There are certain businesses that enjoy taking college students and/or their parents for all they’re worth. Car dealerships, credit card companies and cell phone providers usually fall under this category. I’m beginning to wonder if San Diego State should be included on this list, too.
As a purveyor of residence halls – from the penitentiary-looking Zura Hall to the ritz of Cuicacalli – SDSU is probably the least popular of College Area’s housing proprietors. Hence the reason so many students flee from them after their freshman year. One of the biggest complaints about on-campus housing is that it costs too much and delivers too little.
For the residence halls, the high price is relatively understandable – after all, rent does include utilities, food and regular maintenance. However, for SDSU’s other rental venture, Villa Alvarado apartments, the expense is far less justified.
Villa Alvarado rent covers neither utilities nor dinner. Yet, each resident forks over a whopping $680 a month, according to http://housing.sdsu.edu, for the nine-month privilege of a 900-square-foot abode that looks like it hasn’t been renovated since the early ’80s. That’s each resident, mind you – with four residents per two-bedroom apartment, it adds up to $2,800 a month for rent. Even in La Jolla, $2,800 is more than enough for a two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment with a private laundry room and a deck, according to www.rentnet.com.
What kind of bang do residents, such as myself, in Villa Alvarado get for our buck? We get filthy carpets that make bare feet turn coal-black, and furniture and appliances that are older than we are. It’s expected that towel racks snap in half, pipes leak, closet doors are rickety, screen doors are torn and the windows are unsecured. Residents get a tiny patio with an ugly view of an overgrown embankment and one laundry room with machines that only accept quarters. Plus, it takes a 20-minute uphill hike just to get to the eastern edge of the main campus.
Of course, not every apartment in Villa Alvarado is worth cringing about. Some apartments come with storage space and nice patio views. And, unlike the even more hair-raising University Towers, the heating works.
But it’s still not worth the price residents pay.
I’ve seen many students, particularly freshmen, spend one year in the residence halls and plan to hightail it to privately owned apartments the following year. This includes students whose parents paid for their room and board only if they lived in the residence halls and students who lived in Cuicacalli – the most posh place the university offers. I don’t blame them – what SDSU charges for a bed other landlords charge for an entire studio apartment.
The main benefit of living in Villa Alvarado, though, is not having to worry about a higher rent if roommates leave or fighting over who pays what for electricity because the university splits the utility bills. This makes the on-campus apartments a very wise choice for students who might find themselves stuck with a larger rent bill than they bargained for if roommates bail. Unfortunately, SDSU chases potential residents away with its outlandishly high prices and, from what I’ve seen in my year here, there’s no justification for it.
What I see is an organization that knows it has a monopoly on the by-the-space rent setup, and isn’t afraid to exploit it. However, SDSU should work to serve its students economical and appealing housing options. Villa Alvarado residents shouldn’t be charged more than the complex’s expected maintenance costs, and the price of the phone, cable and Internet services included in the rent. Otherwise, the university should upgrade and renovate the units so they’re actually worth the money.
–Veronica Rollin is a political science junior and a staff columnist for The Daily Aztec.
–This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Daily Aztec. Send e-mail to letters@thedailyaztec.com. Anonymous letters will not be printed – include your full name, major and year in school.
