whilst we're all talking about house prices. I found a nice seaview flat in Filey for £325 a month, nearly went for it. But in the end, decided i'd miss home too much

Crikey. I pay £550 a month for a two bedroom flat in York. Though Filey is in the middle of nowhere, mind.

[Redirect Left]

Whilst we're all talking about house prices. I found a nice seaview flat in Filey for £325 a month, nearly went for it. But in the end, decided i'd miss home too much

Crikey. I pay £550 a month for a two bedroom flat in York. Though Filey is in the middle of nowhere, mind.

Filey is a lovely little seaside village though. Was only a one bedroom flat though, but would have suited me fine. Wish i wasn't such a mummys boy, else i'd have jumped and be there currently

[Kevo00]

Whilst we're all talking about house prices. I found a nice seaview flat in Filey for £325 a month, nearly went for it. But in the end, decided i'd miss home too much

Crikey. I pay £550 a month for a two bedroom flat in York. Though Filey is in the middle of nowhere, mind.

Filey is a lovely little seaside village though. Was only a one bedroom flat though, but would have suited me fine. Wish i wasn't such a mummys boy, else i'd have jumped and be there currently

Move out. You won't regret it. People grow so much when they leave home.

[orudge]

Move out. You won't regret it. People grow so much when they leave home.

This.

However, rent of course is only part of the equation. You also will have some combination of council tax, electricity, gas, phone line, broadband, water, insurance and so on to pay, which can add quite a chunk on.

[doktorhonig]

But if you're a mummy's boy, you could easily move to Egypt, where it's much cheaper.

[EXTspotter]

There is a way around many of those costs. For instance some of my housemates would rather freeze than pay extra money on heating the house. We heat it an hour a day to prevent the pipes freezing, but between november and march, I wear at least 3 layers indoors... Also you don't need a phone line if you have a mobile, you don't need expensive TV packages, however bundling tv to your broadband on Virgin is relatively cheap. If you are a student you are council tax exempt, but if you're working but living in such a small flat away from a large city, council tax isn't going to be that bad. Water will be cheap as there is only 1 person, but keep an eye on your electric and gas use and you should be ok.

You may be a mummy's boy but everyone has to grow up eventually, the truth is that having your own place for the first time is one of the best experiences of your life.

[Kevo00]

You get a council tax reduction for living on your own, so it isn't that bad.

[audigex]

As far as I can work out a room in a house share is ~£350-500 total (bills included) depending on quality, location and whether you're sharing or lodging (lodging tends to be cheaper, as sharing is shared between the number in the house and is normally via a company, whereas lodging is just a little extra money for the person who owns the home)

A 1-bed apartment is approx £300-500 without bills, with bills working out approximately as £200-300 depending how cheap your areas is and how much you use (Assuming freeview, not Sky) to give approximately £500-800 depending on your extravagant you are.

Unfurnished tend to be the cheaper end, which can be economical depending on how long you're likely to stay there: furniture isn't particularly expensive and you can add to it as you go along: plus you get to keep it - but it's an up front cost rather than spread across the year. If you're staying put for 18 months to 2 years, it's likely worth going unfurnished and spending some time on Ikea's website, although it does mean a bit more hassle when it comes to move out as you either have to move it to your new place or arrange for it to end up somewhere else. (Although I've known landlords be fairly keen on you leaving some stuff so that they can let it as part furnished)

[Based on my experience in the Greater Manchester area, your mileage may vary - city centres tend to be extra]

[Dave]

I live in a good sized one bedroom flat (not apartment).

I pay £410 per calendar month - which is quite high for round here - plus the following bills:

Electric: £15-£25 per month (metered)
Water: £29 per month
Council Tax: £64 per month (Band A)
Internet/Phone: £24 per month (Virgin... don't do this though haha)

After adding in my mobile and bus pass, I'm paying about £190 per month out.

So £600 is a pretty good figure if you're aiming at moving out. To be very secure, you want to be earning at least £16k-£17k. I did it on £14k and although I've not been a pauper by any means, I have struggled to stay afloat some months (mainly through bad spending... BUDGET!)

Of course I am now moving to London with Kate where all being well we are just being referenced for a 2 bedroom apartment for... a lot more.

[doktorhonig]

There is a way around many of those costs. For instance some of my housemates would rather freeze than pay extra money on heating the house. We heat it an hour a day to prevent the pipes freezing, but between november and march, I wear at least 3 layers indoors...

Now we know where the mould comes from.

[EXTspotter]

It was there when we moved in. In fact it is probably less bad now than it was before. Heating the house is not an option because we each don't have hundreds of pounds extra to heat it more. Doing the sums; for an hour's heating it costs us each £1. The quarter when it was on 1 hour a day we each had to pay £92. To remove mould completely we've been told the heating would have to be on for at least 5 hours a day for about 4 months to ensure it doesn't grow back. I don't have an extra £600 to spend on demoulding a house which I am only living in until the end of next June. It is seemingly making everyone sick - we've all had respiratory tract infections, but we still can't afford to do anything about it.

[orudge]

With rent and all the bills mentioned above, I'm paying around £12,000/year (i.e., £1,000/month) for an unfurnished three bedroom semi-detached house (with a nice bit of garden). Although, that said, our electricity bills seem to be a fair bit higher than expected, so that figure may well be a bit higher - currently we're paying £40/month for electricity and £60/month for gas, but gas usage is a chunk lower in the summer and electricity seems somewhat higher.

When I was living on my own here, my rent was £650/month, plus council tax/water/sewage of £1023/year (discounted by 25% from £1364), for a two bedroom house. Heating was only electric, and my electricity bill (prepaid meter) could range from £30-40/month to £100/month depending on whether I had the heating on or not. (Last year, it was off from around March to October or November.) I spent a total of £1300 on electricity over an 18 month period.

It was there when we moved in. In fact it is probably less bad now than it was before. Heating the house is not an option because we each don't have hundreds of pounds extra to heat it more. Doing the sums; for an hour's heating it costs us each £1.

How many are in the house? 3 people? £3/hour for heating seems incredibly high. With inefficient electric heaters on an expensive pre-paid tariff, I could have the heating on pretty much all day in at least a couple of rooms and it'd maybe cost me £5/day. Which is still a lot if it's on for the whole month, but nowhere near as high as yours seems to be.

[EXTspotter]

There are a number of reasons why this is, the fact it is so high is likely a combination of all of them: There are 4 of us but for some reason a couple we live with who share a room only pay 1/3rd of the bills between them, yet out of everyone they are the most likely to shun heating and are also trying to prevent me and my other flatmate from using hot water except for showering (they are serious douches). The £1 an hour thing is a comparison of our summer electric and gas bills to winter ones where the only difference is heating, it may also be a bit lower in summer because there are fewer people in the house at that time, however our gas bill (which is only hot water and heating) goes from £24 in the 3 summer months to £300 for the 3 winter ones, but as a household we would use more than an average family living in the same size of house, e.g. Owen's. So in the group I am in, there are 4 computers in constant use, 2 TVs in constant use, we prepare 9 meals in our kitchen daily rather than 3 as we eat separately - about the only cost that would supposedly be the same is the heating, however the house we live in is completely uninsulated, has single glazed windows as well as being poorly daughtsealed so any residual heat in the house is lost very quickly.

I understand that student houses are spartan for a good reason, but there is a difference in renting out something basic, but functional to renting out something which is frankly hazardous and doing nothing about it because as a landlord you know the tenants won't stick around to complain about it anyway. If we were pretty much any group other than students who have little choice in where we live (due to financial pressures), the crooked landlords would never get away with being crooked.

[doktorhonig]

I hope you soon find a better place to stay.