You don't get a room without a network, and you don't get a network without a room

For many first-year students joining Utrecht University, living in Utrecht is part of the dream. However, they soon discover that finding a room in the city is not easy. If they don't manage to get a place in or around the city, this impacts not only their finances and routines but also their social lives. It's hard to participate in the parties and events organised by student associations when you must travel back and forth. These students are tied to train timetables and commuting takes up a good chunk of their day. However, without participating in those social activities, they can't build a network in Utrecht, which reduces their chances of getting a room in the city after all. It's a vicious circle.

Utrecht is one of the most popular and most expensive university cities in the Netherlands. In August, Kamernet calculated that the average room price in Utrecht had risen by 22.5 percent to 837 euros a month. Finding a room is difficult, but finding a cheap room is exceptional. Cheap rooms are usually offered by organisations such as SSH, but their waiting lists are huge. Utrecht students are not alone: about 26,500 students are looking for accommodation all over the country.

'It can't be that hard'
When I started studying eighteen months ago, I had the illusion that it wouldn't be that hard to find a room. I thought all I had to do was chat with other students and that would be it. But most of them didn't even live in Utrecht. They had the same problem as me and had no clue what to do. The few who did have a room in the city said they were lucky.

Jorrit, a Media & Culture student, can relate to my experience. Jorrit did not want to move into a room right away because he wanted to get used to the university first. That major life change was already nerve-wracking enough for him. Two months into his studies, he was ready to move out of his parents. He was done with the two-hour commute from home to university. He too assumed it wouldn't take long for him to find a place.

Jorrit asked his classmates for advice and only three people had tips. "You must register with SSH" and "You just gotta get lucky" was what he heard. As a brand-new student, you are simply not at the top of your fellow students' list of priorities. “Your relationship with the people in your study group is simply too new,” says History student Eef. Besides, "most first-year students just continue to live with their parents."

Tell us something about yourself
Students don't just use their social skills to look for a room; they also use the Internet, of course. Facebook is very popular among tenants and landlords. Dozens of new ads appear on Facebook groups each day. People who are quick to respond have a chance of being invited to an audition. Unfortunately, you are not the only student on Facebook. The groups where these advertisements are posted have between 15,000 and 70,000 members. So, the chances of actually being invited to an audition are slim to none.

In my experience, I have never been invited to a selection interview through such a platform. After I had the umpteenth opportunity to tell "something about myself" only to be ignored, I gave up hope. Jorrit went through the same thing. He said he searched very intensively on Facebook but got "zero answers." Jorrit: "You know you must be careful because there are many scammers on Facebook. I have been told several times that I couldn't visit the property before renting the room because the owner happened to be abroad. They said the key would be sent after the deposit was transferred, which set off alarm bells in my head." Eef encountered scammers several times too. The messages he received from those accounts were "sketchy" to say the least, which is why Eef gave up using Facebook for his search.

Eef. Photo: courtesy of the student

Getting involved as a commuting student
Without a room in Utrecht, it gets a lot harder to be truly active in a student or study association, but Eef is trying anyway. After all, maybe someone in the association might be looking for a roommate. He is a member of the study association UHSK, from the History programme, and contributes to the party committee. Unfortunately, he has not met anyone there yet with a network in Utrecht. "I didn't expect that. I'm on a committee where no one lives in Utrecht."

Being part of a study association as a commuter comes with plenty of disadvantages, like having to leave parties early to catch a train. Otherwise, Eef had to figure out a place to sleep. But crashing on a friend's dirty couch every week is not exactly pleasant. Jorrit also attends activities organised by his study association often. The only advice he received there was to avoid squatting, something he does not find particularly appealing anyway.

When Jorrit found a room in ‘t Goy, in the municipality of Houten, in February, he immediately joined a theatre association. Though his room may not be in Utrecht, it is nearby. It is a 45-minute bike ride away, which is an improvement compared to the two-hour commute he used to have. His social life has blossomed as a result, which goes to show the extent to which a room influences a student's experience of university.

Eef wasn't as lucky. He has not been able to find a room in Utrecht yet, so he decided to live in Eindhoven and travel to Utrecht from there. Though that's a shorter journey than before, he still has to travel an hour by train each way. As for me, despite my limited network, I was able to sublet a room through an acquaintance in Utrecht. Since then, I have been subletting my way through my studies and hope that one day I will get lucky on my quest to find a room.